We’ve just published a new white paper: Common Objections to Online Learning! To download it, click the button below: This white paper will focus on all the common objections that we hear from clients who are not quite sure if online learning is for them and their organisation. If you have doubts about how well online learning works, whether gamification will work for your employee demographics, or whether you have the infrastructure in place to roll out a successful online training programme, this is the white paper for you! Here’s an excerpt to whet your appetite… "Over the past decade, we’ve worked with a lot of clients. They’ve needed our help to tackle a huge variety of problems, from cutting training costs by moving training online to upskilling entire workforces, managing mergers and implementing systems change. One of the things that we’ve noticed over the years is that there seem to be a few standard objections that arise when organisations are considering online learning. For example, there’s the technology issue: my computers aren’t good enough, my employees don’t know how to use them, I’m not a techno-wiz, how will I do this? Then there are the terrified faces of HR personnel when they think they have to input the data of all 52,390 employees into a new system. Not to mention the stalwarts of classroom training who can’t fathom how training would ever work if it wasn’t conducted face to face. Every day, we have to counter many different kinds of objections - and we’re here right now to provide answers and solutions to some of the objections that we hear most often. Here are just some of the questions and problems we’ll address: We already have an LMS - why would we want another one? We have an intranet already! Will our data be safe? There’s waaay too much admin involved, we don’t have the time or resources! I’m not very good on computers, and neither are my employees! Our computers are way too old for online learning! Online learning is boring… it’s generic… it sucks! Gamification? But I heard competition doesn’t work in learning! …and many more!" So, what do you think? Do you share some of these questions and concerns about online learning? If you’ve got an objection to online learning, we want to hear it! Tweet us (@growthengineer) your objection using #LMSObjection and you might see it featured in our next white paper!  The post New White Paper: We Address Common Objections to Online Learning! appeared first on Growth Engineering.

As you probably know by now, at GE, we’re on a mission to redefine what learning can achieve. We truly recognise the efforts of others who pull out all of the stops to make the world a better place. It’s for this reason that we’re happy to welcome Velda Barnes into the Growth Engineering Learning Hero Hall of Fame! Velda is the Head of Learning and Development for Addaction, one of the UK’s leading drug charities. Since it was formed in 1967, Addaction has been raising awareness and helping people recover from drug and alcohol addiction. Coming from its humble beginnings as a support group, Addaction now helps tens of thousands of people overcome their addictions each year. An organisation of this size is bound to have a large workforce, and with that comes a great demand for staff training. Having extensive experience in the realm of treating substance abuse as well as a background in training, Velda Barnes became Addaction’s Head of L&D in 2009. In her time with Addaction, she has helped to deliver winning L&D strategies based on careful training needs analyses. These strategies have taken the form of a blended learning approach involving face-to-face training workshops and custom-built online learning modules. In 2013, Addaction won two Charity Learning Awards for the quality of their learning programme and the effectiveness of their blended learning strategy. These two awards are just the latest in the company’s ever growing list of accolades and by no means the last. There are some eLearning units available on the Addaction website which can be used by any individual or organisation with a need for a better understanding of issues surrounding substance abuse. The eLearning modules are centred on drug and alcohol awareness with other units dedicated to helping professionals in the health and social care sector safeguard those who might be affected. All of this was made possible because Velda Barnes could see the benefits of online learning and found a way to use it to change people’s lives for the better. You can stay up-to-date with her mission by following her on twitter and if you want to stay informed about Addaction, their twitter feed is here. Velda will also be speaking at the 2015 Learning Technologies conference in London in January so be sure to snap up your ticket! As you can see, online learning can be used to achieve any number of learning objectives. At Growth Engineering, everything we do is geared towards engaging learners to help them become better than they thought possible. Click the button below to find out what we can do for you.  

