{"id":19093,"date":"2021-02-11T16:20:14","date_gmt":"2021-02-11T16:20:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/?p=19093"},"modified":"2021-02-11T16:20:14","modified_gmt":"2021-02-11T16:20:14","slug":"successful-employee-onboarding-with-a-learning-platform","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/blog\/successful-employee-onboarding-with-a-learning-platform\/","title":{"rendered":"Successful employee onboarding with a learning platform: getting up to speed faster"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you didn\u2019t know any better, you\u2019d think a spreadsheet or series of calendar invites was a pretty well-structured onboarding process. You meet people, you get to know a bit more about the company for a couple of weeks, but when do you learn the things that help you hit the ground running?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Or maybe there\u2019s a learning management system in place where you tick off the right courses in those first few weeks. The thing is, there\u2019s a world outside those pop-up windows! One where you don\u2019t just complete the generic compliance and onboarding courses, but you\u2019re welcomed by a personalised plan that lasts longer than week one.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">That\u2019s the power of a learning platform, you can <a href=\"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/onboarding\/\">tailor an onboarding course<\/a> to someone\u2019s role, add personal touches, track progress and connect them to the right people. It\u2019s structured, but with a personal touch. Somewhere between holding your hand through each task and just leaving you twiddling your thumbs.<\/span><\/p>\n<h2><b>A quick reminder of why onboarding is so important.<\/b><\/h2>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Not just the usual stuff about it\u2019s your first impression or engaging and retaining staff (which are absolutely true). But, the thing is that a lot of companies just aren\u2019t doing onboarding right! Only <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">12%<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> of employees strongly agree that their company does a great job at it, probably because more than half focus solely on process and paperwork. Plus, the vast majority don\u2019t look past week one.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Here\u2019s some of the typical pain points when it comes to onboarding:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A lack of clarity over roles and responsibilities.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Failure to set clear expectations and timelines.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">No clear structure which allows key tasks to get overlooked.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Information overload and a lack of focus on what\u2019s relevant.<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Inability to measure progress and low visibility into progress.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h2><b>Using a learning platform to build better employee onboarding experiences<\/b><\/h2>\n<p><strong><em>Jump to:<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#Personalising onboarding and learning pathways\"><b>Personalising onboarding and learning pathways<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#Automating the standard onboarding stuff\"><b>Automating the standard onboarding stuff<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#Self-driven learning, knowledge bases and revisiting content\"><b>Self-driven learning, knowledge bases and revisiting content<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#Tapping into different, relevant content types\"><b>Tapping into different, relevant content types<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#Social learning and knowledge sharing: getting to know the right people and information\"><b>Social learning and knowledge sharing: getting to know the right people and information<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"#Tracking and measuring progress\"><b>Tracking and measuring progress<\/b><\/a><br \/>\n<a name=\"Personalising onboarding and learning pathways\"><\/a><\/p>\n<h3><b>Personalising onboarding and learning pathways<\/b><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We\u2019re starting with the big one! An onboarding course isn\u2019t a restaurant menu. People normally don\u2019t need to see every single dish on offer, especially if their dietary requirements mean only one menu is relevant, and there\u2019s almost no point shoving a dessert menu in their faces when they\u2019ve not even chosen their starter.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And yet you find standard onboarding courses that detail every little thing someone might need to know, regardless of whether they\u2019re relevant to their role or if the timing is right. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sure, there\u2019s some things everybody needs to know, but for the most part, people benefit from relevant information at the right moments. If you\u2019re going to achieve that and prevent information overload, personalising onboarding is critical.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-19096 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/1-2.png\" alt=\"Asking the right new employees questions before onboarding\" width=\"940\" height=\"788\" srcset=\"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/1-2.png 940w, https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/1-2-300x251.png 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 940px) 100vw, 940px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Imagine someone joins the customer support team to manage accounts for a particular sector. What\u2019s more useful for them in their first weeks, the backstory for every single client or just the relevant history of the accounts they\u2019ll be managing? Or how about a new sales rep for inbound leads, would a long course on the outbound process be relevant as they settle into their role?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As we\u2019ll find out shortly, when you focus on what\u2019s essential you\u2019ll increase likelihood of them retaining knowledge, but you\u2019ll also connect them with the right knowledge to ramp up faster.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Of course, none of this is possible without establishing clear plans and objective for each new employee.<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Which tasks will they be responsible for?<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When do we want them to be capable of doing those?<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What\u2019s the best way to make that happen?<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Who are the right people to help them get up to speed?<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><a name=\"Automating the standard onboarding stuff\"><\/a><\/p>\n<h3><b>Automating the standard onboarding stuff<\/b><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Personalising each onboarding experience takes time, so it\u2019s important to automate whichever standard or mandatory tasks you can. When there\u2019s things each new joiner needs to complete, you\u2019re ensuring consistency as you gain back that time.