Tag: elearning companies in US

25 Aug 2022
HR training

What is the best training for HR to retain employees? 

The employees are the primary tools for a company. Hence, companies are investing in human capital management. The Great resignation highlighted the importance of human resources, which has complicated things for US companies.

The training for HR is necessary in this regard so that your company does not become a victim of employees resigning. Hence, the companies must provide employees with ample development opportunities which can report continuous results too.

Training for HR is crucial to stop this phenomenon of Great Resignation because the employees have more knowledge about the available openings due to the large-scale use of social media. They are more in touch with their peers in the same profession in other companies and are aware of the salary gaps.

Why did the Great Resignation happen?

The employees have been quitting jobs since 2021 when they discovered the benefits of working from home. The main reason why this trend of mass quitting their jobs by the employees happened was that some of the jobs were not required anymore.

The change in technologies due to lesser offline sales made some jobs obsolete; as a result, employees have to be trained to work alongside technologies.

Accordingly, the role of HR has escalated due to the pandemic, which has made employees realize how vulnerable their jobs can be. Hence, they have recognized the need for frequent learning. HR has to think about how they can influence employees to stay in a company. Hence, their role now consists of training programs for employees that focus on strengthening the soft or hard skills demanded by their designations.

Employees also want better salaries because the pandemic and the ongoing war have made them realize how tough it is to cope with unprecedented attrition. Hence, skill development is the main priority for them.

The companies must also allow employees to switch from one team to another if they are eager to retain them. So retraining such employees is essential who enjoy your company’s culture but are not satisfied with their roles. The aim of HR should be to see which employees have the talent for their roles to be changed.

Training for HR is imperative to stop the trend of Great Resignation.

They must ensure that employees have freedom while working.

Change in the management structure: Make it lateral rather than completely vertical

So, companies need to give up their hierarchical structure of management. The HR must be trained to help the organization transcend from a hierarchical management structure where the employees are just supposed to take instructions and do the work assigned to them. In companies where such management style prevails, the employees have no scope for giving feedback, leading to resentment.

If a company has to be successful, employees must have an equal say in how they would like to work.

Advantages of a hierarchical/vertical management structure

But in a hierarchical management style, since all the processes are standardized, there is a lesser possibility of committing mistakes by employees. However, the high turnover in such a management structure is also due to no tolerance for mistakes.

Since an employee’s work is predetermined, there is no scope for growth. An employee has to adhere to the decisions taken by the management, which might not be so beneficial for the company. If a wrong decision is implemented, everyone, including the employees, must bear the brunt.

What is a lateral management structure?

On the other hand, leaders are like mentors in a lateral management style that is the opposite of a vertical structure. They encourage employees to work hard and lead by influence and example rather than power. The employees are responsible for their decisions and mistakes too. They are not admonished for their mistakes, but an empathic approach exists that they ingrain knowledge from them, and mistakes are a part of a learning curve.

Apart from the change in the management style, the training for HR can help the leaders detect the following signs of burnout in employees:

Lesser social interactions: If an employee does not attend any social event organized by the company to finish a project, he is overworking and can become a victim of burnout. This means that the employee is working on a scheduled holiday, and HR must stop it. The employee will soon resign, leading to a lesser workforce and more workload for the remaining employees.

Check their wellness: HR must take steps to ensure that the overworked employees are prevented in time and rectify their schedules. If they are hesitant to speak to you about their problems, then it’s better to have a third party on board who can talk to all employees and form wellness reports. Through these reports, you can find employees who are overworking due to understaffed teams.

Hire crucial resources: Training for HR has also been necessitated to ensure the company gets the right resources to cope with overwork. Suppose employees are handling several projects and have to work overtime due to this reason.

In that case, a project manager can be hired who can schedule the different workflow of employees as per the priority of projects. He can communicate with various clients and ensure that the employees’ work hours are not overstretched to complete simultaneous projects on time.

Cut down on slack activities: The training for HR can also help them communicate with managers more effectively to know whether certain meetings are necessary. If employees can update their work status on tracker tools, then informing managers through in-person meetings isn’t necessary.

For example, a pregnant woman can be given an aide to help her combat her hectic work schedule.

Hence, it’s quite a major responsibility for the HR that an employee feels 100% valued in a company and does not quit.

 

04 Apr 2022
continuous learning

How can management encourage a culture of continuous learning?

