If you are like many other companies and are still conducting your company’s daily operations remotely, it can be difficult to train your new hires. You usually rely on comfortable integration into your physical workspace when training your new employees, but you likely need to rethink your entire training strategy to accommodate new health and safety guidelines
. Like always, you need to come up with new methods to adapt to the changes in society. Here are ten training tips you can use to help your human resources department train new employees.
1. Prepare To Return
Odds are that you will not be working remotely for forever. Make it clear from the beginning that remote working is not the norm and that you will be back in the office eventually, and prepare your new employees for when that day comes. For example, building security is not an issue when working remotely, but you may use some kind of identity proofing in your regular office building. Send your new employees their identification cards and explain when and how to use them even if they will not be using them for the foreseeable future. It will help your employees remember that this is not normalcy, and they should be expecting change.
2. Keep It Simple
The best way to keep your training program simple is to have it all available in one place. It is too much of a hassle to expect new employees to jump around from program to programs and synthesize the information from all those sources. When your workers can focus on the content of the training instead of the inconvenient technology surrounding it, they will retain more important information. It is easy to assume that new workers will catch on to everything immediately, but that is not always the case.
3. Make It Interactive
Training can be boring, and there is no way around that fact. Your new employees might start off engaged and interested in the training, but before long, their minds will inevitably begin to wander. However, if you invest in an interactive training program filled with quizzes, pleasing visuals, and short videos, new workers will be more incentivized to pay attention because they have to pay more attention to complete the training. It might cost more to create such an individualized training process, but if you have the resources to make it happen, then consider it.
4. Make Videos
One of the most important ways to make your training process interactive is through videos. Videos provide both auditory and visual stimuli and can provide interactivity as well. This covers all three of the commonly accepted learning styles: auditory, visual, and tactile. Have these videos incorporate you or your other employees in some way to familiarize new employees with current ones. For example, you or an employee can provide a voiceover for the video, or you can have employees appear on camera. It all depends on how involved you want to be in the program.
5. Monitor Training Performance
When employees are remote, it can seem more difficult to monitor them and give them feedback at first, but once you recognize the various ways you can monitor them remotely, it will feel simpler than ever to keep tabs on them. You can either monitor performance in real-time or afterward. If you invest in a screen-monitoring service, you can spend time monitoring the training if you choose, or you can create quizzes that provide the employee with instant feedback that you have access to later. Either way, you should always monitor your new employees.
6. Do Not Force Pacing
Everyone works and takes in information at his or her own pace, and if you rush that process, he or she will not have the capacity to do the best work possible. Let your workers do the training on their schedules to an extent. Obviously, you have to set a deadline at some point, but be careful not to rush your employees beyond their comfort levels. Strict and containing time limits will incentivize employees to speed through the training process without learning anything. They will be more likely to click through the slides and retain nothing.
7. Provide Meeting Times
If your new employees have never worked remotely before, it can be an awkward transition. So, provide opportunities for them to socialize with you and your other employees. If new employees can put faces to the names they see in their emails, it will change their perception of your company from a nebulous, faceless corporation to a friendly, personable entity that cares about them and their wellbeing. Create ways to humanize your company both internally and externally. People respond when they interact with other people, so give new workers plenty of people to interact with.
8. Request Feedback
Do not let your ego cloud your judgment about the quality of your training programs. Do not assume that your program is perfect simply because you paid good money for it or designed it yourself. You are not above criticism. After people have completed their training, send them a survey, or ask them personally what they liked and did not like about the training process. Employees often find errors that others have missed. Take the suggestions you receive into account, even if they seem like bad ideas at first. You do not have to implement every suggestion, but at least think about them.
9. Convey Company Culture
Company culture varies widely from business to business, and new hires will likely be cautious and reserved at first before they have a sense of what the company atmosphere is like. To get them to come out of their shells as soon as possible, try your best to make it abundantly clear in your training materials and initial interactions what atmosphere and culture you try to create. However, do not lie and say that you foster a fun, laid back atmosphere if that is not true. People prefer honesty over idealism.
10. Make Training Ongoing
While this might not be a popular decision among your employees, it is one that will help your company moving forward. Training is not something that an employee can rush through once and be done with it. It has to be an ongoing process. The business world is constantly evolving, so you and your employees need to be prepared for substantial changes at any time. Sometimes, these changes require new methods and, therefore, new skills. Alternatively, even if there are no substantial changes, people forget information over time, so it is helpful to require a refresher course every so often.
The way companies train their employees is different between industries. Some companies require heavy, physical training, while others require learning new computer skills. It all depends on what the functions of your employees are. No matter how you choose to train, there is no single correct or incorrect method. Work with your internal employees as well as whatever company you decide to work with if you choose to create training software to create the most efficient training system possible. Your new employees and friends will later thank you for the effort you put into making their first few weeks at your company that much better.
