3 Ways Technology can Increase Learning Transfer.

When businesses are investing in learning and development opportunities, you need to be able to critically asses the impact through learning transfer.

CIPD found that just 8% of companies are evaluating the wider impact of L&D opportunities on business or society.

The L&D market is worth over $360 million now.

But, while investment goes up so does low-quality learning and development according to research by City and Guilds.

The primary objective of any learning process is obvious: to increase knowledge and influence positive behaviours.

Whether that’s compliance, upskilling, reskilling or refresher training, the objective is the same.

Post-training, we want our people to transfer the knowledge they’ve learned away from the classroom. But how can companies encourage this learning transfer?

Keep reading to learn:

• What learning transfer is
• The benefits of learning transfer
• The secret sauce to encouraging greater learning transfer

Let’s dig in.

What is learning transfer?

Learning transfer is the art of taking knowledge from training or learning courses and applying them and sharing them outside the classroom.

While learner engagement is key to learner retention, what else is key is ensuring that learner’s have practical use for their new knowledge.

If they don’t, then you have essentially wasted the time and money invested in the training course.

This is a problem many L&D professionals are facing.

Some estimates put the successful transfer rate of training between 10-22%.

Pretty low! So, how can you up the rate of learning transfer?

First, let’s look at the benefits.

What are the benefits of good learning transfer?

A course with good learning transfer can impact businesses by:

• Improving productivity through better processes, smarter working and deeper knowledge
• Increasing wider team knowledge
• Lifting sales
• Driving better leadership

When the benefits are this good, it’s worth investing in high-quality learning to ensure a high rate of learning transfer.

The alternative?

A huge drain on your budget and disengaged people.

Even if just one member of staff gets good learning transfer, that can have a huge trickle-down impact.

They could bring in new processes, share their knowledge, change the status quo.

Learning done well can revolutionise businesses and so investing in the right training is vital.

How to increase the learning transfer rate

For us, technology is the secret sauce when it comes to improving learning transfer.

Like many areas of L&D, technology is a facilitator in transferring learning to the workplace, rather than a tool to do so.

But, in today’s world, we rely heavily on technology.

We use it to make sure we’re up on time for work, to connect with friends, family and colleagues across the globe and to manage projects more efficiently in the workplace.

Technology is at the heart of almost everything we do in the modern world – and learning is no different.

Here are three ways in which technology can help you encourage your people to apply learning in their day jobs:

• Build psychological safety
• Provide coaching and feedback
• Make learning social

Let’s look at each one in more detail.

Build psychological safety

One of the biggest barriers our learners face when it comes to applying newly learnt skills or knowledge on-the-job is the fear of failure.

This fear of failure can cause procrastination and self-sabotage.

This runs in tandem with that knowledge they learned becoming less and less easy to recall (and in turn, apply).

To overcome this, our people need environments that they feel safe and comfortable to try – and of course, safe and comfortable to fail in.

And a great way to facilitate that environment is by encouraging collaboration and engagement amongst teams.

Tools such as Totara Engage create a sense of community amongst learners and provide quick and easy access to key information in the flow of work.

Combining both of these provides a sense of camaraderie amongst your people, and allows them to quickly double-check their knowledge before applying it in the real world.

And applying new knowledge and skills doesn’t seem so scary when you have the support of your colleagues and learning platform behind you.

📈 Pro Tip

Think Learning uses Totara’s codebase to provide its core LMS. On top of that, you can expect extra tools and features to help you manage your learner’s experience.

Book a demo to learn more.

Provide coaching and feedback

To ensure learning is being transferred to the workplace appropriately, managers and coaches need a space to provide feedback, tips and words of encouragement to team members.

A talent experience platform can help you achieve that.

And more importantly, a space to give and receive clear, constructive feedback.

Plus, if needed, a platform like this can allow trainers to nudge learners in the right direction if they need to refresh their knowledge.

By having all of that data in one space, it makes it easier for the L&D team, plus the rest of the business, to keep up to date with learning progression.

Make learning social

Social learning is a great way to encourage behavioural change in the workplace.

Learning platforms that facilitate social learning provide visual concrete examples of the learning in action, rather than bombarding employees with countless theories int he hope they find the meaning themselves.

So, learners are more inclined to – and confident in – applying their learning in the workplace.

They’ve witnessed exactly how it is done and know what they need to do to use their newly acquired knowledge or skills.

So, if you’re looking for ways to make your learning last in the memories of your people, and make sure they actually apply it at work – it’s time to think about learning transfer.

Improve learning transfer with Think

We’ve barely scratched the surface with the tools and features on offer that can support better learning transfer.

From Feedback 360 to one easy-to-use platform that centralises all of your people data, you’ll have all of the tools you need to best combat low learning transfer.

Want to learn how we can help? Book a demo with our team! We’ll show you exactly how we support our customers make more out of their learning opportunities.