2 Secrets for Promoting Learning Transfer in Corporate Training

Does your company offer its employees LMS-based corporate training? If so, it is one of many. Learning management system (LMS)-based learning, or online learning, is becoming the standard in corporate training. The LMS industry is growing at the speed of light; it has companies to thank for that. Company leaders worldwide are implementing learning management systems. Why? For one primary purpose: to train their employees.

Why an LMS Should Be Used for Corporate Training

An LMS has many functions. For example, a full-featured learning management system…

Offers language localization.

Allows employees to work remotely while staying connected to their coworkers.

Gives employees access to work-related resources on their mobile devices.

While many LMSs offer these features and more, their primary function is to train and teach people. It’s important to remember that. Learning management systems were, and are, designed with training in mind.

Learning Management Systems are Designed for Corporate Training

A quality LMS is excellent at delivering training to corporate employees. One reason an eLearning system is perfect for training is because it tracks a learner’s success. Christopher Pappas wrote, “The best Learning Management System gives you the ability to keep track of learner progress. It also ensures they meet their performance milestones. For instance, if an online learner is not able to successfully complete an eLearning scenario, you can offer them supplemental resources. This will help them to improve performance or learning behaviors. Most Learning Management Systems feature useful reporting and analytics tools. These can allow you to discover areas of your eLearning course that may be lacking. It can also point up the areas where your eLearning course excels. If you discover that many of your online learners are struggling throughout a specific online lesson, for example, you can modify the eLearning content as necessary.”

An LMS tracks an employee’s training success. It also caters to individual learning styles. People have different learning styles. Some are kinesthetic (hands-on) learners, and some are visual learners. Still others are auditory learners. An eLearning platform delivers training to each of these learners in specific ways. It offers videos and simulations for visual learners. It offers recordings for auditory learners. Also, LMS-based learning is generally more hands-on than classroom-style learning. The fact that online learning is self-paced makes it absolutely perfect for corporate training. These are some reasons why online learning has become the go-to style of training for so many companies.

2 Secrets for Promoting Learning Transfer in LMS-Based Corporate Training

Learning transfer is crucial to the success of your employees. After all, you can offer all the training in the world, but if it is not retained, what’s the point of it? “Ensuring learning transfer is the greatest and most important challenge facing workplace talent development professionals,” wrote Seema Nagrath Menon, contributor to the Association for Talent Development. That's a serious and true statement. No employee can be successfully trained apart from a solid transfer of knowledge. Deep learning transfer is key. It can make the difference between a learner truly understanding and remembering their training, or just having it go in one ear and out the other.

Learning transfer is the key to an employee’s (and, for that matter, a company’s) success. This begs the question, "How can a company promote learning transfer in LMS-based corporate training?" Here are two secrets for accomplishing this:

1. Space your employees’ training – Does your company space employee training? If not, it isn’t promoting learning transfer. Menon, mentioned above, said, “The spacing effect (also referred to as distributed practice or interval reinforcement) is a well-documented practice of giving information over time with specific spacing in between. Essentially, spacing is the opposite of cramming. Long-term retention of the information improves as the spacing between repeated study events increases. This cognitive strategy can be used to improve memory. Correctly distributing informational or practice sessions over time can enhance knowledge retention.”

2. Implement microlearning – Using an LMS to administer microlearning is another great way to ensure learning transfer. Microlearning refers to learning that is delivered in small chunks. A learning management system is an ideal platform for microlearning. For example, say an employee is enrolled in an LMS-based training course. A number of videos, quizzes, simulations, etc. comprise this course. When a learner watches a 5-minute video or takes a 2-minute quiz, he or she is engaging in microlearning. In order to move to the next section of the course, a learner has to complete the prior sections, engaging in more microlearning. Like spaced learning, microlearning prevents “cramming,” which is common with traditional learning. Microlearning powerfully encourages learning transfer.

Companies everywhere are seeing great results from using LMSs to train their employees. They will experience even better results when they promote learning transfer via spaced learning and microlearning.

How is your company encouraging learning transfer in its employee-training program?