Securing learner engagement with your L&D plan can often seem like an uphill battle. It’s a bit like spinning plates - as soon as you turn your attention to a new plate, the one you had spinning starts to wobble and you’re in serious trouble if you don’t give it another quick spin. You’ve got to keep your attention on all of your plates to make sure none take a quick nosedive. Engaging employees is like this. When you’ve got your attention on them, they’ll more likely than not seem to be engaged, happy and motivated. But turn your back for a moment and they’ll soon be dragging their heels, watching the clock and wishing it was Friday already. How many of your employees are engaged? Gallup polls found that just 13% of employees worldwide are engaged. A worrying 63% are not engaged, meaning they lack motivation and don’t make much effort to help the organisation succeed. And an even more concerning 24% are actively disengaged - these people are unhappy, unproductive and demotivated at work. They’ll write hate mail, bring down the morale of everyone around them, gossip, spread bad thoughts and coast through their workdays doing the bare minimum just to keep their managers happy. They’re not great to have around, really. So what do games have to do with this? Well, one of the reasons that ‘gamification’ helps to engage these workers and rouse them from their slumber is that we’re all used to playing games. Games are a natural part of our entire lives, from playing peekaboo as babies to 5-hour sessions of Call of Duty as adults! Indeed, research from Gamification Nation found that 70% of senior executives play games during work hours. Whether it’s a reflection of society’s obsession with Candy Crush or used as a means of chilling out and making the most of a quick tea break, we think it’s a reason to make sure games and game mechanics are brought into the workplace. And contrary to popular belief that gamers are generally teenagers holed up in their bedrooms tapping away on their computers or pressing buttons on their controllers until the wee small hours, only 18% of gamers are aged 18 or under. In fact, the majority (53%) of gamers are between 18 and 49 years old, with a fair proportion (29%) aged 50 and over. Clearly, since we enjoy playing games throughout our lives and understand the mechanics and metaphors behind games, it makes sense to strategically bring them into our work lives and take advantage of our natural desires for competition and completion. It stands to reason, then, that research from Talent LMS shows that 72% of learners ‘strongly prefer gamification’ on their Learning Management Systems (online learning platforms) and learners are going gaga over getting points for activities like reading, writing, sharing course reviews and voting for content. Don’t you think it’s time to bring gamification into your Learning and Development plan? Download the white paper below to start your own learning journey!  

You wouldn’t start a relationship with someone if you weren’t compatible with each other, so why would you choose a Learning Management System that doesn’t fit with your business? When you’re choosing a new LMS, one of your biggest questions might be whether or not you can take it home to meet the parents. Some concerns you may have about your new LMS might include: How much time will you have to spend on making your shiny new Learning Management System talk to the HR system? Will your learners have to sign on to a bunch of different systems? What happens when employees leave or join? How can you make the most of social networks that employees enjoy using? There are lots of things to consider when you’re trying to decide on a new Learning Management System. Luckily, our API makes integration easy, saving you time, and helping you take your LMS implementation to the next level. With the Academy LMS, you don’t just get a learning platform - you get a loving and meaningful integrationship! Let’s see how. Single Sign-on Nothing kills user experience more than a cascade of login screens. The Academy’s API enables single sign-on functionality across all applications, saving time by removing the obstacles that stand between your learners and their training. Adding users Imagine getting a new LMS and then having to manually add each learner! With the Academy LMS, the API allows integration with your HR system meaning your LMS is always up-to-date with your current employees. Custom integration We recognise that every business has different needs, so it makes sense that they have different systems to address them. We’re a friendly bunch here at Growth Engineering, so we do all we can to make sure our Academy LMS can get along with your applications - regardless of their quirks and foibles. We’ve also been working really hard on integrations to make implementing your LMS even easier! Let’s