Implementing and Developing and Effective Employee Training Program Across Multiple Office Locations

According to a study conducted by Dale Carnegie Training, 71 percent of the responding workers said they weren’t fully engaged in their jobs. If you take 71 percent of employees at one store, that’s far too many who are unengaged. If your company operates in multiple locations, that’s hundreds or even thousands of workers and staff — and that reality is simply bad for business.

Developing effective employee training programs is a great way to better engage employees and increase their productivity. For organizations with many stores or branches, implementing employee training software can be a challenge. Can you be sure all your workers are learning the same things at the same level of proficiency? If something isn’t working at a store in Albuquerque, will employees in Atlanta receive that information? These tasks may seem daunting, but with the right approach and an innovative solution, they are achievable. Here are some ways employee training programs can be implemented across multiple locations:

Turn to Tablets

Increasingly, companies are incorporating tablet technology into their employee training programs. Content, especially video content, on an iPad or surface is more easily and effectively accepted and consumed by workers. Tablets save companies money on training materials as well — instead of going to the expense of printing, shipping, and then storing that content at stores, it can be uploaded — either locally or from corporate — and automatically synced onto devices at a fraction of the cost.

Same Training Sent Everywhere

An immense challenge for successful employee training and development programs across multiple locations is ensuring consistency from store to store. For example, if a new menu item is rolled out at restaurants nationwide, it should be prepared the same delicious way at one location as it is at another. After all, if customers are not locally impressed with the taste of an improperly prepared item, that might reflect negatively on every other store in the chain. And, of course, consumers appreciate and prefer consistency — that's why McDonald’s became so popular decades ago. With tablet technology, companies can help ensure that outstanding training content is delivered to each store and is being correctly learned and applied.

Live Training

Conference calls and video meetings can be extended to develop an effective employee training program, but tablet technology takes this concept to an innovative level. For starters, conducting live training on a tablet is simply convenient — an employee with a day off, on the road, or in the field can attend via his or her iPad. More importantly, workers can take this live meeting to the places where the training will be applied. For example, if they are being taught how to use new kitchen technology, they can bring a tablet into the kitchen to compare what’s on the screen to what’s right in front of them. Questions can be asked directly; even video can be shot to demonstrate any problems that emerge.

Nationwide Collaboration

With potentially many employees across the country learning the same content, undoubtedly, there will be questions, concerns, and opinions. Interactive tablet solutions allow this feedback to be delivered not only back to corporate, but also to colleagues at other stores. If a part of training isn’t quite working at one location, employees at another location may have the solution. This way, your workforce is creating its own best practices. Because changes to tablet-based training content are easy to make, updates can be easily sent to the appropriate employees across the entire company. This level of collaboration eliminates much of the red tape sometimes encountered when trying to get a question answered, as well as empowers workers to be part of the process instead of just a cog in the machine. And, that is how to develop an effective employee training program.

What challenges have you encountered in implementing and developing effective employee training programs across multiple locations?