Companies are working hard to make their employees work hard to attain goals. But it’s not so easy because only continuous learning can make them the best. The companies can ensure that employees put their energies into learning, which is not an easy task, especially with remote employees.

Why is continuous learning needed?

For companies to get extraordinary performance from their employees, it’s paramount that they are always learning because innovation can only happen then. For example, a company may want to add a better structure to its work, implementing new production rules and the accompanying software.

And this process upgrade happens occasionally; hence the companies must encourage continuous learning which is available on-demand for employees and happens when they are free from their scheduled duties.

Remote employees don’t come to the office, and it’s a challenge to stay in touch with them. Employees also don’t like to follow up on industrial trends because they consider them a waste of time. Hence, they have to be made to realize the importance of such news. They can be sent a digital newsletter informing them of the most contemporary happenings in the form of summaries of their sector. The remote employees can also be sent birthday cards and welcome letters to new joiners. There can be weekly Teams call where the employees are congratulated for their exceptional performance and areas where there is scope for betterment.

The remote employees might not have time to access the training modules. They might be traveling a lot, especially in a target-based job. Hence, make sure that they can access the training modules offline or get them better mobile data packages to get a signal wherever they are.

Sometimes, continuous learning becomes a problem when the employees hesitate to ask questions. It’s not a good company culture when the employees have such apprehension because it can affect their performance. Such shyness comes when it gets revealed to the whole group that a particular employee has asked a question. And when all the team members know that a certain employee has problems, they start answering his question simultaneously. The solution, in this case, is that the remote employee with a query must get someone working from within the office(mentor) to support him. Such queries by remote employees can be simple, like how reports have to be prepared, but their delayed resolution can be troublesome.

However, this mentor can also support the remote worker by providing him with help on how to use the LMS for his continuous learning because the latter might face problems frequently. This is how the management can foster a culture of continuous learning in a company:

    1. The job of managers

 

Managers have to encourage employees for them to pursue their learning activities. If an employee is taking time out for his work, his manager should not take it as abstinence from work. The employee can better contribute to the job with his improved skills. By making a role model of such an employee, you can inspire other employees to do the same. A lot can be achieved in a culture of continuous learning through collaboration. The managers should popularize the belief that sharing is caring. So if an employee knows something, he should share it with others.

Knowledge hoarding is a dangerous phenomenon because it does not help when employees conceal crucial information from others to get ahead. So, it is the manager’s job to see that knowledge sharing is given its credit and that such employees are acknowledged. Employees should not follow a practice of knowledge hoarding because they feel important when everyone asks them about work. A company should ensure that team victories are more important than personal success. This way, a worker hoarding knowledge will share it with the team.

Sometimes, some employees have better access to resources than others because of their education or academic contacts. Moreover, the employees should be privileged to get a paid subscription to professional magazines. The management can pay for such magazines and hold discussions about what employees have learned during lunches. The employees can also be paired in groups (task-force) to share their queries with others and get competent answers through investigation.

    1. Social learning

Social media groups are essential to continuous learning, but they can start veering from the topic. Hence, it’s the job of a moderator to see that no one posts irrelevant memes on Facebook. Also, when any can’t answer back a question in two hours, it must be directly reported to the seniors to provide correct answers. The learners who share the most strategic posts like simulations, podcasts, or an article must be rewarded for their efforts. They could have contributed such content themselves or got it through somewhere. But a worthwhile article link can solve the problems of employees who get a reliable resource. However, there must be a schedule by which employees share such information, like once every week. If every employee posts something every day, there can be cognitive overload, and employees might miss something. Again, a moderator must approve such posts.

  1. Weekly webinars

After an expert has conducted a webinar, the next round ensures that all the solutions are crystal clear to the attendees. There can be a moderator in their webinar-based question and answer(Q&A) session who has ample knowledge and can shortlist the important questions. Send emails to the employees about the time and the meeting link of the webinar. The script of such a webinar containing questions and answers can be given to the employees who didn’t attend the event.

In the same way, when any online discussion gets started, the moderator should inform all the employees about it. The new employees might be getting solutions to their problems, like how to tackle a tough client. When a discussion starts about an online post, the other employees should be notified about them. The employees become aware of any ongoing discussion when they click on the “Join” button. The employees who have started their jobs from home sometimes feel left out when they are not given a proper introduction. They can be given a virtual training session through an experienced manager, who can also listen to their problems online. Later, the employees can be sent an online MCQ questionnaire by the LMS admin, in which they can fill in their responses about the quality of the lecture. This survey can also contain a Likert scale where employees can rank the lecture from a rating of 1-10.