see some of them: Salesforce.com auto integration Our Salesforce integration is the perfect accompaniment for our Sales Academies. Now you can watch your sales performance soar with an engaging LMS that synchronizes with your current system. SharePoint auto integration The Academy LMS allows seamless integration with external tools like SharePoint giving learners complete access to available resources without having to switch between applications. And more… Keep your learners connected with a Learning Management System that has been adapted to the way they interact. The Academy LMS is compatible with most major social networks including Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook and more useful integrations are expected early in 2015 - here are just a few of them! Upcoming Integrations: Workday auto integration - coming January 2015 We’re about to launch an update to the Academy LMS including custom integration with Cloud-based HR SaaS solutions like Workday. With this integration, your list of learners can synchronize automatically with your existing system. PayPal - coming February 2015 Soon the Academy LMS will offer a full PayPal integration solution allowing you to make or receive quick, secure payments through your learning platform. Authorize.net - coming February 2015 Coming hot on the heels of our PayPal update, the Authorize.net integration will ensure that the Academy is fully equipped to support eCommerce features. SAP auto integration - Coming March 2015 Our developers are currently working on a comprehensive integration solution designed to synchronize the Academy LMS with most common SAP applications. Oracle auto integration - Coming March 2015 Due to popular demand, we’re implementing a custom integration to bring together the great features of the Academy LMS and the administration tools of the entire Oracle suite, including HRMS systems like PeopleSoft. As you can see, there’s a lot of exciting things happening over at GEHQ! We always aim to please, which is why our Academy LMS never stops improving. Our developers are always hungry for new challenges and these often come in the form of requests from our clients. Because of this, there’s no telling what ERP or HRMS integration we’ll start working on next. If you do happen to be curious, don’t hesitate to get in touch! You can find out more about what our Academy LMS can do on our guided webinar tours. Just click the link below and we’ll find a time to suit!  

This week, we’re honouring a group of people whose purpose in life is to find interesting facts. For those who don’t know, QI (Quite Interesting) is a panel quiz show hosted by Stephen Fry and featuring Alan Davies as the permanent butt-of-all-jokes. The aim of the game isn’t to get the most questions right - in QI, panellists are rewarded for offering the most interesting facts. At the same time, points are deducted for giving answers that are too obvious. In every episode, we’re not just treated to obscure facts and lively banter, but common misconceptions are swept aside leaving us all much smarter people. So who is behind the research engine that keeps the fact-bank topped up? The "QI Elves" is the charming moniker given to the researchers. Aside from pooling their collective fact-hunting efforts for the TV show, the Elves also host No Such Thing as a Fish, a weekly podcast that we can’t stop recommending to people! The podcast features James Harkin, Andrew Hunter Murray, Anna Ptaszynski and Dan Schreiber. Every Friday, they each take turns presenting the most interesting fact that they have uncovered in past week. With all of the facts being churned up every day, you would think they’d have enough now to write a book. Well, several in fact. This year, if you’ve behaved yourself, you might just find a copy of 1,411 QI Facts to Knock You Sideways in your stocking. This latest offering from the Elves features plenty of mind-blowing facts, for example: Orchids can get jetlag. Lizards can’t walk and breathe at the same time. There are 177,147 ways to tie a tie. Traffic lights existed before cars. If your thirst for knowledge is still unquenched, you can follow the QI Elves on Twitter for a constant stream of trivia as well as regular updates on the show. Also, be sure to tune into NSTAAF - it’ll be the best use you can make of 30 minutes each week! The great thing with sharing facts (as we discover in both QI and NSTAAF) is that it encourages more people to share their own facts, whether they are directly related or not. Even at GEHQ, not a lunch-break goes by without some random piece of information that sparks off a conversation. We all experience the power of collaborative learning on a daily basis, whether it’s for a specific purpose or just for fun (which is also hugely important). To find out what social learning can do for you, click the button below.  

