Affiliates

Compliance

Content partners

Learning and development

Learning technology

News

Product updates

Wellbeing

The official Go1 blog. Bringing you the latest insights into learning technology, professional development, thought leadership, and Go1 product news.

Blog

petrol_green

True

The official Go1 Blog. Bringing you the latest insights into learning technology, professional development, thought leader opinion, and Go1 product news.

Subscribe to the Go1 Blog

Accounting and Finance

Time Management

Sales and Customer Service

Digital Marketing

General Management

Housing and Real Estate

Human Resources

Industrial Skills

Investment and Trading

Leadership

Legal

Marketing

People and Communication Skills

Project Management

Business Skills

Language and Literature

Health and Well-being

Writing and Publishing

Audiovisual and Music

Personal Development

Health and Safety

HR Compliance

Data Compliance

Financial Compliance

Crisis Management

Safety and Compliance

IT Software

Web Design and Development

Data & Analytics

Design and Animation

Gaming and Games Development

Devops, Networking and Security

Programming and Web Development

Computer Science and Engineering

Technology Skills

Privacy

Featured courses

Global settings

Twitter

LinkedIn

Youtube

Custom content or off-the-shelf learning? It’s an ongoing L&D dilemma. 

As an L&D professional, you’ve probably found yourself deliberating over the pros and cons of off-the-shelf learning compared to custom content. 

Both buying content and building your own have their advantages and disadvantages, while a combination of both off-the-shelf learning and custom content is also a popular choice. As such, it’s best to know the benefits of both types of learning content before making a decision. 

Here’s everything you need to know about the pros and cons of off-the-shelf learning. We’ll start with a snapshot of the pros and cons, before exploring each of these points in greater detail. 

Snapshot: pros and cons of off-the-shelf learning

According to LinkedIn’s 2019 Workplace Learning Report, 73% of talent developers say they use off-the-shelf learning content to train employees, while 85% of talent developers say they use internally created, custom content to train employees. 

These figures show two things. Firstly, both off-the-shelf learning and custom content can be beneficial in certain learning scenarios. Secondly, combining both off-the-shelf learning and custom content is a common and popular choice for many L&D teams.

Despite this, many L&D teams struggle with their content procurement process. While both forms of content are popular, often, teams find it difficult to know when one type of content is more suitable than the other, leading to an amalgamation that doesn’t fully address the original issue. 

For example, Emerald Works’ 2020 Back to the Future Report finds that 39% of L&D teams say they are overwhelmed and under-equipped, while 26% cite a lack of attractive, high-quality digital content as a major concern. Additionally, 95% of L&D teams say “digital content development” is a priority, yet, only 29% say they have the competency to deliver on this goal. 

A recent Deloitte survey also found that only 5% of companies believe they have mastered the content and technology capabilities needed to make digital learning an accessible and compelling experience.

In other words, there is a lot of room to improve the content procurement process. Many L&D teams are still uncertain about which content is the most suitable for a learning project. 

When is off-the-shelf learning your best option, and when does custom content come out on top? Let’s find out. 

One of the biggest pros of ready-made off-the-shelf training courses is the ability to reduce your spending. This type of content allows you to deliver informative and engaging learning for your employees at a lower price than most customised training programs. By using off-the-shelf learning, you also do not need to hire consultants, designers, or experts to create a course — you simply download the program and add it to your LMS.

Off-the-shelf learning is also perfect for providing training on particular systems and programs, such as Microsoft Office, Adobe Creative Suite, and so forth. It is also great for courses that cover generic topics like team building, compliance training, change management, negotiation skills, and customer service. These generalised, skill-based courses contain content that can be successfully applied across various organisations.

Another benefit of off-the-shelf learning is the ability to save time and have training exactly when you need it. As the content is available immediately after purchasing, all you have to do is download it and add it to your LMS, meaning a quick turnaround time for your learners. 

Breadth and diversity of content is another pro of off-the-shelf learning. Instead of designing course after course from scratch, a wealth of content is already available, waiting for you. 

Finally, off-the-shelf content is typically written by subject matter experts who are trusted content creators in that area or field. As such, you are generally assured of a high level of quality and expertise. 

Cons: when is custom content my best option? 

