The quality of a trainee’s learning experience is directly correlated to your organization’s success. As more organizations look to transition to online learning or blended approach for their training and development, they’re often met with friction. Learners suffer from virtual burnout — when people kick into survival mode where the focus is only on keeping their head above water and getting the urgent things done. They aren’t interested in covering material they already know, and it is important to respect their knowledge and time.
But just how serious is employee burnout? Joel Goh, Harvard Business School professor, along with Standford business professors Jeffrey Pfeffer and Stefanos A. Zenios, estimated based on mathematical projections that the U.S. government spends about $125 to $190 billion dollars a year on the mental and physical ramifications from burnout — representing 5 to 8 percent of national spending on healthcare. So, while transitioning to online training may seem like a solution to staffing, expense, and productivity issues, it remains critical to organizations’ health to prioritize the learning experience when choosing a solution.
The name of the online learning game is engagement and a learner-centric approach. When designed correctly, online learning can be engaging and effective. The science behind learning centers around cognitive triggers that stimulate neurotransmitters that keep learners engaged — which is so much more than building in little games or adding videos. Yes, gamification can be a good strategy to keep attention during learning, but it must be executed in a way that is actually helpful to the learner. The reason Amplifire consistently cuts training time and associated costs is because our brain-science-based platform successfully keeps learners engaged, learning faster, retaining more, and performing at higher levels. Instead of being burnt out, employees are energized and confident after training.
Wondering what features you should be looking for or best practices to implement to provide a positive learning experience for employees? Fight burnout and enhance the online learning experience with these best practices.
5 Best practices to create a positive online learning experience:
1. Personalization
An adaptive platform that adjusts to individual learners’ knowledge levels is essential to learning personalization, and thus the overall learning experience. Amplifire’s adaptive algorithm watches each learner’s starting levels of knowledge, uncertainty, and misinformation and refines which areas they need to focus on. The learning experience is rigorously personalized with adaptive functionality — no instructor intervention needed. It cuts learning time in half (sometimes more) by treating each learner as an individual with their own unique mix of mastery, misinformation, uncertainty, and information gaps. In the Amplifire platform, learners also benefit from a virtual instructional coach, VIC, who encourages, cajoles, and prompts learners with guidance.
2. Flexibility
Another way to combat employee burnout during training is to provide flexibility. Virtual learning is inherently more flexible than in-person formats but offering additional flexibility as to what time and where employees can complete their online training reduces the stress of trying to complete it during busy work times or during their personal time.
3. Science-based learning techniques
Choosing a learning platform that uses science-based techniques is important not only because it makes learning more effective, but also because it is a better experience for the learner. The Amplifire platform is built on cutting-edge brain science discoveries from our Science Advisory Board (SAB) — some of the world’s leading experts in neuroscience and cognitive science. It is built to work with the way the mind naturally learns, so learners can spend less time learning and actually retain more than traditional methods.
Science-based learning is also a more engaging experience. Over twenty cognitive triggers — identified by the SAB — are coded into the platform to guide people on their personal path to mastery. Cognitive triggers such as priming, metacognition, feedback, spacing and more create a learning experience that has a gamification feel to it. Triggers increase learning and retention by switching specific brain circuits on so that it can be recalled at a future point in time. Some of the most effective triggers work by creating engagement through emotion and attention — two powerful influences on memory. These triggers have been identified to form rapid, long-lasting memory that sticks. And when learning sticks, employees perform better, and organizations prosper.
4. Feedback
Feedback is a critical component in online learning environments. Learners may feel disconnected or lost without valuable feedback that addresses their specific learning needs. In a comprehensive literature review of studies exploring the role of feedback in learning, 65.07% of the studies demonstrate that automatic feedback increases learner performance in activities and 82.53% of the studies showed that there is no evidence that manual feedback is more efficient than automatic feedback. So, instructors need not feel any added strain to provide feedback — it can be automatic, just not cookie cutter.
Feedback (an Amplifire-identified cognitive trigger) should be personalized to each learner, rather than blanket explanations that lack relevance. For example, Amplifire offers feedback in real time based on a learner’s answer. Upon submitting an answer choice, learners receive immediate feedback whether they were right or wrong, and the correct answer is delayed to further stimulate curiosity and motivate learners to seek the correct answer. Detailed, elaborative feedback can boost learning by 500% when compared to non-feedback learning. The timing of the feedback process is optimized for maximum retention, according to research provided by the SAB.
Furthermore, learners can see and track their own progress as they move throughout the module. This eliminates the guessing game and makes the path to mastery as transparent as possible.
5. Data analytics
A key part of the successful learning experience equation is collecting data to inform any further enhancements your organization should choose to offer. In a blended setting, Amplifire’s data analytics offer insights that were previously invisible. Instructors can see which topics have landed and which topics students have struggled with, and where further instruction is needed. They can then filter topics with a high struggle rate to inform their instruction. Instructors can identify individuals who are struggling with what questions or topics to provide at-the-elbow coaching. This level of personalization ensures struggling learners get the help they need and the best learning experience possible.
Training comes full circle when organizations can also use learning data to see evidence of mastery when their people complete Amplifire courses, ensuring they can operate to the highest standards. This is how the quality of a trainee’s learning experience is directly correlated to your organization’s success. Every detail matters when employee wellbeing is at stake, too. Amplifire’s platform helps you ensure their learning experience is positive and effective, so everyone wins.
From the beginning, Amplifire has relied on innovative brain science to guide its product development to create the most effective learning and training solution, perfectly tailored to the way the human brain works. Learn more about how Amplifire helps people learn better and faster by checking out a demo.
