Training a Diverse Workforce: Do Different Generations Really Learn Differently?

Purpose-driven. Tech-savvy. Work-shy. I see these adjectives everywhere in relation to what appears to be on everyone’s mind — Millennials in the workplace. The ongoing fascination to categorize and understand how to keep millennial workers tracking towards success (or just to stick around for more than six months) seems to have reached an all-time high. Facts about how the human attention span is constantly shrinking and rumors about how the more “lazy” and “idealistic” workforce of millennials are challenging workplace standards has got the attention of business leaders around keeping their employees engaged. This hot topic is especially scolding (pun intended) for managers seeking to meet the learning needs of an increasingly diverse workplace, causing managers of all capacities to ask the question: “How can I get all of my employees to stay motivated and involved in their development?”

When thinking about how to tackle this question, it seems many managers and employers jump to the conclusion that they should approach different generations with a different solution. Why? There appears to be an assumption that individuals of a certain age respond better to different management tactics, or that they learn differently (i.e. based on millennial characteristics, individuals of this generation will learn better when given the opportunity to take fast-paced, online, self-directed training versus live, in-person training or mentorship). But, is this actually the case? Do different generations really learn differently?

The truth is…

We all want to know things, and we all start at the same place — with a question. Programmed with the desire to understand and discover, we are all experts at seeking answers. Though the process by which we find these answers has changed over time, the desire to expand our capabilities and knowledge hasn’t, and doesn’t vary from generation to generation. We are all intrinsically motivated to learn, and approach learning in much of the same way.

However, our expectations on how we find those answers has changed. Living in the digital age — whether we were born in it or whether we watched it develop before our very own eyes — we all have an expectation on how quickly we find what we’re looking for. We expect our questions to be answered instantaneously and at our convenience, and when they aren’t we quickly get annoyed and look for a faster, more relevant solution. While some generations may be more impatient than others (millennials especially), the expectation is the same: the answer is usually just minutes (or seconds) away.

Meet universal expectations, meet universal learner needs

Instead of focusing on how to make training more appealing to different audiences by jumping through x advised hoops that will make you more “relatable” and appeal more to said generational attributes, I encourage you to think about ways you can serve up relevant content more efficiently. It may seem simple, but people really aren’t that different and haven’t changed that much from one generation to the next. The atmosphere is what has changed — making the exchange of quality information faster.

To keep your audience engaged you’ve got to master the digital environment we operate in by making training material more accessible, applicable and interesting.

The training delivery itself doesn’t matter so much as the rate at which quality information can be consumed — making online training your best candidate for success in engaging an audience whose primary source of information is the web. If your training material doesn’t answer the relevant questions of your audience in a timely and engaging manner, your audience isn’t going to be all that interested in what you have to teach them and will likely start searching for shortcuts to find the same information — potentially missing important bits of proprietary information in the process.

No matter how diverse the audience, the best way to sustain engagement around your training materials is to deploy them in a way that is most convenient and efficient for your audience. From our experience, the best way to do this is through an online learning platform where content is deployed in short, meaningful video segments.

Questions about how you can make your training materials more appealing to a diverse workforce?

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