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For example, in HowNow, you could automatically enrol someone in a course based on their join date &#8211; helpful for your compliance, health and safety and the things everyone really wants to know about, like the holiday process and employee benefits. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You could also send them resources based on whether they\u2019re added to a particular group, such as the brand guidelines once they\u2019re in Marketing. These steps give you peace of mind around \u2018must do\u2019s\u2019, as opposed to stressing about \u2018mustn\u2019t forgets\u2019.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-19097 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/2-2.png\" alt=\"Save time by automating onboarding elements by employee criteria.\" width=\"940\" height=\"788\" srcset=\"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/2-2.png 940w, https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/2-2-300x251.png 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 940px) 100vw, 940px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Apply the same logic to the various courses in their onboarding pathway and you\u2019re creating a better pace. When one course is completed, they\u2019re automatically enrolled in the next &#8211; cutting down on waiting around and empowering them to move through the process a bit faster but still at their own pace.<\/span><a name=\"Self-driven learning, knowledge bases and revisiting content\"><\/a><\/p>\n<h3><b>Self-driven learning, knowledge bases and revisiting content<\/b><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Onboarding isn&#8217;t a one and done kind of thing. Given the amount of new knowledge we encounter in that period, it\u2019s a bit much to expect people to see or hear something once and remember it all.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The Forgetting Curve is a cruel reminder of this, explaining that after one day we typically recall less than 60% and by day seven it\u2019s below 20%. Luckily, there\u2019s a few ways a learning platform can help you beat the curve.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Firstly, by creating one place for all knowledge, so that people can search for information independently, whenever they need it. By increasing the frequency of encountering that information, they\u2019re increasing the likelihood of retention. <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This is often referred to as the spacing effect or spaced repetition. Imagine someone asked you to list every book on a shelf after you looked at it once versus looking at it for 10 minutes every day and being asked at the end of the week. You\u2019ll have gone from hopeless to librarian levels in just seven days.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h4><strong>Highlighting and Annotating content<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sometimes, picking out the important parts of longer written content is a barrier to spaced repetition. It\u2019s fair to expect people to recall the titles and authors of those books, but not the third line on page 39. That\u2019s why we created our <a href=\"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/blog\/highlighting-and-annotating-content-helping-you-learn-and-recall-knowledge\/\">Highlight and Annotation tool<\/a>!<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-16096 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/Highlight-Annotate-GIF-V2_compressed.gif\" alt=\"Highlight and annotate nuggets and courses in HowNow to learn actively\" width=\"871\" height=\"401\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We\u2019re empowering learners to flag the relevant pieces of Nuggets and resources, leave notes and revisit them later. With the ability to easily find these in their Highlights section and frequent reminders sent in their email digest, people can replicate this concept of spaced repetition.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You\u2019ll also notice the bookmarks section next to highlights below, allowing people to flag complete resources as important too. That gives people the option to flag complete content, but as we\u2019re about to find out the format and length matter.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-16098 size-large\" src=\"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/HowNow-highlight-and-annotate-1024x463.png\" alt=\"Use spaced repetition to retain information more effectively\" width=\"780\" height=\"353\" srcset=\"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/HowNow-highlight-and-annotate-1024x463.png 1024w, https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/HowNow-highlight-and-annotate-300x136.png 300w, https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/07\/HowNow-highlight-and-annotate.png 1366w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 780px) 100vw, 780px\" \/><\/span><a name=\"Tapping into different, relevant content types\"><\/a><\/p>\n<h3><b>Tapping into different, relevant content types<\/b><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If you really want to get personal, you could always ask your new employee how they learn and where they like to get their information. If they prefer videos because they can visualise ideas or pause at key points to digest information, that\u2019s a string to your bow as you shape their onboarding.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Of course, you might not have the time to do this for every individual, but it does pose the wider question of which content you use in courses. A pain point with the traditional LMS has been the content types you can include, but in HowNow, the world is your onboarding oyster! Podcasts, videos, blog posts, quick Nuggets from team members &#8211; take your pick.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ask yourself questions like:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What\u2019s the best content type to clearly communicate this message?<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What\u2019s in our existing content library?<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">How specific are the resources we\u2019re including?<\/span><\/li>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\" aria-level=\"1\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What\u2019s already out there in the third-party content world?<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For example, if you need to talk people through how to use a system or function, a screenshare video could really speed up their understanding. Why? Rather than reading through a written guide and trying to put that into practice, they can replicate the steps in real time and follow along to ensure they\u2019re doing it right.