This time we’re not sharing with you our favourite learning or technology-themed TED Talks. Instead, we thought we’d give you some awesome videos to watch in your spare time to help you appreciate the little things in life. It’s all well and good focusing on life-altering training and career-changing skills, but, as Ferris Bueller said: Life moves pretty past. If we don’t stop to look around once in a while we’ll miss it. So here are some excellent TED Talks that will, hopefully, get you looking at life in a different way. 1. Joshua Prager - In search of the man who broke my neck When he was 19, a man ploughed into the bus that Joshua was riding in, snapping his neck and leaving him a quadriplegic. Years later, after he’d relearned to breathe on his own, move, stand and walk - but was still a hemiplegic - he tracked down the man responsible… 2. Terry Moore - How to tie your shoes You probably had no idea you were tying your shoelaces wrong all these years, did you? We’re afraid it’s true. This short video will show you how to create a much stronger knot. Try it for yourself! 3. Dan Gilbert - The psychology of your future self Dan explains that we’re constantly making decisions that will directly impact the lives of the people we’re going to become. Adults pay good money to have tattoos removed, that they as teenagers paid good money to get! Middle-aged adults rush to divorce people young adults rushed to marry. Everywhere we look, we’re undoing or resetting aspects of our lives which at one point we thought were on the right path. As a psychologist, Dan is interested in the reasons we tend to make decisions which our future selves come to regret - and he thinks it could be because we have a ‘fundamental misconception of the power of time’. Watch more below: 4. Ron Gutman - The hidden power of smiling Did you know, it’s really difficult to frown while looking at a smiling face? It’s because smiling is evolutionarily contagious - when we see a smile, the control we usually have over our facial muscles is suppressed. Ron explains the psychology behind smiling, why it makes us feel good and how it should really be seen as a ‘superpower’. 5. Debra Jarvis - Yes, I survived cancer. But that doesn’t define me Debra found that the best way to cope with her cancer was to claim the experience - not let it control her. "What if there were no survivors, meaning, what if people decided to just claim their trauma as an experience instead of taking it on as an identity? Maybe it would be the end of being trapped in our wounds and the beginning of amazing self-exploration and discovery and growth." We hope you liked our selection! If you’ve got a spare few minutes, why not check out our white paper on how to make learning fun?  

When we start work, we don’t always think about where we want to end up in a few years’ time. Do we see ourselves in the same role, within the same company, or is this just a stop-gap or a stepping stone to something more ‘us’? If you have high hopes for your career then it’s vital you have a development plan, either written out or in your head, of where you want to go - without it, you’re at risk of coasting along and making no real progress. So, firstly, what exactly is career development? Career development is the ‘ongoing process of managing your life, learning and work’. When we talk about career development, we’re referring to the development of the skills and knowledge that will allow you to plan, make decisions and accomplish what you want. Once you have these skills and knowledge, you’ll be able to plan your life much better. Clearly, a career development plan sounds like a great idea, because the whole purpose of a career development plan is to help you reach your goals. What’s not to like!? What does a career development plan involve? Well, it varies slightly whether you’re already in a role, are looking for work and whether you’re already working in the field you desire, but career development plans tend to follow similar patterns: Figure out your key strengths You may want to become a world-famous singer, but if you can’t hold a note, you will need to give up on your idea (sorry!). Similarly, if you can multiply 5-digit numbers in your head within seconds, you might want to consider a role within finance, investing or stocks. Set your goals Firstly, do you have a ‘job’ or a ‘career’? The difference will be in how you feel about your work - if you dislike it or don’t feel all that passionate, it’s probably ‘just a job’ to you, but if you enjoy yourself and want to progress within your chosen field or company, you’re probably in a career. Of course, there are other factors to consider, but generally speaking when we’re creating career development plans we’re focusing on a role we enjoy and want to succeed in - not a job we do just to pay