The employees also feel that providing feedback about virtual sessions is not so time-consuming in such a way. When the employees give the questionnaire results, the reports can be prepared in the form of charts and then shown to the manager, who can be given access to better resources to be a superior trainer for the juniors.

Ensure that if you have implemented an LMS for continuous learning, it sends notifications to employees as soon as an article or a video is published. If the employees have a Facebook group, as soon as someone posts a query on it approved by the moderator, he must send email notifications to all the group’s followers.

14 Mar 2022
LMS

Can an LMS be hacked? Make sure that does not happen!

Online learning has become a crucial part of our lives in the pandemic. Cyber awareness training takes so much of a company’s time, but it is worth the effort when the LMS does not get hacked. E-learning is happening all the time, but sometimes that can cause problems when your security details are shared with unwanted people.

Issues arise when the company’s LMS gets hacked or when a MOOC’s website is compromised.

Hence, these organizations must ensure that the users cannot log in without providing an OTP. It will prevent unauthorized users from accessing the accounts of learners. This can be the adverse consequence when an LMS gets hacked:

Hackers can take loans and steal mail

Hackers can get access to so much valuable information through login credentials. This can include the user’s bank details, which can be further used to take credit. But this can be stopped through a credit freeze, where the users can ensure that no one can apply for a credit card or a loan when such a freeze has been imposed. When you need a loan, you can unfreeze your account.

Apart from that, the unsuspecting users of such e-learning sites can also have concerns when someone gets access to their house address and pays a visit. He can check the mailbox and steal all kinds of items, such as passport numbers included in confidential mail.

The learners must make sure that they do a follow-up whenever they have not received any mail from an organization. They know if their mail has been stolen by someone else in such a situation. When they are not in the house, they must ensure that their mail is received by someone else so that it does not go into the hands of fraudsters. If someone is not available to collect your mail while on vacation, it’s better to ask the sending organization to delay it until you arrive. Apart from passport numbers, thieves can get access to all kinds of information through your mail, such as school records, utility bills, etc.

Solution 1: Limited number of login attempts

The e-learning companies USA must ensure that the users are given an extra layer of protection when they log on to the LMS through their business’s website. Any user must be unable to access the LMS after three attempts to log in. His access must be blocked because, generally, a user can’t enter an incorrect password three times. It could be hackers trying to get into an account using brute force algorithms.

Solution 2: Anti-spam feature in the LMS

The users must also be given a reCAPTCHA option so that no bot can access the LMS. Also, the user data must be protected on the server’s end. Only specific LMS administrators must have access to this server so that no one can steal this confidential data. The company getting an LMS from the e-learning vendors must ensure that it has features such as anti-spam. It makes sure that no one can access the LMS through spam email accounts. Once any spammer creates an account on an LMS, he can install ransomware on the server and access all user details. They can then ask for a hefty ransom to get back access to all its LMS files. Even if such spammers don’t install ransomware on the server, they can still send learners phishing emails and access sensitive information like banking details.

Solution 3: LMS access allowed through specific IP addresses

It’s the job of the e-learning vendor to check that anyone cannot register on the LMS. The permitted users should only be from certain specific domains, like the corporate website or an e-learning portal created for this purpose. Anyone else logging from his email ID should not create an account. Furthermore, the company should ensure that no one has access to the e-learning portal except the employees. But even if the URL gets known to others, its access must be allowed from specific IP addresses. Hence, the businesses must ensure that the LMS security is taken care of properly by the e-learning vendor.

Solution 4: Automatic Backup

An LMS vendor must also have backup support if the servers get hacked. In the absence of a backup, the e-learning content is also lost apart from user details. Hence, its LMS software must have the capability to create a backup every night on the dedicated server of the LMS vendor. When a backup option is there, companies are saved from the hassle of recreating all the e-learning content from scratch.

The LMS vendor must ensure that the users’ systems don’t get hacked by fraudsters. Hence, the LMS must come bundled with antivirus software to scan the users’ computers and alert them about any virus installation.

