What makes a happy employee? Perhaps free lunches, a new puppy… maybe even ongoing employee education will do the trick. Maintaining a motivated office is far more important than many believe. So much so, the cost of unhappy, unengaged employees in the workforce is up to $300 billion in the U.S. annually. This is not a bill many would be able to pay. Preventing poor performance starts with inspiring employee engagement with work projects and maintaining motivation throughout the year. Put your checkbooks away and listen for solutions to raising employee engagement rates.

Why learning management is crucial to the employee

A miniscule 30% of full-time employees throughout the U.S. feel engaged during the work day. A common solution to this rising problem in the United States is Learning Management Systems (LMS). These systems have been a growing trend over the past few years. A study conducted by Software Advice shows that the LMS market has grown 21% just within the year of 2014.

There are many ways to implement an LMS into a company’s system to increase employee engagement and performance. Properly training new employees using learning management systems gives the employee a sense of direction right as they are welcomed to the team instead of leaving them lost and unsure of what is expected of them. Employees shouldn’t be overcome with a sense of insecurity on what exactly they’re supposed to complete at the time of the onboarding process. Part of a recruiter’s job is to make your employees feel welcome by taking the new hires under their wing; this starts with the learning process. 

What learning management systems provides for the employer

LMS have a plethora of functionalities that differ depending on organizational preference. HR professionals and recruiters can benefit from these systems to fully train new hires. Not to mention a robust LMS helps managers form performance goals, and more. With this extended help, HR professionals can assess an individual’s skill strength rather assuming their level of prior training. Failing to fully train new hires often results in unhappy, unengaged employees. 

Company success starts with rightful employee placement. Harvard Business Review discovered 80% of poor turnover rates come from poor hiring decisions. That poor hiring decision for a candidate making $100,000 a year could cost at least $250,000 to replace. In a recent study performed by Robert Half, out of 1,400 hiring executives surveyed, 36% believe poor hiring is a result of substandard skills match between a candidate and what an organization requires.

Proper training

A trend in many companies during the training process is to complete training in long, “all at once” sessions. This reflects poorly on the employer brand and leaves new hires thinking “Is this what working here is like?” Managers should pace the new hire training to maintain high employee engagement.

As a result, micro-learning has become increasingly popular. For example, a training manager would take an hour-long session and break it up into 12 mini sessions. 38% of hiring managers using LMS are likely to train with micro-learning for better results. Mark Clare, founder of New Value Streams Consulting says:

“Part of the popularity of blogs, tweets, and YouTube is that they provide the micro-content that is more properly sized to the limitations of learning processes. They fit how our minds naturally work.”

Move aside, success coming through!

Another way managers can use LMS to aid their teams and company to raise productivity rates is by using the gamification method. What does this mean? Gamification, simply put, is having a point system, leadership boards and badges, much like a game would provide. This creates a healthy, competitive feel for employees, motivating them to achieve skill and praise. Those managers using gamification methods have noticed a 25% increase in productivity rates.

Properly assessing new hire skills, performing dispersed training, and applying gamification methods to the office is the perfect storm for higher employee performance rates.

Bio: Sean Pomeroy

While selling other companies software solutions, Sean worked with Michael Warden to design over a dozen applications for different organizations and industries over the years. Sean now focuses on the vision for the company, business development, and continues involvement in the software design of ATS and LMS: Cyber Recruiter and Cyber Train. Want to see what Visibility Software has to offer? Take a demo now.

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