the bills. When you set your goals, think big. You’ll likely be working until you’re in your 60s, so just think how much you can accomplish in that time! Want to run your own department? Awesome. Want to start your own business? Go for it! Identify your career path So, what do you want to get out of your career? Where do you want your career to be in one, two, five or ten years’ time? If you’re lucky your career will fit into a structure hierarchy, like ‘Sales Executive’, ‘Sales Manager’, ‘Area Manager’ and ‘Regional Manager’, which makes plotting your path easy. But if your trajectory isn’t so clear-cut, on what other milestones can you judge your progression? HINT: Don’t make a goal simply for the sake of making one. Make sure what you select really does resonate with you and you can imagine yourself doing whatever you pick as your ideal career. If you don’t like people, don’t try to squeeze yourself into a leadership role. HINT: Don’t go by what other people want! If your goal is to jump the career ladder from Sub-Editor right up to Editor within two years yet someone else you know has set their sights on moving from Sub to Assistant Editor in the same timeframe, that doesn’t mean your goal is wrong. It may mean you have to work harder, but if you’re passionate and dedicated, who’s to say it can’t be achieved? Analyse the differences in where you are now versus where you want to be A gap analysis will show you where you are lacking in skills right now, what you already know and what you need to work on in order to move forward. Try it now: take a look at a relevant job advert and rate your skills from 1-10 on how well you meet each requirement. You’ll be able to see where you need to focus. For instance, if you’re a junior salesperson but want to become a Sales Manager within five years, you may notice that a lot of job adverts require a sales qualification (like an Institute of Sales and Marketing Management Diploma or Certificate) to meet the level required. Therefore in order to meet your career development goal, you’ll need to undertake training to reach the required standard. Other careers may require different training, or maybe a certain level of networking skills or demonstrable sales increases - find out what’s required and add these to your ‘to-do’ list. Order your tasks & set dates Let’s say you’ve identified ten things you need to do or improve to move up in your career. The next trick is to put them in the most logical order. If you need to do X before you can do Y (such as getting a qualification in sales proposals before you can offer to assist your boss in creating them) then X will obviously need to be at the top of your list of priorities. Also, if your career development plan involves taking on more responsibility, try doing this in stages rather than doubling your workload overnight! Monitor your goals & keep track Don’t lose sight of your development plan or skip tasks you find difficult. Keeping on top of what you need to achieve will allow you to focus on your progress. If you feel yourself slipping behind in achieving your goals, try to figure out why this is. Have you lost your passion? Are you finding it too difficult? Regaining your motivation might be as simple as repeating the steps above and seeing how much you’ve improved your skills since the last time you assessed yourself. What do you think? Will you create a career development plan for yourself, now you’ve seen how simple it is? Career development is the kind of thing that’s easy to forget about - until you wake up in ten years and realise you’re at the same place you were when you started your career. If you want to progress and succeed, create a career development plan - you’ll be able to accomplish great things! Want to learn more about how important training and development is to your career? Check out our demo eLearning module of ISMM Unit 308: Planning for Professional Development. Just click the button below! P.s. Check out Careerealism for more great advice.  

We know that life is busy. Whether it’s planning for Christmas, sorting out our kids’ uniforms, putting in overtime at work or doing the shopping, sometimes it’s hard to find a spare moment in the day! That’s why we’ve created a really easy way for you to get in touch with us: the Request Contact Form: It’s really simple and only takes a minute. All you have to do is click the button below, fill out some details and then we’ll get in contact with you at a time to suit you, whether it’s today, tomorrow or three months from now. So if you’ve got something you’d like to ask us or would like to have a demo tour of our award-winning Academy LMS but are snowed under right now, don’t worry - just register your interest and we’ll do the legwork when it’s convenient for you. Don’t say we never do anything for you!  

