[Alexandria, VA], September 25, 2024—New research by the Association for Talent Development (ATD)discovered that the use of blended learning in organizations is high and is expected to increase in the next two years.

“Blended learning—the combination of formal and informal learning events—represents a large portion of overall learning, and 71 percent of respondents say that at least half of the learning occurring at their organizations is blended,” according to ATD’s Blended Learning: Leverage Flexibility to Maximize Results research report, which is sponsored by BookClub.

“About 75 percent of report respondents indicate that the use of blended learning at their organization has increased over the past two years, and the same percentage believe that it will increase over the next two years.”

Key findings from the report include:

Organizations use blended learning for new-employee orientation and employee development. Organizations also value the flexibility of blended learning.

Creating blended learning programs involves combining and managing multiple internal and external resources. Designers and facilitators often juggle content from multiple sources on different learning platforms.

A wide variety of skills are required to successfully design and develop blended learning programs. Communication, creating learning content, and designing the curriculum are the skills most organizations report as extremely important.

“More than 60 percent of respondents say that creating a blended learning program is more time intensive than an average learning program at their organization,” the report said. “To help ameliorate that challenge, TD professionals should consider using external facilitators or instructional designers, as well as external content from a variety of sources.”

ATD surveyed 360 TD professionals about the benefits and challenges of blended learning, how organizations create blended learning programs and what they use them for, and what skills TD professionals need to become experts at blended learning design and delivery.

ATD is hosting a free webinar about the report on October 17 at 2 p.m. ET.

About ATD

The Association for Talent Development (ATD) is the world’s largest professional membership organization supporting those who develop the knowledge and skills of employees, improve performance, and help to achieve results for the organizations they serve. Established in 1943, the association was previously known as the American Society for Training & Development (ASTD).

ATD’s members come from more than 100 countries and work in public and private organizations in every industry sector. ATD supports TD professionals who gather locally in volunteer-led US chapters and international member networks and with international strategic partners.

For more information, visit td.org.