Solution 5: Access through OTP only

The LMS vendors must also ensure that the software is compatible with the mobile phone. It’s because any app can be hacked quite easily; hence it’s the job of the LMS vendor to check that the users can only log into the app through the OTP protocol so that anyone who has downloaded the app can’t log on to it. Also, all the data transferred through the app must be encrypted to protect it from hacking.

This is how an e-learning vendor can prevent an LMS from getting hacked.

Learn more…

 

11 Mar 2022
Salesforce training

How can salesforce training help companies in increasing their numbers?

Companies have to focus on sales and hence customer service representative training because otherwise, they can’t yield the best results.

Customer relationship management software is an excellent tool for companies to improve the customer experience. When the customers are pleased with post-sales service levels, their exit rate drops. But, the customer service executives have to be trained for using this software. These are the ways in which Salesforce training helps customer service representatives(CSRs):

  • Better call handling:

When the CSR has been trained to use software such as Salesforce, they have a complete record of previous customer interactions. The CSRs benefit so much when they get the aptest training on Salesforce, like call logging. This means collecting the data of telephone calls which includes from where the call has originated i.e., the location. Also, the CSR can record when did the call start and end.Hence, through call logs they can detect the new and the current customers because both have to be dealt with differently.The CSRs can ensure that they can shortlist the callers on the phone. The customer service representatives also learn to handle every call and immediately extract the required information.

The call logging can be used by other CSRs who can also see the follow-up activity scheduled with it, so they know whether the prospect has asked for further product details or wanted a lower price. They can use this software to correctly write down the customer conversations to talk to them later easily.

The CSR can also be taught which details must be noted down while talking to a lead/customer because they influence buying decisions.

Elearning provides all this information in 2-3 minute videos that the users can watch whenever they are free from attending calls. ELearning in Salesforce is better for CSRs because they can watch such videos on weekends when they have ample time.

Such Salesforce training videos are even helpful for administrators who can watch them handle the software for more complicated functions.These videos can be used to train admins on how to grant access privileges for mass editing to specific users in the company only. It can be done when the sharing settings on a Salesforce object have been restricted.

Moreover, Salesforce training helps employees in updating the records through this software. This includes mass editing, where they can change multiple values at once, for example, and product prices.
In the following ways, CSRs can be trained to use this software:

  • Call details:

Salesforce training helps record employee conversations with customers/prospects, which are helpful once the former leaves a company.

The employee can also take leave with his family, but the company’s work does not suffer in his absence because another employee uses Salesforce to get hold of all his documents and call logs. The organization’s work becomes seamless because all the employees use the same software to maintain logs, and they can also share information easily. A structure is included in the entire calling operations.

  • Aggregate data:

One of the biggest reasons companies must use Salesforce is that it can help consolidate customer data. The customer marketing data is stored on a single software, i.e. the CRM, rather than on different marketers’ desktop. This is useful for CFOs to decide whether to curb spending on marketing to customers. Hence when the finance team has the Salesforce to know which investment decisions have successfully yielded sales, it can act judiciously. It can decide whether a particular investment has to be encouraged or removed altogether because it leads to customer attrition rather than retention and growth.

CRM training can help companies CSR’s in meeting their sales targets and generating higher revenue. Such employees can become sales leaders and benefit themselves and the company. They can also lead to more conversions.

The organizations can also have a better reach to customers through a CRM, which is paramount in this software. The customers can be sent content leads and advertised about the new changes companies plan to introduce in products. The CRM has all the information about the customers, like their emails ids. They can be sent the relevant information about any upcoming products they might be interested in.

The customers can also be a relevant source of information for companies because they can ensure that the CSRs get all the essential knowledge. The CRM can be an essential repository of prospects that have completed product training courses. Such leads are prospective customers because they have finished product based courses. Hence their details can be provided to sales reps to ensure they buy. Companies also customize their salesforce software; hence elearning is also helpful to train customers.

Salesforce is crucial for people in non-sales roles because they also need to access this software to produce reports that other team members can use. Such reports are invaluable for taking in time decisions. For example, Salesforce helps maintain a record of business travel expenditures. In the end run, these expenses can be monitored for their ROI. If they are not yielding the right ROI, they can be curtailed in time. But the finance team must be able to access Salesforce for producing such reports.

Hence it can’t be denied that Salesforce training is inevitable for a company.

04 Feb 2022
leadership training

What should be the essential components of leadership training? 

