US manufacturing is expected to have 2.1 million unfilled jobs by 2030, according to a survey by Deloitte and National Association of Manufacturers (NAM). The impact would be dreadful for the US economy, estimated around more than US$1 trillion by 2030. So finding qualified talents is harder than it’s been. 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. Have you considered yet to digitalize your trainings?
Many companies have been moving out of the physical classroom and toward e-learning. However, manufacturing companies are often still hesitant, as in-class training has been the norm for most of the industry.
Yes, certain topics require a hands-on approach, but there’s still a lot that can be taught through a manufacturing training LMS and online courses. Let’s go through why e-learning can be a very effective training tool in manufacturing and how you can do it the right way.
Why online manufacturing training works for the industry
There are many benefits to using an LMS for manufacturing training. Creating a custom online course could be one of the best training steps that you’ve ever taken. Here are just a few advantages:
- Offer highly technical training: There is a lot of technical knowledge that workers need to do their job effectively, including best practices. Much of this can easily be taught through an e-learning platform. There’s a shortage of product and process experts, and that gap can be filled more quickly through e-learning than through normal channels.
- Revisit and review content: With traditional courses, there’s no way to easily revisit course content without repeating it completely. On an LMS e-learning platform, you can give learners the option of repeating the training if and when they need to, or review any specific points they were unclear about.
- Share knowledge with vendors and partners: Manufacturing companies rely heavily on the knowledge and skills of partners and vendors, but it just isn’t possible to train all of those people in a traditional training course. For one, it would be too expensive. But with an LMS and e-learning, there are a lot more options available to open the course up to other partners who need the knowledge too.
- Save time and money training new employees: The manufacturing industry has a pretty large employee turnaround. And often, the new workers come from a completely different industry and need to be trained from the ground up. Creating a classroom setting for a few learners at a time is not only expensive, but time-consuming and logistically complicated. Plus, training needs to happen often. Having a platform for employee onboarding and training for new employees is a lot less expensive and more practical.
- Support safety and compliance training: There’s a lot of safety and compliance training that needs to happen in the manufacturing industry. An online platform can support this type of training too. You can train any individual at any time without having to wait for a class to be filled up for them to get their safety training and start to do their job.
Where to begin
You might not know how to get your manufacturing company started with an e-learning platform. The key is to do it in a phased approach.
Start small
Evaluate which elements of your traditional courses can be copied onto an e-learning platform. Dokeos can help you decide which elements those are and figure out how they can be incorporated into a manufacturing training LMS.
Once the evaluation is complete, your company can create custom courses and ensure they include everything you need them to. Then your company can allow a few individuals to test the course and ensure it works.
They work through it, evaluating and assessing the outcomes. They can be given evaluations, or if they are trusted employees, you could only ask them to give feedback. With their help and feedback, the individuals you work with will also help to ensure that the final course is everything you want it to be.
Then you can go back and edit the course, adding, removing, and adjusting content. You will keep doing this until it is precisely the course your company needs to teach workers everything they need to know about manufacturing, including safety and the technical side of things.
Begin pilot testing
During the pilot testing phase, the course can start to go out to more people. A set time period should be allowed for employees to test the course and ensure that any bugs or gaps can be found and addressed.
At this stage, since more time is allowed for testing, testers can see if learners are retaining the things covered in the courses or if more should be done to ensure they’re absorbing what you want them to. You can give them tests after some time to see if the course is working.
Normally, the pilot program will only be made available to a certain number of workers; for example, everyone who has been in the company for a set number of years. It’s more about making sure the course works than it is teaching the students at this stage, so using seasoned and knowledgeable employees is fine.
Deploy your course
Finally, when your course is completely ready, you can start to deploy it to the company. You can do this in sections too—start with a group of new workers until you are ready to deploy it company wide. Eventually, you’ll be able to share it with your partners and vendors, as needed.
Take the next steps on your training journey
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.
E-learning in the manufacturing industry is becoming more widespread, and that makes complete sense. There’s a lot of opportunity for your company to benefit from a manufacturing training LMS. But where to start? We can help you. Making sure that e-learning will benefit your company won’t cost you a thing.
Start a free trial with Dokeos, and we can ensure your manufacturing company has an incredible e-learning platform. Contact us today
