How to Deliver Engaging Mandatory Training to Employees

Mandatory employee training is a standard part of modern business. So why is it still such a burden and frustration? Just the word ‘mandatory’ echoes stern deadline emails. Recent surveys reveal the most common word we associate with mandatory training: boring!   

Let’s stop right there and re-write the narrative. 

Required training provides an opportunity to: 

• clarify organizational goals
• equip learners with new information, and
• try something new in the process! 

You’ll also discover that a learning management system is the best way to provide the structure you need and creative methods to deliver mandatory training. 

Let’s reclaim this vital part of professional learning! 

What is mandatory training? 

Mandatory training is workplace learning that employees are required to complete. It is assigned to promote & preserve a safe working environment, best practices, and efficiency.  Mandatory training is important to prevent skills gaps, reduce risk, and empower your learners to do their jobs well. 

You may also know it as compliance or statutory training, which deals specifically with areas covered by law. However, not all mandatory training is statutory (required by law). Every organization can decide what training materials they need their teams to learn. 

Ultimately, required training will be specific to your business and employees, and highly dependent on your industry.

Types of mandatory training

These are just a few examples of common mandatory training topics for modern teams: 

• Anti-harassment and anti-discrimination training
• Customer service standards 
• Workplace health, safety & hazards 
• Diversity and inclusion training
• Fair disclosure & conflicts of interest
• Employee and employer rights & responsibilities 
• Use of technology & data security standards 

As you may have realized while scanning the list — each of these topics is crucial to business operations. Each one also requires a customized and creative approach to help your learners truly absorb the information. 

Why is mandatory training important? 

Mandatory training is important because it improves, protects, and strengthens every organization and their work. When it is presented and absorbed well, mandatory training topics will make learners and the entire organization stronger. 

But without effective required training, knowledge gaps quickly become major liabilities. As one financial professional explained: “Compliance information that is not successfully assimilated by the learner creates a risk for the company.”

It’s important to clearly communicate and prove the connection between the required course and bigger company goals and values. Management might see it clearly, but most learners need the connection to stay engaged

Finally, compliance training and materials must be kept up-to-date. With regulations always changing, your teams need accurate information as they work. Frequent reviews and edits will keep this vital part of your L&D functioning well.

How to deliver mandatory training with an LMS 

As the foundation of your learning and development program, mandatory training needs thoughtful delivery and careful tracking.

• Your teams need a centralized source of knowledge where they can find quick answers on policies and procedures. 
• Your administrators need to track progress and completion to be sure requirements are being met.
• Your learners need a variety of methods to grasp and take ownership of new concepts.

For all those reasons, an LMS is the ideal way to provide mandatory training.

An LMS uses cloud-based technology to keep your most up-to-date compliance training materials in one place. It’s accessible to all employees and provides media-rich methods to deliver mandatory training. 

Here are the key steps to deliver required training with an LMS:

1. Create your training materials 

First, identify the company policies or statutory topics that your teams need to master. Gather all relevant materials and build them into courses in your LMS. Be sure to incorporate a variety of media formats to engage different learning styles. 

2. Build learning tracks

Develop a progression through the material with built-in assessments at relevant check points. Plan the sequence of required training from day 1 onwards at the company, keeping recertification and reviews in mind! 

3. Assign and notify your learners 

Assign courses to learners and easily set deadlines along with reminder notifications in their most-used apps like Slack and Google Calendar. 

4. Track and analyze learner stats 

Take advantage of detailed LMS reporting tools and track learner progress as they move through courses. Accurate data on course completion is so important for compliance training, and an LMS gives a digital trail to prove that employees have met requirements. 

Continuous learner feedback will also help you to tweak and enhance your training modules over time.  

Key benefits of an LMS for mandatory training

Still wondering how an LMS specifically adds value? Here are 5 benefits: 

Supports micro-learning

Ultimately, you’re looking for the greatest impact with mandatory training, so the concepts stick and become part of daily work for your learners. Micro-learning (where you break training down into smaller chunks) is a proven way to beat the boredom and disengagement that happens in marathon training sessions. 

An LMS allows you to segment the information into shorter modules with one or two training objectives. This helps your learners to pace themselves and absorb more of their health and safety, legal, or other training. 

Provides a multimedia experience 

Mandatory training does not need to automatically be boring! An LMS allows for training modules to include video, zoom teaching sessions, images, and more to help new information really sink in. 

Built-in assessments 

An LMS allows you to place assessments at the beginning, middle, or end of modules. These can be in the form of quizzes, long-form answers, video responses, and more. Assessments in Continu are specially-designed to test new information through all those formats and more. 

Be sure to reflect on what a successful assessment looks like for different courses and what a learner should demonstrate to show their understanding. For example, a course in health and safety training will likely have black and white answers best suited for a quiz. But an anti-harassment and anti-discrimination training may require group discussion or long-form answers to show mastery.

Allows for detailed reporting

An LMS like Continu has powerful tools to gather data on how your learners move through training modules. This shows progress in real-time so you can assess learners on a rolling basis. It also helps you notice and support team members who may be falling behind in their learning tracks. 

These are a few reflection questions to ask as you evaluate the data you gather: 

• How long did it take learners to work through the course? (both a long and short time are signs that something may need tweaking!)  
• How many attempts did it take for learners to get a passing grade on the assessment? 
• How close to the due date are learners taking this course? (too close may be a sign of dreading the training!)

Enables blended learning  

Blended learning mixes online and in-person / interactive training for the greatest-possible impact. LMS integrations with staple programs like Zoom make this easier than ever before. Group interaction can really help concepts from modules to stick. It also makes space for questions and fun better than solo e-learning can! 

Why use Continu for mandatory training? 

If mandatory training has been a struggle for your organization, don’t give up yet! With a powerful LMS partner, you can start seeing higher completion rates and learner engagement than ever before.

Continu is the single platform for all learning and the ideal way to provide compliance training for modern teams. 

Key Features: 

• Intuitive, easy-to-use interface 
• Automated learning tracks deliver the right materials based on individual learner needs 
• Easily track assigned and completed courses
• Target content by role or geographical location
• Download, export, and share reports with ease
• Scalable platform, accessible from anywhere on multiple devices

If you’re ready to transform compliance training for your teams, we’re here to be a trusted guide.