Personalization: The Golden Rule for Training New Employees

Personalization is not just for your external customers. Your internal customers — your organization’s staff — also require personalization, especially when onboarding new employees.

Effective onboarding leads to improved employee morale, productivity, loyalty, and workplace culture. But the critical ingredient when training new employees is personalization.

Dive Deeper: The Employee Training Manifesto for Enhanced Productivity

Onboarding new employees – why personalization matters

There are a number of reasons why personalization is so essential when training new employees.

• Everyone has different learning styles and preferences – catering to these needs will help ensure more successful onboarding
• Everyone has different goals, both for their current role and for their career development – tailored training that helps employees grow will help them become more invested in their training
• Personalized training programs are more engaging – the more personally relevant the training is, the more engaged, productive, and interested an employee will be
• The more relevant the training, the higher the ROI – general training that provides the same content to all will only be relevant to a few, on the other hand

While of course, some aspects of orientation and training can be general. But it’s critical to identify the areas where specific roles, learning types, and needs are met with a personalized approach.

Today, technology has opened up new possibilities.

Today we have access to degrees of personalization that weren’t technically or financially possible in the past.

“What’s the ROI?”

The big question on every executive’s mind is ROI.

This is likely a question you’ll be faced with when proposing a personalized training program. You may even be asking the question yourself.

As we’ll see, the answer can be both easy and difficult.

On the one hand, personalization has generated massive returns wherever it is applied.

Much of the focus of personalization, however, is on the customer experience. In marketing, product development, and so forth, personalized experiences generate extraordinary ROI.

In this regard, it pays to remember that your employees are also your customers – a better experience for them improves the business as a whole.

Calculating the ROI of training can be difficult, however.

Unlike marketing, for example, you cannot simply measure the investment against a single metric.

Effective training will positively impact:

• Employee morale
• Productivity
• Retention
• Learning
• Committment to the organization

And more.

Yet measuring these results in numbers can be complex and sometimes impossible.

However, the ROI of personalization is clear. And the ROI of effective training can be tracked, albeit with a bit of effort.

These alone should be enough to prove the value of personalized training programs.

To get started, test the waters bit by bit, then analyze the results as you go.

This will help you establish the positive ROI of your own efforts, both in terms of finances and qualitative results.

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How to Create a Personalized Training Plan: 10 Tips

If done well, a personalized training program will certainly generate better results than a one-size-fits-all model.

Below are 10 tips that can help you create a personalized training program for your organization:

1. Open dialogue with the new hire before their first day. Ask targeted questions and establish a starting point for your training program.

2. Create a program tailored to their specific needs. With an employee training template, include their responsibilities on the job, combined with their personal career goals and milestones.

3. Assist with career development. One aspect of an effective organization is career development. Employees will be more engaged and loyal when they know they are moving their career forward.

4. Make a schedule specific to that employee. As a rule, personalized milestones, goals, and schedules should be tailored to that employee.

5. Discover how they like to learn, accept praise, and receive criticism. Everyone learns differently, so whenever possible, provide training solutions that match their personality.

6. Leverage state-of-the-art teaching tools to enable more personalization. Digital adoption platforms, automated learning solutions, and other digital tools can greatly enhance and personalize the learning experience.

7. Use digital tools in your own department to enhance productivity. Without modern tools, personalizing a training program would be extremely burdensome. To juggle this workload, make use of project management software, business process automation tools, and other digital tools.

8. Foster strong human relationships throughout. Don’t let digital technology replace the human element — encourage mentoring relationships, hands-on learning opportunities, and connect with the trainee yourself.

9. Collect and analyze data constantly. Without data, you won’t know what’s working, what’s not, or how to fix it. Having this data will help you improve your program, and demonstrate ROI to stakeholders.

10. Continual testing, improvement, and adjustment. The key to creating a successful program is constant improvement. Regular optimization and experimentation will help you deliver better training to your employees … and better results to your organization.

These are just a few tips to help you outline your personalized employee training plan.

Combined with the points mentioned earlier, you should have enough to roll out an initial program. And, as mentioned in the last tip, this program should be undergoing constant improvement.

If you execute the program well, you will certainly see positive results and ROI.