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Online learning tips for companies and for non-formal learning spaces

Online learning tips for companies

1. Raise motivation through personalisation

Upskilling and training of employees is important for any company that wants to grow and remain competitive. Nevertheless, professional development opportunities should be looked at as a combination between organisational goals and individual employees’ personal and professional needs. Raise employees motivation to take a particular training offer by encouraging them to reflect on their needs and interests: 'How would this training be relevant for their career development?; What are the particular skills can they develop?; How can these be also useful in their personal life?’. Provide guidance on the learning opportunities for various positions within the company, whilst giving employees freedom to select what they want to focus on, or the order in which they wish to take the courses. Encourage them to set weekly or monthly goals, based on their needs and interests, instead of adopting and following the defined course objectives. Collect feedback regularly to take stock of where training opportunities are leading to, and discuss learning progress throughout the year (for example, by setting up a ‘professional growth planner’).

2. Encourage employees to create a learning diary and share with others

Having a learning diary is a great way to summarise important sections or topics, reflect further on course questions/exercises, extract important content, and note down new ideas that come to mind throughout the course. In other words, everything relevant for a learner’s personal and professional development. A learning diary is something they could always go back to, providing a quick gateway to the more relevant topics and reflections. Encourage employees to keep learning diaries and facilitate exchange of diaries to support each other’s learning! Give them a hand in choosing the best online diary tool. Some great tools for this purpose are: Padlet, Miro, Tackk, Adobe Spark pages, Sway (Microsoft), Weebly, Blogger, Sutori, Glogster and many more!

3. Facilitate online study groups

Research has shown that collaborative learning increases engagement. By encouraging employees to discuss and exchange ideas on the learning content, you will facilitate better understanding and results and stimulate the development of soft skills (e.g., teamwork, active listening, giving and receiving feedback). A study group could simply be a dedicated online space where colleagues can chat and share reflections and questions. It could be also supported by a shared drive where they can access each other’s learning diaries. Boost the use of these groups by inviting more experienced employees to give short lectures on the topics covered or offer alternative perspectives on challenging questions. The reflection questions in the Digital SkillUp courses can offer a good way to spark discussions and to allow learners to see different perspectives!

4. Create an online knowledge database

Facilitate the exchange of useful materials or learning diaries by establishing a dedicated storage space on the company servers, like a company online library! Give employees ownership of this space and support them in organising, managing, and maintaining it.

5. Encourage informal collaboration and support schemes

Informal training is a time and cost-effective way to develop skills. One way of encouraging collaboration is to embed the learning experience in existing mentoring schemes, where experienced mentors with knowledge on the topic can support mentees’ understanding of learning content. You can also establish a peer learning matchmaking area or regular peer learning workshops, where employees can easily connect with colleagues. Try to get employees from different departments and levels within the company on board. Motivate employees to invest time into the programme by incorporating it into performance reviews.

6. Learning during working hours

Assign time for learning within working hours, which employees can claim based on their workload and interest.

7. Embed course in your company regular training programme

Discuss and plan employees training with HR departments. Plan your budget and look for cost effective solutions. While external training can be very effective, it can often be expensive. To maximise the efficiency of your training budget, you might want to capitalise on the talent in your company by asking internal experts to share knowledge on specific topics. In addition, keep up to date with existing free of charge training tools. For instance, the Digital SkillUp courses are available for free and could be integrated into your basic digital education and upskilling programmes.

8. Apply knowledge to real-life situations and projects

We tend to quickly forget what we have learned. If new knowledge is not applied, 75 percent of it will be forgotten after six days. Encourage your employees to immediately apply knowledge through practical real-life examples and via your company’s projects. Give your employees an opportunity to bring in new ideas and express their creativity, and enhance organisational productivity.

9. Inspire by positive role models

Incorporate learning activities into your company’s organisational culture and promote positive role models. Encourage your employees to present their learning paths in various company’s meetings and acknowledge success cases. Keep in mind that your employees are constantly faced with the need to learn and acquire new competencies. They may hesitate to take part in additional training programmes if there is no clear acknowledgment and recognition by the management.

Online learning tips for non-formal learning spaces (e.g. public libraries)

1. Raise motivation through personalisation

Make learners reflect on their needs and interests when it comes to a particular course and reflect on how this could this be relevant for their work, and personal life. Give them freedom to select what they want to focus on and in what order they wish to take courses. Encourage them to set daily goals for studying, based on their needs and interests, instead of adopting course objectives.

2. Encourage learners to create a learning diary and share with others

Having a learning diary is a great way to summarise important sections or topics, reflect further on course questions/exercises, extract important content, new ideas that came to learners’ during the course. In other words, everything relevant for a learner’s personal and professional development. It would be something they could always go back to, providing a quick gateway to the more relevant topics and reflections. Encourage learners to keep learning diaries and facilitate exchange of diaries to support each other’s learning! Give them a hand in choosing the best online diary tool. Some great tools for this purpose are: Padlet, Miro, Tackk, Adobe Spark pages, Sway (Microsoft), Weebly, Blogger, Sutori, Glogster and many more!

3. Facilitate study groups

Research has shown that collaborative learning increases engagement. By encouraging learners to discuss and exchange ideas on the learning content, you will facilitate better understanding and results and ensure the development of soft skills (e.g., teamwork, active listening, giving and receiving feedback). A study group can meet regularly face-to-face or online to discuss content covered and generate discussions or tackle questions. It could be also supported by a shared drive where they can access each other’s learning diaries. Furthermore, you can boost the use of these groups by inviting guest tutors (e.g. practitioners from business, academia and industry) to give short lectures on the topics covered or offer alternative perspectives on challenging questions. The reflection questions in the Digital SkillUp courses are a good way to spark discussions and allow learners to see different perspectives!

4. Offer opportunities for knowledge exchange and socialisation

Facilitate the exchange of useful materials or learning diaries through a dedicated online database/storage. Help learners build or extend their personal learning network online by setting up a dedicated space, such as an Microsoft Teams group, a Facebook group or a Whatsapp chat to connect, share immediate questions, and support each other.

5. Facilitate, do not lecture!

Facilitating activities and study groups around the courses can help learners engage with the material but without making them feel that as a facilitator you must know everything about the topic. Your role is to facilitate the discussion and help everyone reach a collective and collaborative experience that builds knowledge. Being an expert is not required to facilitate study groups on the Digital SkillUp courses.

6. Encourage creativity

The Digital SkillUp courses are a jumping off point for an emerging technologies journey. Encourage learners to look at how they can apply their knowledge in new ways and organise activities like an online hackathon to foster their creative skills and ideas. Organise a final activity that marks the end of a course and helps learners apply their new knowledge creatively.