Large enterprises have already started automation of manual and repetitive work using artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning software. Several studies suggest that most of the location-based work and cubicle-based jobs will be impacted severely by 2030. That is why; many organizations have already launched projects to reskill and upskill the existing employees.
According to LinkedIn’s 2021 Workplace Learning Report,
“59% of learning and development (L&D) managers globally identify reskilling and upskilling as their top priority in 2021.”
Unlike upskilling, reskilling emphasizes training and preparing the workforce to do a different job by acquiring new skills. The enterprises from various industries invest huge resources to make employees acquire new skills. The new skills will help employees to start a new career or change job roles seamlessly over a period of time.
In addition to facilitating employee learning and development (EL&D), the learning management systems (LMSs) make it easier for your organizations to reskilling the workforce by creating, managing, and delivering a variety of online training programs and courses. Your organization can use the right learning management system (LMS) to reskill a large number of employees across geographies.
Also, you can leverage the gamification and personalization options provided by the LMS to persuade employees to learn and acquire new skills by keeping them motivated and engaged. The right LMS will further help you to curtail the time and resources required to reskill a large and diverse workforce in a number of ways.
9 Ways Your Organizations can Leverage the Right LMS to Reskilling the Workforce
Reskill a Large and Diverse Workforce
Reskilling a large and diverse workforce is an ongoing process. Your organization has to invest resources regularly to train and reskill a large number of employees across geographies.
According to the elearning statistics available on EdApp.com,
“Reports have consistently found that eLearning typically requires 40 – 60% less time from any employee compared to traditional training.”
In addition to facilitating eLearning delivery, the LMS will help you to train and reskill a large workforce without creating additional learning materials and deploying extra instructors. The right LMS will help your organization to reskill many employees without investing in extra resources.
Enable Self-Paced Learning
While implementing workforce reskilling, you need to ensure that each employee acquires fresh knowledge and new skills without affecting her professional responsibility. You can leverage the right LMS to enable employees to acquire new skills at their own pace and convenience despite busy schedules. The employee can access the LMS after working hours using her desktop, laptop, or smartphone. Also, the employees can access the online training materials over the internet from different geographic locations.
Implement Microlearning
At present, microlearning is one of the hottest trends in employee learning and development. You must adopt the trend to make the reskilling programs successful by making employees acquire and retain learning. Most new-age LMSs support microlearning by providing content authoring tools. You can use these content authoring tools to keep the learning units relatively small. The short bursts of content will make it easier for corporate learners to acquire a new skill.
Provide Access to a Variety of Digital Content
You cannot reskill all employees successfully without allowing them to access their preferred content. While creating content and training materials, you must focus on integrating a wide variety of digital content – ebooks, audiobooks, video clips, infographics, and quizzes. At the same time, you also need to ensure that each corporate learner can collect information about a concept or topic from external sources. The built-in content authoring tools provided by LMSs help you to allow each employee to choose from a variety of digital content.
Create and Deliver Content Quickly
You have to design and create many training programs to reskill a large and diverse workforce. In addition to creating a variety of learning materials, you must focus on making the content available in multiple languages. Most LMSs these days come with built-in content authoring tools. The content authoring tools help instructors and content creators to create learning materials without putting in extra time and effort. Your organization can further make a wide range of off-the-shelf content available to employees simply by integrating the LMS with robust digital libraries.
Keep Employees Interested and Engaged
Like students, adult learners also find game-based learning more engaging and impactful. Game-based learning inspires adult learners to work harder on retaining knowledge and acquiring new skills. Most LMS systems these days support gamification. They help L&D managers to keep corporate learners engaged and motivated using built-in gamification options like earning points, getting performance feedback, showcasing progress to the next level, and competing with other corporate learners.
Encourage Collaboration and Discussion
The sophisticated LMS platforms these days support self-paced learning and instructor-led training. Also, they create opportunities for corporate learners to ask questions, clear doubts, and share ideas by providing a slew of options – discussion forums, chats, and query corners. The learners can leverage these features or options to understand a concept elaborately and discuss the concept from multiple perspectives. The L&D managers can use these features to keep learners motivated by making them a part of online communities.
Measure Successes and Failures
The LMS systems make it easier for you to accelerate and automate the assessment process. You can use the LMS to conduct tests and assessments without any human interventions. The new-age LMSs allow you to conduct tests and assessments by conducting multiple-choice exams. Also, the LMS platforms can assign scores and issue online certification once the learner passes the exam. The managers can further generate dynamic reports based on real-time data to measure course completion rates and identify skill gaps.
Improve Reskilling Program Performance
You cannot prepare employees for new roles or responsibilities without optimizing the performance of workforce reskilling processes. You can avail of the features of a new-age LMS to gather feedback from managers, instructors, and employees. The constructive feedback will help you to finetune the performance of individual reskilling programs by understanding what works and what doesn’t work. Also, you can make the reskilling programs more impactful by finetuning them according to the needs and preferences of learners.
Your organization cannot reskill a large and diverse workforce without using a customizable LMS. In addition to coming with built-in features to facilitate workforce reskilling, you must choose an LMS that allows you to create, manage, and deliver a wide variety of reskilling programs and courses. Also, you can leverage the learning experience personalization options provided by the LMS to motivate employees to acquire fresh knowledge and new skills.
