Edith Krag

Relates the experience of Consolidated Insurance Co. in using the systems approach and the Audio-Visual-Tutorial System in teaching typing skills. Shortage of typists; Job specifications; Improved employee morale.

TRAINING CLERICAL HELP

Are you ready for hybrid training?As companies tentatively return to physical offices or field work, learning and development (L&D) leaders are now responsible for delivering flexible and effective programs to both remote and in-person employees—all in the face of changing workplace expectations and fragmented digital tools that create inefficiencies affecting engagement, time, and budget.With all the responsibilities that come from an evolving business environment, it’s easy for training managers to overlook key issues when developing a hybrid training strategy. Explore these five common hybrid training mistakes and how to avoid them:Mistake 1: Not recording your trainingsImagine if every email you sent disappeared immediately after it was read—it’s unthinkable. Yet many L&D leaders take the same approach to training by failing to record their courses.As your training programs evolve to encompass both in-person and virtual components, recording your trainings is essential to a hybrid L&D strategy that is flexible, accessible, and effective for all employees.With so many digital tools at our disposal, it’s easier than ever to capture lectures, demonstrations, role-play exercises, and any number of training experiences your employees need to succeed. Never forget to record your training.Mistake 2: Taking a one-size-fits-all approach to trainingA successful hybrid training strategy must be purpose-built to meet the unique needs of your curriculum and employees, building on the processes that have been working and evolving those that haven’t.Rather than taking a reactive, blanket approach to training, tailor your tools and communication process to suit the different types of training you deliver. For example, an HR compliance training might be most effective with an asynchronous, remote model, where a hands-on technical course would require synchronous, in-person demonstration alongside a pre-read on theory.Mistake 3: Managing multiple tools to create and store training recordingsTrainers and L&D leaders have enough on their plates without the added task of juggling tools to save, edit, upload, and share training materials and recordings.Integrate and streamline your hybrid-training tech stack with a single comprehensive tool, such as an enterprise video content management system (VCMS). Securing your training recordings in a VCMS that integrates with your existing tools like a learning management system (LMS), customer relationship management (CRM) software, or video-conferencing platform creates a more seamless experience for both trainers creating content and employees engaging with it.Mistake 4: Neglecting on-demand training contentTraining doesn’t stop at the end of a course. Yet, training videos are often saved in a folder that’s never accessed again—that is, if they’re recorded at all.You already know how important it is to capture your training. With your hybrid workforce more distributed than ever, it’s essential to provide consistent, searchable, on-demand access to past training recordings. Easily discoverable, on-demand training resources allow employees to access critical knowledge “at the speed of need,” improving engagement and productivity and strengthening learning outcomes.Mistake 5: Insisting on perfectly polished training videosThink back to the most valuable training you’ve received—was it a sleek corporate training film or a DIY YouTube video?Quality is key to successful training, but authentic, personal knowledge sharing is more powerful than a highly produced—and expensive—training video. Your trainers are already seasoned content creators. Leverage their skills for a hybrid training context and empower trainers and employees to easily record, edit, and share video training.While there’s no single approach to a hybrid training model, prioritizing consistency, flexibility, and choice will set your L&D programs up for success.

Training a Hybrid Workforce? Avoid These 5 Mistakes

The worlds of technical communication, technical writing, and instructional design have significantly evolved over the years. From “cut & paste” to the word processor revolution, desktop publishing, and the advent of content management. While becoming more and more widespread, for some, the mere mention of content management can bring on a look of fear or panic. Too many still carry the scars from 18-month rollouts and not having access to the resources necessary to get the exact look and feel that marketing is demanding.The industry needed a content management solution that was simpler, easier to use, and affordable. A system where content creators themselves could manage every step of the process without the need for dedicated programmers or other specialized technical assets. When searching for the right authoring and management system for your team, here are four things you should take into consideration:Content ReuseOne of the core and fundamental principles of content management is that content should never be duplicated. Content should only exist once and should be used by reference, as necessary. MadCap Flare takes this concept to an extreme level. Do you have a boilerplate safety chapter that needs to be included in the front of every manual? No problem. Do you have a common procedure that applies to six different products? Easy, just create a “snippet”—a reusable content fragment—and add it by reference anywhere you need it. Whether your content reuse needs are at the section, chapter, topic, subsection, paragraph, phrase or even character level, it’s important they are created once to minimize duplicate efforts and reduce errors.Multichannel PublishingWith today’s varied content delivery requirements, consider using a solution that can support you as your publishing needs change and evolve. Those publishing needs might include traditional print-based materials (such as PDF or Microsoft Word), or web browser-based content that needs to be responsive (automatically adjusting between a desktop, a tablet or a phone interface), or an eBook for offline use, or even a traditional desktop help format such as compiled Microsoft HTML Help.Collaboration CapabilitiesA critical aspect of any content management system is how easily and how well you can work with others. One of the critical additions to MadCap Flare in recent years is the MadCap Central cloud-based management platform. You can now keep a record of every edit that ever occurs to any content file–without needing your IT department to set it up for you. This also supports multiple authors working from the same content storage repository. This model opens peer-to-peer collaboration options similar to “track changes” functionalities available in Word processors. You can also add “annotations” or sticky notes to content in order to communicate with other authors.Content AnalysisThe next major area is analytics. This can be confusing because many talk about analytics as if it was a single subject. However, there are two facets to analytics: customer output analytics and source content analytics. Customer output analytics monitor areas such as page views, searches being performed, searches being performed where no content was found, and customer statistics (what browser they are using, what version of that browser, and so on). This type of reporting helps digest how your customers are using your content and highlights areas in which your content might need to be improved upon. Content analytics run against your content repository to continually monitor the health of your content, such as broken links, snippets or variable suggestions, or reporting to point out old images that should be archived.Prior to choosing an authoring and management system to support your entire content development lifecycle, take into consideration solutions that offer: content reuse, multichannel publishing, collaboration capabilities, and content analysis.

Why Instructional Designers and Learning Professionals Choose MadCap Software’s Authoring and Management System to Support the Entire Content Development Lifecycle

Edith Krag

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