When a leader takes on this role, he has to ensure an excellent performance from his team members. Leadership training is essential because leaders need to encourage employees. The employees need to have the proper motivation, which can make them reach their highest productivity levels. This kind of motivation is instrumental to success when the company has to start a new business, project, product line, or take in a new client.

A leader must provide his team members with the right resources. For example, if the sales team is making sales, but the numbers are not right, they must be provided with the course to find apt prospects. This way, employees can get an idea about increasing their sales by pitching in the product to the interested prospects.

How should employees be trained for leadership?

The employees should be taught through games like drag-and-drop and labeling for leadership training. The managers can also give audio reviews about what is lacking in the employees’approach as a leader. The learning materials can also be created to take care of different prospective leaders. Leadership training is needed for the following skills to be ingrained in leaders:

  1. Soft skills: empathy, and coaching:
  • Coaching:

Leadership training can also teach managers how to provide coaching to their employees.

For this, training professionals can provide simulations to managers to help an employee who needs their advice. Once all the managers have provided their responses, the training professionals can check which manager has included all the critical points while helping the employee.

  • Empathy:

Leadership training can help managers handle situations that involve consoling an employee who has faced the death of someone in the family, or pacifying someone facing problems at work. The managers should understand how to deal with each of these situations. Managers require skills such as communication and empathy to become influential leaders.

But, measurement of these learned skills is an implausible task and the managers have to be taught how to use these them. And the training cannot replicate every situation a manager might face and prepare him for the skills required.

  1. Setting up team norms:

Handling teams is also challenging for a leader. Team management is a critical task, ensuring that the members collaborate. The team members should also follow some discipline which involves adhering to the team norms. There must be some rules established for team members to communicate to get the work done. Establishing some ground rules is necessary to know how they are supposed to contribute to a project. When such rules are clear to everybody, there is no scope for miscommunication resulting in delayed deadlines. Such team norms have to be specified by the team members, and the team leader has to make sure that they are not unambiguous.

While setting such regulations, the team members have to jot down their experiences of working with the worst and the best teams to know what they should expect from their current team members. Creating the team norms should be a trust-building session so that every member knows what his colleague has encountered in the past and won’t like to see repeated. When all the team members have agreed that specific behavior isn’t permissible, it’s time to decide some acceptable behavioral team norms with mutual consensus.

There could be genuine problems with why this member is flouting team norms. Although a team norm was agreed to, this member can’t follow it, e.g., he can’t attend the conference call because he is a member of different teams, which takes up his time. When the team norms are decided, a unanimous decision is a must because any rule that can’t be adhered to must not be brought into existence.

  1. Making team members more efficient:

The primary responsibility of a team leader is to ensure that the team members are effective and are contributing their best. Hence, he has to encourage them to expedite the job by following time management and prioritizing. The job of a team leader is to ensure that the members feel satisfied with their work and feel important, even when they are encumbered with more duties.

In leadership training, the leaders get the right idea about how to help the team members in establishing these norms. For example, there can be a deviant team member who does not go by the norms. In that case, there must be a protocol established to rectify this team member’s behavior. The team leader’s responsibilities are minimized in this situation, since there is a procedure in place for dealing with such team members.

  1. Dealing with surprising situations:

Team leaders also face challenges when an unanticipated situation arises out of nowhere. For example, the business might lose a significant employee, or a worldwide situation affects the finances due to low sales. So such situations create roadblocks for companies to attain their goals, and the leaders must have strategic plans to ensure that everything is restored to normal. Hence, when such situations arise, the major task before a leader is to ensure that the goals are followed. Set these goals beforehand so that the outcomes are not modified despite the contingencies.

  1. Handling delegation of tasks:

A team leader has to delegate his task correctly and ensure that it is carried out rightly. Therefore, he has to take feedback from his juniors about the tasks delegated to them. A leader has to take the responsibility of delegation quite seriously because otherwise, the desired results won’t be there. So anybody selected for delegation must have the requisite skills and knowledge. Also, the same person must have an impetus to carry out the task delegated by the leader because doing the task can lead to the former’s personal growth.

  1. Creating a positive image for his team:

A team leader must ensure that he has created a favorable image for his team members in the company and different departments. Thus, he can get the senior managers and other departments to contribute when a situation warrants.

He was a German psychologist who is known for discovering the forgetting curve. According to this curve, the biggest decline in memory happens within 20 minutes, and then 1 hour.