How can an LMS improve a business?
In a recent study from LinkedIn*, 94% of employees surveyed confirmed they were more likely to stay with a company that invested in their learning and development. There has also been an abundance of evidence to show how a good learning and development program can improve retention rates, boost productivity and much more. Today, most businesses consider a superior L&D program as essential to organisational success, not just a benefit. For HR managers, the problem isn’t convincing leadership that learning and development deserve serious attention. The problem is proving that these programs can be delivered.
The challenge with workplace learning and training
While there may be plenty of evidence to show that learning and development are crucial to business success, creating and delivering a learning experience that achieves this success is still a challenge.
The type of L&D program that can reduce employee turnover and improve productivity needs to look beyond basic compliance training. Learning needs to be appealing and engaging to employees while also developed behind the scenes to meet overarching business goals. Companies are often wary of investing in the time and resources needed to create and maintain this type of strategy. Those that tackle it without the commitment needed often see results fall short of expectations.
Businesses looking to offset some of the commitment needed to deliver training and learning internally are often faced with the high price tags attached to many external course providers. This approach also usually has to contend with the additional lost time and costs associated with classroom based learning.
Deliver superior learning with an LMS
This is where the right learning management system (LMS) comes in. Investing in technology to handle the management and delivery of workplace learning can significantly reduce the manual labour involved in creating a superior L&D strategy. With a powerful LMS, HR teams have the tools and capability to realise the workplace development program they need with half the manual labour and time.
Take a look at just some of the key benefits you can expect when utilising the right LMS to develop and deliver your new learning and development strategy.
1. Improve learning engagement and success
Whether you want to empower employees to develop hard skills, soft skills or both, learning can only be successful if it’s engaging. Too often, businesses fall back on classroom based practices that last for whole days or provide lengthy documents for workers to read and revise from. This type of learning hasn’t progressed from traditional compliance training and often sees employees not completing courses or not performing well on them. For businesses, this is seen as a sign that employees don’t really want the training they asked for or that development programs aren’t worth their investment.
A learning management solution, like SuccessFactors Learning, for example, can give HR teams and managers the tools to create a range of learning material and develop engaging training courses. These can include quizzes, videos, slideshows and more that can all be utilised within a single course to make varied and engaging learning material.
*A recent study also found that 74% of employees would like to learn in their spare time at work and there is an increasing number that would like to access learning from home. Ultimately, today’s workforce wants the freedom to learn on their own terms. With a cloud based LMS, learning can be left in the hands of employees. They can access their courses and pick up their learning at a time that suits that, even on mobile and tablet devices if preferred.
By making learning more accessible and engaging, a learning management system can help improve course completion rates and make learning more successful for everyone.
2. Improve employee performance and boost productivity
If employees are engaged with and absorbing learning material, then improved performance and productivity are also a natural byproduct of an LMS. Additionally, an LMS can help to streamline the process of creating and delivering training. An easy-to-use solution can help HR teams and managers produce new and relevant learning material quickly so employees can continue to learn and productivity can continue to improve.
This type of agility also means companies can keep up with the latest skills and invest more time to develop in areas ahead of the competition. In this way, an LMS can provide a competitive edge that can significantly impact business performance. For HR teams themselves, they’ll also benefit from improved productivity as they save on the admin burden and manual input usually required to deliver a similar learning experience without the right technology.
3. Faster compliance
For companies in highly regulated industries where compliance requirements are essential but lengthy and time consuming, an LMS can prove to be invaluable. With the ability to easily and quickly create the necessary learning materials to aid in employee compliance training plus the ability for workers to access and complete training from any location at any time, businesses can ensure the compliance of new hires in record time. This means employees can achieve compliance during their onboarding process or even before their first day, enabling them to be work-ready as soon as possible.
4. Save money
Taking learning online with an LMS comes with its own cost benefits, too. Organisations can save the costs associated with third party courses provided or classroom learning including printed materials, travel expenses, training staff and time off the job. In fact, a cloud based LMS provides unparalleled accessibility that employees can utilise to learn on the job and in their spare time, ultimately meaning workers are spending more time on their day-to-day work.
Long term, delivering a superior learning experience with an LMS also means reduced employee turnover and improved productivity, both of which are great for the bottom line.
5. Align training to organisational needs
One of the toughest challenges when developing a learning and development strategy is aligning courses and training to the needs of the business. This challenge often causes businesses to focus on traditional compliance training and little to no investment in soft skills courses. While this is great for the immediate needs of the business, it isn’t engaging for employees and it doesn’t take a strategic approach to learning either. Businesses are often missing out on developing the leaders they need for competitive advantage in the future in exchange for easier, short term gains.
A learning management system provides the tools and freedom for businesses to take a strategic approach to their development programs. HR teams have more time to work with business leaders to decide which skills and training might be needed to meet the changing needs of the industry and long term business goals. They then have the resources and tools to create learning paths that facilitate this, quickly and easily adapting learning as needed.
6. Track, analyse and improve learning
Unlike more traditional learning methods such as classroom based programs, a learning management system can provide a wealth of data on the courses you deliver to employees. Analysing course completion statistics, enrollment rates, how long employees spend with specific learning material or on specific courses and much more can all help the development of future learning materials. Discover which content is the most engaging and which skills are the most desired to continually shape and improve your learning program.
A superior learning management system
Today, the technological potential for workplace learning gives more capability than ever before to HR teams and the technology continues to improve. To deliver the kind of learning strategy that is going to both engage and meet the needs of employees as well as align with organisational goals, a superior LMS like SuccessFactors Learning is key. As experts in all things SuccessFactors and the power of workplace learning, we can help you get the most out of this world class system. Contact one of our team to find out more, or book your free demo today.
*Source is taken from LinkedIn: https://learning.linkedin.com/content/dam/me/business/en-us/amp/learning-solutions/images/workplace-learning-report-2019/pdf/workplace-learning-report-2019.pdf