8 Ways to Overcome Challenges in Creating Engaging Learning Environments

Published in

The Business of People

4 min readNov 6, 2017

With the rise of new technologies and an increasingly volatile working environment, fostering the engaging learning environment required by every business is a challenge more than ever before.

The way we work is continually changing. At best, workers can simply lack the enthusiasm for any long-term training and career development in their current posts.

At worst, employees feel forced to undergo learning and development which they consider too unrelated to the function of their specific role.

Given this dilemma, how can the modern employer overcome these challenges while nurturing the intrinsic desire for learning among their current team?

Out with the Old and in with the New

The days of the annual appraisal are fast becoming a thing of the past. This means that for employers serious about tangible employee engagement are turning to more informal ‘catch ups’ as an alternative.

These conversations, while seemingly informal on the surface, enable the employee to open up to their manager on the parts of their role that engage them the most, and which may need improving.

What is the incentive for them?

Banishing bad attitudes from workplace training means keeping your employees focused on the positive outcomes for both the workplace and out.

Which skill-sets and personal qualities might improve as a result of training? How might these new professional skills benefit them in their personal life? All incentives matter and it is important to keep them in mind.

What is the incentive for you?

It is true that, when acknowledging that some learning is about developing an employee in the areas in which they want to improve, this does significantly help in engaging an otherwise difficult member of staff.

However, with your coffee firmly in hand with your company goals in clear sight, suggesting what your employee may need to focus on to improve their work performance in the more immediate future is also something you can introduce in your next discussion. Sometimes all that is required is a little give and take

Hand over the Reins

Yes, from structure comes freedom, but sometimes it may be better to allow your employees to write development plans on their own.

Allow them to take responsibility for their personal ambitions, whether that involves a University course or simply some further vocational training.

Encourage them in these goals and when they achieve them.

While this is an excellent way of increasing employee engagement and the variety of development topics, you will be surprised at how many of these newfound personal skill-sets filter back into improving their function as an employee.

Let them shine!

Whether volatility in workplace patterns or in the market itself, employees within the modern workplace are already sensitive to the smallest sign of instability or change.

To remedy this at times tense workplace climate, emphasising the importance of showcasing newfound talents within their role ensures that all employees feel recognised and that the company is investing in their talents for the long term.

All aboard: Changing Organisational Behaviours.

For effective ongoing support, this must be top-down as well as bottom-up.

From senior management, all the way to the employees directly behind the product an organisation creates; fostering an engaging learning environment requires an understanding at every level that considers continual development as a real asset for developing its employees- and ultimately, the organisation’s internal competitive advantage.

When will I have the Time?

Workforces are shrinking, deadlines are getting tighter and the pressure to become more efficient within the increasingly-automated organisation is increasing week by week.

However, as a training solution to maximise this employee efficiency, modern training delivered by a high-quality provider is able to fall into the background and allow your employees to function at their best.

At Qintil for example, we actually offer training and training management packages that enable learning to take place flexibly at the trainee’s own pace, and even from the comfort of their own home.

In our experience, this not only maximises time saving, but also output for the organisation as a whole.

Targeting and Tailoring for Transformation

Achieving an adequate return on a training investment, and particularly given the transient nature of today’s workforce, can be a significant issue for many organisations. But cutting the training budget is often a false economy.

This mean that, certain organisations resort to non-integrated eLearning-only solutions in an effort to emulate procedures that were originally fully face-to-face.

But are eLearning-only courses able to fully simulate the benefits of training both inside the organisation and out?

Based on the experience of many organisations, the proof is in the tailoring: This means that, while some pre-packaged online training solutions may be appropriate for certain technical and compliance-based scenarios, optimum results are consistently achieved when both online and offline components are able to work together.