The Importance Of A Rapid eLearning Strategy For Your L&D Department

How Does A Rapid eLearning Strategy Benefit Your L&D Department?

A rapid eLearning strategy is quick to create and consume, especially when compared to traditional training that requires long seat times and even longer development schedules. But what role does it play in your employee development program and how can it benefit your L&D workflow? Rapid eLearning helps to ease the burden of ongoing maintenance and creating content from scratch. Likewise, employees can get the info they need and apply it right away since rapid eLearning design starts with targeted goals and key takeaways. Here are 7 reasons why a rapid eLearning strategy is important for your L&D team.

1. Repurpose Existing Assets

A major component of rapid eLearning design is to reuse what you already have. Your development team can repurpose existing training materials to reduce spending and get a head start. For example, they don’t have to create templates or curate content online because your library has everything they need. In some cases, you can even convert Flash to HTML5 to eliminate the design process altogether. The caveat is that you need to evaluate your assets beforehand. Do a thorough inventory to see if anything’s worth salvaging from the archives, even if it’s a matter of taking images, sound bites, and video clips, then discarding the rest. If you put your lateral thinking cap on, you can probably find a treasure trove of reusable resources.

2. Reduce L&D Workload

Chances are that your L&D team already have enough on their plate. After all, they’re charged with content development, upkeep, and admin duties—and that’s just for starters. Rapid eLearning helps alleviate their workload because it involves fewer steps. They still need to organize, convert, and revise content. However, there’s little that they need to create from scratch (if anything). Even if they do, there are templates, themes, and an asset library to simplify the process.

3. Bridge Relevant Gaps In Record Time

One of the best things about rapid eLearning is that there’s no lag time. As such, you can address emerging gaps or new policy changes right away. For example, you already have content that fits the bill. The only catch is that it’s Flash, which isn’t the most mobile-friendly. Plus, the themes and aesthetics feel a bit outdated. Rapid eLearning design allows you to convert Flash to HMTL5 and deploy your course this week instead of next month, when employees may already be violating rules or regulations.

4. Minimize Rapid eLearning Design Content Maintenance

Does your L&D team have the time to maintain your entire online training library? More importantly, do they have the patience or energy? The last thing you need is employee burnout. Successful rapid eLearning design minimizes content upkeep because everything is built with quick revisions in mind. For instance, those templates I mentioned earlier have placeholders to expand on existing courses without building from the ground up. Likewise, L&D staffers can quickly update JIT resources to include new policies, tasks, or protocols.

5. Fewer Rapid eLearning Strategy Revision Rounds

It’s true, there are revisions involved. You must always be willing to add or remove content to make online training more relevant. The good news is that rapid eLearning requires fewer revision rounds. In many cases, it starts with a quick prototype that includes all the essentials so that your L&D department can map out their approach and identify key takeaways. This prevents lengthy revisions in the long run because they adjust as they go along. Furthermore, rapid eLearning resources are generally concise and easily digestible, which means there isn’t as much content to edit before launch. Not to mention, converted content has already been proofread. So, those components require less polishing.

6. Streamline L&D Work Practices

Another benefit of rapid eLearning design is that it’s more structured. One might assume the exact opposite. That rapid development doesn’t leave time for an intricate framework. However, your team needs to create a detailed overview and guidelines to streamline work practices. For instance, they start with a prototype, followed by feedback sessions. Once they’ve developed a successful example, they can move on to the actual design process. Even converting Flash to HTML5 calls for a road map to avoid delays and align with current online training objectives. That said, once they get a hang of it, the process is much faster than traditional training development, as the main goal is to eliminate redundancies and major revisions further down the line.

7. Reduce Employee Seat Time

Employees spend less time training because rapid eLearning resources serve niche purposes. For example, they access a three-minute task tutorial to refresh their memory and improve performance behaviors on the job. Thus, they don’t need to sit through a half-hour course just to get this tidbit of information. Employees are also able to focus on personal gaps and goals, which makes the experience even more engaging and relevant. Finally, rapid eLearning cuts payroll costs because you don’t have to pay for long training sessions. Granted, there are some topics that still require comprehensive certifications or courses, but many pain points can be addressed with JIT support.

Conclusion

Should your L&D department implement a rapid eLearning strategy? Hopefully, this post has helped you answer that question based on your objectives and use case. More often than not, rapid eLearning is a cost-effective way to convert Flash to HTML5 and modernize outdated content. But you can also use it to develop fresh online training resources in a fraction of the time thanks to templates and other pre-built assets. Another option is to hire an outsourcing partner who specializes in rapid eLearning design to stretch your budget.

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