As the saying goes, you’re only as strong as your weakest link. In other words, your business needs everyone involved to be up to scratch if you want to reach your full potential.
In construction companies, there are often hundreds of employees working together in different departments. To maximize your workforce’s potential, it’s vital to offer all of your employees good training to ensure everyone is able to work to a good standard and understands the company’s expectations and protocols.
While training may initially seem like an unnecessary expense—especially if you hire experienced, competent employees—manufacturing training will help you align your team around the same goals and ensure that your entire workforce works to the same high standard regardless of their previous experience in the industry.
Here’s a step-by-step guide to running an effective workforce training program as a manufacturing company.
Step 1: Identify areas that need improvement in your workforce
A successful manufacturing company should function like a well-oiled machine. Each employee should be able to contribute seamlessly to the overall effectiveness of the whole.
With a successful manufacturing workforce training program, you’ll be able to effectively oil out weak spots within the system. A good training program should begin by highlighting weak points within the system so that the program can focus on areas that may need particular improvement.
For instance, if you notice that one area of production appears to slow down your overall productivity, it may be worth providing additional training for the people in this area to bring them up to speed on your processes. Or, if you notice that your workforce doesn’t always report on their progress the same way, offer training tailored to streamlining your reporting processes.
In every organization, the areas that need improvement or clarification will be different. Spend some time looking over your analytics and metrics and coordinating with managers to assess which training areas your company needs to focus on.
Step 2: Design or commission a tailored training program (or several)
Once you’ve targeted specific areas of your company and your processes to focus on in your training program, it’s time to collect materials, expertise, and information to create your tailored training program. You may also wish to create training programs specifically designed around specific topics such as safety in the workplace, practical tips on manufacturing your specific products, workplace conduct, or diversity and inclusivity in the workplace, all of which will help your workforce to effectively and productively work together.
Many organizations opt to use digital programs to build their training programs (something like 98%). With training software, you’ll be able to create engaging, powerful programs that your employees can partake in digitally.
At Dokeos, we offer state-of-the-art training programs that you can design for your workforce. Whether you want to run workshops, utilize videos, train your workforce in compliance, or share vital new information with your employees as your manufacturing business expands, our dynamic, customizable training programs will have you covered.
Step 3: Combine in-person learning with digital training
Using digital learning as the backbone of your training program is a great way to ensure that your training is engaging, visual, and, perhaps most importantly, unified and standardized from session to session. However, in the manufacturing industry, it’s also vital to combine this type of training with practical, hands-on training, too.
Alongside digital learning, offer in-person sessions with management or manufacturing experts within your company to give your employees vital practical experience that they can take with them into their day-to-day work.
Step 4: Keep up to date on your workforce’s training
One of the most important things to understand about workforce training in any industry is that one session is only the beginning of an ongoing process. A workforce is never “done.”
After building and implementing your training programs, be sure to keep them up to date and continue offering ongoing training for your employees a few times a year.
Eighty percent of workers claim that regular, shorter training sessions are more effective than more formal workplace training, so it’s always worth offering top-up sessions throughout the year.
Using digital training program software like Dokeos, you’ll be able to update and edit your training programs over time. Plus, you’ll be able to track your employees’ progress to ensure that everyone has had the training they need and gets the chance to experience deep learning in the manufacturing industry.
Design and implement an effective training program with Dokeos
Ready to start building effective, easy-to-use training programs for your manufacturing company? At Dokeos, we can help you design, create, and run in-house training that is tailored to your unique needs. With Dokeos, you can transform your employees into a knowledgeable, engaged, ever-learning workforce.
Already have a few training programs set up but curious to learn more about using Dokeos? We can integrate you into the Dokeos LMS so that the transition is pain-free. We’ll also help you get oriented with our system so that you can be up and running in no time.
Ready to give it a try for yourself and train manufacturers in your company? Get started with a free trial today.
