In my previous HRTools.com Insight, I defined the term ‘blended learning’ and covered a few basics. If you’re unfamiliar with this employee training technique, you might want to review that first.
Now, I have a few recommendations, or tips, to share for maximizing the blended learning experience.
1. You may have heard that saying, “New and Improved!” While there are a lot of new and improved training technology options, I think it’s important to keep in mind that not every learning opportunity needs to be altered to include technology.
- Instead, the key to blended learning is to effectively evaluate your options. You want to select the right combination of the media or tools by evaluating how you are going to achieve the strongest business impact; and at the lowest possible investment.
- So an instructional designer should evaluate the materials and the delivery styles of what has been previously used and ask themselves: How can we improve these training elements with technology?
2. You will want to know how to effectively track the progress of the participants who are engaged in the self-paced portions of blended learning programs.
- Ensure that a tracking method is in place so that you can detect problems such as a lack of progress or participation.
- Design your program to ensure that the asynchronous segment and any other pre-class assignments that might be given are completed.
3. You will want to consistently hold employees accountable for the material that they are learning.
- Ensure that the different segments are fully integrated. Employees may try to select the parts of the program that they prefer. As a result, they may not really concentrate on the segments that are required. That's a natural tendency.
- Help them understand that all the segments add value to the objective of the program. So it’s important to hold them accountable for that information and to make sure that each segment is interrelating.
Blended learning also has other positive implications for American business today. Obviously these dire economic times are posing threats to budgetary concerns, which can affect employee learning and development resources. Studies point to survey findings that some U.S. companies are cutting their training budgets this year, and they will probably do so in 2010. So transitioning to blended learning programs can be vital to the success of a business’s training and development plans.
And as companies evaluate their training and development needs, they should consider the following:
- What are the business needs? A business should take into consideration its mission, its vision and its values for the company culture.
- What are the strategic goals? A business should align its training with the current strategic directions of the company.
So as you consider or determine whether to transition to a blended learning approach, you will want to analyze: What is the specific problem that needs to be solved? You will want to determine: What is the goal of this training?
As you can probably tell, blended learning has great potential for almost any organization. With all the technology and media available today, organizations can often be freed from the expenses of purchasing three-ring binders and printing volumes of materials. Again, your primary objective is to get the most return on your investment.