Let’s face it: Training and onboarding can be tricky. Throw in a pandemic, and it can be even more difficult! Having a good plan in place can lead to a successful experience for both training professionals and learners.
What Is Just-in-time Training?
Just-in-time training, also often referred to as performance support, is an approach to learning that focuses on delivering training and support to employees at the moment they need it — during their natural workflow, rather than through scheduled training or requiring employees to search across multiple platforms to find the help they need.
Why Just-in-time Training?
Having a performance support solution to provide new employees with access to needed resources is imperative. When they have on-demand learning available to them, it can literally guide them to success. In fact, over the past year, there has been a huge increase in businesses that are making that strategic leap to just-in-time training.
Learning new applications and processes can be difficult, and it is essential to have the right training processes in place. Being able to disseminate information efficiently and quickly to help streamline new employee training is a win-win. Often, the first point of contact for new employees when seeking answers or direction can be the company help desk. Having a just-in-time training solution can relieve pressure for this key company resource.
5 Ways to Use Just-in-time Training
1. Consolidating Information, Delivering at the Time of Need and Increasing Adoption
In most organizations, resources and training materials are hosted in an array of locations, whether in a learning management system (LMS), in folders on a network or on a shared drive. When employees need help, they call a help desk, ask a colleague or spend an extensive amount of time looking independently for the right resource.
Now, imagine that someone is working in an application and needs help to complete a task. A robust and intuitive just-in-time solution appears in the employee’s workflow and provides him or her with in-application, step-by-step training. This solution would eliminate the time it normally takes to locate a resource and, in addition, reduces errors. One-click access to the right information helps employees work faster and smarter.
2. Streamlining the First Day on the Job
Imagine being able to set up the exact steps and tools that a new employee needs for his or her first day of work. With just-in-time-training, you can make everything from human resources (HR) documents to information security requirements accessible from a customizable, non-intrusive pop-up in the corner of the screen as soon as the new employee logs onto his or her computer.
3. Going Beyond the L&D Department
With the ability to deliver messages firm-wide or by team, a just-in-time solution can prevent employees from missing any important email communications, from simple reminders like, “Do you really need to reply to all?” appearing in employees’ inbox to critical messages from the information technology (IT) department about server restarts.
A current use case for HR is releasing a message to employees who have been in contact with someone who has tested positive for COVID-19. Releasing a message through a just-in-time training solution means that these types of messages appear in the middle of the desktop, overlaying all applications, until the employee confirms that he or she has read it.
4. Using in Conjunction With Assessments
We don’t know what we don’t know! With an in-application assessment, you have a just-in-time solution that can simply and effectively close knowledge gaps. Having the ability to assess employees and job candidates in real time ensures that they can demonstrate proficiency at tasks across multiple applications. Complimented with a just-in-time training solution, this technology enables businesses to pinpoint and deliver the training needed to build employees’ skills.
5. Identifying Learners’ Needs
Not only can a just-in-time training solution deliver information, but it can also capture data. If an employee searches for a topic and it’s not available, the tool can report that information to the training team, who can then make the relevant learning resources available.
Businesses can also benefit from access to other reporting and analytics. For companies that don’t have an LMS with these features, being able to understand employees skill sets with just-in-time training can be helpful.
How to Gain Buy-in
Gaining buy-in for this sort of training can be tricky, especially when budgets are tight and there are furloughs or layoffs. At many organizations, though training is critical this year, it’s been difficult to obtain the necessary funding. But when an organization’s training team is downsized, having a solution that frees up time and makes their work more efficient is invaluable. (On the other hand, many organizations are reporting that budgets are opening up for 2021. In these unparalled times, it is hard to plan for anything.)
The Time Is Now
Digital learning may be the best option for most organizations, at least for now. It’s time to identify the best solution for your organization, with all the tools that are at your disposal. Maneuvering just-in-time training into your workflow process may be just the thing to guide you through the upcoming year!
Are you ready to make that strategic leap?