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h4><b>The bonus of consistent, on-demand experiences<\/b><\/h4>\n<h4><b><\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The real crime would be making somebody repeat that tutorial live every time a new employee joins, which happens more often than you might think. The onboarder is then hostage to a time slot and they can\u2019t revisit that later. If you create one on-demand resource, there\u2019s consistency for the learner and they\u2019ve got the freedom to visit and revisit when they\u2019re ready.<\/span><\/h4>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">These might seem like small steps, but little things add up! Without a learning platform or central knowledge base there\u2019s not an easy way to create this on-demand, easy-to-find element. Shared folders are often the limit in those cases! <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">And that doesn\u2019t mean the end of the ability to ask questions, you can leave comments on the resource or reach out to the person that recorded the tutorial with further questions.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-19098 size-large\" src=\"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Onboarding-blog-connecting-CRM-video-870x1024.png\" alt=\"Video tutorials on using new tech for onboarding.\" width=\"780\" height=\"918\" srcset=\"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Onboarding-blog-connecting-CRM-video-870x1024.png 870w, https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Onboarding-blog-connecting-CRM-video-255x300.png 255w, https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Onboarding-blog-connecting-CRM-video.png 1182w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 780px) 100vw, 780px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But what if there\u2019s already a video tutorial online from a third-party or the tool itself that does the job for you? That saves you even more time and resources, plus you can sift through and select the one that\u2019s most useful or relevant. <\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What speeds this up is when your learning platform curates resources from high-quality sources or enables you to quickly embed content in your courses.<\/span><a name=\"Social learning and knowledge sharing: getting to know the right people and information\"><\/a><\/p>\n<h3><b>Social learning and knowledge sharing: getting to know the right people and information<\/b><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">What can somebody on the team teach that new employee specifically? Were they one of the driving forces behind a project they\u2019ll be picking up? Are they the subject matter expert when it comes to a particular tool they\u2019ll be using? Do they have a personal relationship with clients and great context to share?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Tap into all of those ideas! Ask them to create short videos, lists of tips, timelines of relationships &#8211; whatever\u2019s relevant. Context was the key word in the questions above, because it\u2019s contextual knowledge that these internal experts can share. It\u2019s also a more personal way for new employees to learn because who doesn\u2019t love a friendly face between reading through documents or resources?<\/span><br \/>\n<a name=\"Tracking and measuring progress\"><\/a><\/p>\n<h3><b>Tracking and measuring progress<\/b><\/h3>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We\u2019ve come full circle in many ways, because the key question is how people running their onboarding process through a calendar or spreadsheet understand progress? They don\u2019t. They have no way of knowing how their new employee is getting on. No idea of when they\u2019re ready to take on a particular task, when they\u2019ve acquired the required knowledge and whether they\u2019re stuck on a pain point.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You\u2019ll either end up throwing people in the deep end or leaving them hanging on the diving board, waiting for the go ahead to dive in! What we\u2019re saying is that without structure, you\u2019ve got no idea when it\u2019s time to ditch the armbands or float.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-19099 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Onboarding-tracking-and-measuring-progress.gif\" alt=\"Onboarding tracking and measuring progress\" width=\"1000\" height=\"446\" \/><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We\u2019ll give you the insights to view how much of a course somebody has completed, which resource they\u2019re up to and add in tests and quizzes to tangibly measure progress! Without those metrics, it\u2019s difficult to know the right points to check in with people or which sections they\u2019re struggling with or exceeding at.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">You can\u2019t be all stick and no carrot, and that\u2019s why gamification is such a well-loved feature for learning platforms. Use badges and certificates to give people a little pick me up or positive boost as they reach milestones in their onboarding journey!<\/span><\/p>\n<p><strong>What now? Check out our <a href=\"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/blog\/your-gets-to-the-point-employee-onboarding-checklist\/\">&#8216;gets to the point&#8217; employee onboarding checklist<\/a> today, with a PDF version you can download for free.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/blog\/your-gets-to-the-point-employee-onboarding-checklist\/\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-15948 size-large\" src=\"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/Donwload-PDF-Version-1024x1024.png\" alt=\"Download your PDF version of the new employee onboarding checklist\" width=\"780\" height=\"780\" srcset=\"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/Donwload-PDF-Version.png 1024w, https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/Donwload-PDF-Version-300x300.png 300w, https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/Donwload-PDF-Version-150x150.png 150w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 780px) 100vw, 780px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>If you didn\u2019t know any better, you\u2019d think a spreadsheet or series of calendar invites&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":437,"featured_media":19102,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3116],"tags":[1596],"yst_prominent_words":[447,16],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19093"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/437"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19093"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19093\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19111,"href":"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19093\/revisions\/19111"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19102"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19093"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19093"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19093"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/staging.liquid-themes.com\/hownow\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=19093"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}