When we’re having fun and enjoying ourselves, our brains are more active. This means that when we’re having fun in a learning environment, we’re likely to remember more information because of our more active brains. Clearly, making the learning experience exciting and enjoyable for learners is important. But if you’ve ever taken online learning courses yourself, you’ll probably be wondering how it can possibly be made to seem fun - that’s because your experiences of online learning were most likely on a system that was old-fashioned, poorly designed and poorly executed. These days online learning is much more fun! Let’s see how… Technology to Delight Learners If you don’t know already, there are a bunch of ‘Easter Eggs’ hidden within Google. Some are funny results from specific search terms and spinning the page (type ‘do a barrel roll’ into Google!). You can find a list of some of the best Easter Eggs here. Why are we talking about this? Because it shows how important it is to excite and delight learners on your Learning Management System with unexpected goodies, cool features and fun functionality! By giving learners these extras, you’re appealing to their sense of excitement and wonderment - who knows what they’ll uncover next if they just keep looking! This gets them engaged with their online learning environment, meaning they’ll be more likely to do the eLearning assigned to them and they’ll interact more with the LMS, which will take them up the rankings of the leaderboard, which brings us to our next point… Gamification to Make Learning Fun The more a learner interacts with their Learning Management System, the more secrets they’ll uncover and the more rewards they’ll accumulate. These rewards - like badges, points and achievements - add up to improve a learner’s overall standings on their LMS. The more badges they get, the higher up the leaderboard they climb, showing their fellow learners how dedicated they are and what a great job they’re doing. This is motivating because, let’s face it, no one really wants to get left behind, so learners will do extra work to gain the three badges they need to race ahead to the top spot. Sociable Learners are Happy Learners When it comes to gaining knowledge, evidence shows that only 10% comes from ‘formal’ learning like classroom-based training and eLearning modules. 70% is gained while ‘on the job’ in the workplace, and 20% is gained through observation of others. Clearly, then, encouraging learners to become more sociable on their Learning Management System will help them bridge the gap between what they learn in the eLearning module and what they truly need to know in order to succeed in their day-to-day jobs. Want to find out more? We wrote a white paper all about how gamification and excitement is great for the success of a training roll-out. Check it out below!  

If you’re anything like us, one of the first steps to training a new employee is to get them understanding the brand. Your company brand is like a fingerprint - it touches on everything you do, it’s unique, and it helps customers identify you among a sea of competitors. Think about Coke, Apple or Tesco. The brand runs through everything: advertising, products, email signatures, websites… even offices, intranets and stationery is branded these days! So why is it, then, that companies don’t make the same effort to brand their Learning Management Systems? It’s important that employees appreciate that when they go into their LMS to undertake training, they’re not doing it for anyone else - they’re learning new things ultimately for their own benefit, though also for the benefit of the organisation. Therefore we think it’s really important that each of our customers has their very own branded LMS - think: colours, images, phrases, titles, functionality, date and style of launch… Everything should be unique to that customer, since every customer is themselves unique! Fully skinnable This means that each and every Learning Management System we create for clients looks different. Got a pink and purple brand? Welcome to your pink and purple Academy LMS! Is your company quaint and sweet, specialising in fluffy kittens and potpourri? Then your Academy will be too. Do you sell guitars for death metal bands? Your Academy LMS can be as dark and hardcore as you want! You see, when every aspect of your Academy’s UI (that’s ‘user interface’) is built to match your brand, your learners will feel at home. They’ll know that the Academy - and all the eLearning content and special features within it - has been specially selected by the company just for them. They’ll know the care and consideration that went into it. It’s not just any LMS - it’s their LMS. API Connectivity Ugh. There’s nothing worse than having to log in five times just to get to a piece of eLearning that you’re not really all that enthusiastic about doing anyway! Luckily for your employees, learners only have to sign in once per session. So if they log into a work or shared computer using their username and password, the Academy will recognise this and they won’t have to log in again that session. No more multiple logins - yay! Integrations Got an HR system you really like? We’ll integrate with it so that anything you change or update on the system automatically cascades to the Academy. So if Deirdre in Accounting gets married, you’ll only have to update her surname once. It might seem like a little thing, but when you’re dealing with thousands of employees at once, it’s definitely the little things that count! You can read more about our API and integrations here. Talk like a Pirate Day While it’s certainly not everyone’s cup of tea, the fact is that our Academy LMS can be altered to encompass whatever text or phrasing you desire. Don’t like, "Leaderboards" on your Academy for dog trainers? Why not change it to, "Top Dogs"? Are you really feeling the love on Valentine’s Day? Simple: change every ‘Like’ to ‘Love’ for that special event! See? It’s important that your employees don’t see their Academy LMS as an add-on or an external site, but as a system that is integral to the organisation. They’ll respect it far more if they recognise it. Want to learn more about how important design and branding is in learning? Read our white paper on how user interface design is linked to engagement!