Being able to measure your team’s training is crucial to its effectiveness. Having to measure it manually, especially with growing teams, can be a massive pain point. Unlocked Learning is here to resolve that issue by removing the friction caused by traditional training assessment tools. Instead of hunting down metrics, imagine being able to receive every training metric in one dashboard? That’s exactly what you’ll be able to do with the next stage in Coassemble’s evolution.

For years, our founders have wanted to create a way to deliver a truly “invisible LMS” training experience. To do that, we created the tools that enable the sharing of knowledge anywhere, and the ability to track it easily. What are the benefits of taking your training outside of the traditional space and engaging with your team in the platforms they already use? Those benefits are exactly why our experts drafted this article for your team. Read on to learn how to implement a truly “invisible LMS.”

What is an invisible LMS?

Before online training, there were in-office methods that involved presentations, manuals, and in-person training. Then online training took those same practices and created virtual versions of them. But you still have the same issue that caused lack of engagement with teams for in-office and online training—workers had to leave work to learn. 

Teams engaged with their communication channels, their platforms to accomplish work, and project management tools. The second they had to leave these spaces, it breaks the flow of work, bringing down engagement. This makes training assessment difficult because the data can be skewed by engagement as well as training quality.

So our CEO Ryan started consulting with firms to see how knowledge was being shared effectively and where teams engaged most. In one instance, he found a large scale team that had a lower engagement with their training platform compared to their communications platform. However, Ryan found that when training was delivered in the team’s comms channel, the engagement increased by 75%—that’s huge🚀

Applying that same principle, an invisible LMS allows you to deliver training anywhere without diminishing the LMS experience. For your team, it appears that training is happening in the platforms they are familiar with and use everyday. But for your admins, it allows them to create training content and view various metrics including:

• When and where a user has accessed and self-enrolled in a training session.
• Any instance employees complete a check-point or the whole training session.
• Any time a training enrollment link is shared, and who accesses or enrolls in it.
• What the completion rate is for individual and team training sessions.
• What the average time in each training session a user or group spends.
• And more!

The idea of an invisible LMS or online training platform isn’t to remove the training space, but rather, relocate where the training happens. Training content authoring tools have to provide deep analytical tracking and measurement without having to “hunt down” the data to gather it. 

A rapid content creation tool combined with the tracking and sharing features of Unlocked Learning allow you to create a truly ‘invisible’ training experience. This can accelerate your training process and help you reach outcomes faster by being able to improve the process easily. And the benefits don’t stop there!

Why is easily accessible training assessment important?

One of the biggest eLearning mistakes that occur with online training is devoting disproportionate amounts of time to assessment. Whether that’s not spending enough time to understand why training isn’t effective or spending too much time searching for data, both can be a time waste. Ensuring all of the data is readily available is the only way to guarantee rapid assessment. Let’s look at what models led to the importance of easily accessible training assessment and analytics.

The earliest and most widely accepted and formalized training assessment process was the Kirkpatrick Model by Dr. Donald Kirkpatrick. Dr. Kirkpatrick was one of the presidents of the American Society for Training and Development, now known as the Association for Talent Development (ATD). The model presented four levels for training assessment:

• Level 1: Reaction—how did learners initially respond to the training?
• Level 2: Learning—what knowledge was retained from the training?
• Level 3: Behavior—were any in-the-flow of work practices carried on from the training?
• Level 4: Results—did the outcome of the previous levels match the expectations of the training?

This model was developed in 1959, and became the foundation for training assessment across the globe. However, many believed there should be a fifth level of assessment to evaluate the cost/benefit of the training. In 2003, Dr. Jack Phillips introduced the fifth level as the return of investment for the training. His calculation below was the formulation used to assess if the cost of training was worth the total benefits after the training was delivered.

ROI = (Total Program Benefits – Total Program Costs ROI/ Total Program Costs) x 100%

Dr. Phillip’s proposed addition created a training assessment model that shaped how online training can benefit teams by providing an accurate scope of insight to a business leader. There are two ways you can do this, either manually or by using a tool with detailed analytics capabilities. 

The benefits of traceable training content

Reducing the time and friction created from difficult to obtain training assessment metrics obviously offers several benefits to you and your team. Everyone can use a little extra time to be able to focus on their work. But what direct benefits can you capitalize on from traceable training content? Our biggest picks are automating your training process and enabling self-directed learning.

Automated onboarding and training

The ability to automate your training process doesn’t mean removing the “human” component of your training. Automated onboarding means when you hire a new team member, they received an email inviting them to begin their onboarding process. Automated training means when your team is beginning a new project they don’t have experience with, sending a training session in their project management tool to guide them on where to begin. Automated training can also be moments of just in time training delivered when a team member is having difficulty accomplishing a task they forgot how to complete.

The ability to automate really is about removing the need for you to directly send training or assess when training needs to be delivered. It empowers your team to train in the flow of work so they can tackle new projects head-on. By creating training delivery triggers, you’re able to free up a lot of time spent on manual delivery to create and assess your training.

Self-directed learning

Self-directed learning is all about creating a resource hub for your team. Rather than scheduling training and hoping your team retains that information when they need it, you provide them with access to train on their teams. This means less time spent training outside of their work and more training in the flow of work. You can gather all of your training into one space and then create an enrollment link for your team to access whenever they need it.

Self-directed learning also removes the barrier of manual checks for your team to progress in training. Rather than completing a section and waiting for a response to continue, your training platform guides learners through each step. This accelerates your training process and enables your team to train autonomously on their own time and when they need it most.

We hope you’re as excited as we are about Unlocked Learning’s training assessment capabilities! For more information on how you can rapidly grow your team at scale with online training, chat with our team today!