There are some situations where off-the-shelf learning just isn’t suitable. Instead, you’ll benefit from using custom content to provide your staff with tailored learning materials specific to your organisation.

In an article for eLearning Industry, Dr Ayesha Habeeb Omer explains why custom content is often the best choice for certain product training and software systems training.

“ERP end-user training, for example, is something off-the-shelf eLearning courses are not suitable for: it is completely tied to an organisation’s internal processes and working,” she says.

It may sound obvious, but the biggest benefit of custom content is that it can be customised to meet any criteria. Therefore, learning content can be tailored to your company’s exact requirements and highly targeted to your learners. 

Every company or organisation has unique training needs that relate directly to its culture, processes, systems, and goals. There may be times when you can’t source relevant content from external sources for these unique requirements.

You may also want your eLearning courses to reflect your company’s brand, using your brand, corporate colours, or logo throughout the course. With custom content, you can include these branding elements in your training materials.

Keen to learn how Go1 can help improve your digital learning content? Reach out to our friendly 24/7 support team anytime for a chat.

False

As an L&D professional, you’ve probably found yourself deliberating over off-the-shelf learning vs custom content. Here’s everything you need to know about the pros and cons of off-the-shelf learning.

Pros and cons of off-the-shelf learning

Selecting digital learning content is a vital step for any L&D team. However, it shouldn’t be a painful one. 

All too often, the digital content procurement process throws up more questions than answers. Just a few that might influence your decision include: 

Is this content appropriate for each audience in the business?

What are the most appropriate styles for your business?

Which content formats will suit your learners?

What are the pros and cons of different brands?

What content may be coming in the future?

Will this content address our identified skills gaps?

Adding to this, the learning technology landscape is vast and complex, meaning procuring and curating content can be time-consuming. Further, providers that offer a single delivery style are unable to engage learners in different ways, making content diversity a key consideration. 

It’s our goal to simplify this process, so we’ve compiled everything you need to know about selecting digital learning content for your next project. 

The challenges of selecting digital learning content

While selecting digital learning content is essential, it remains an area where many L&D teams struggle. 

According to Emerald Works’ 2020 Back to the Future Report, 26% of L&D teams cite “lack of attractive, high-quality digital content that supports our business goals” as a primary concern. Worryingly, this feeling is on the rise, increasing from 21% in 2019. 

Additionally, 95% of L&D teams say “digital content development” is a priority, yet, only 29% say they have the competency to deliver on this goal. Again, this percentage is trending in the wrong direction, down from 34% in 2018. 

The good news is that among high-impact learning cultures (defined as the top 10% of surveyed L&D teams), only 6% are concerned about a “lack of attractive, high-quality digital content that supports our business goals.” In other words, nailing your digital content procurement process can have many positive ramifications, allowing your team to go from strength to strength. 

Selecting the right digital learning content for my team

In such a vast digital learning landscape, there are several traps that you can fall into when selecting digital learning content. 

For starters, it is essential to get your content vetting process right. Often, teams fail to vet content thoroughly. Instead, they base their decision on a recommendation. To ensure the right decision is made, teams should consult subject matter experts to thoroughly and objectively vet any potential content.  

It is also important to factor in your existing learning culture and the pace of your organisation when selecting digital learning content. For example, it is no good selecting dense, long-form content if your learners have little time to dedicate to learning. 

As such, you must understand your learner’s needs — how much time they have for learning, where they need to upskill, their prior relationship to learning, their preferred learning style, and more. To achieve this, a training needs analysis can be a useful tool. For more information on how to conduct a training needs analysis, see our article on how to assess employee training needs. 

Finally, it is crucial to consider the learning format when selecting digital learning content. As mentioned in our previous article on driving higher learner engagement, learning content can often be laborious and predictable in its delivery style. 

According to LinkedIn’s 2021 Workplace Learning Report, blended learning is here to stay, with 73% of L&D pros expecting to spend less on instructor-led training and 79% expecting to spend more on blended online learning. With this in mind, it is important to diversify your digital learning content to combat any potential monotony. 

To achieve this, you should offer a wide range of learning content to cater to learners with different learning capacities and preferences.

Using Go1 to procure digital learning content for your next project 

Go1 can be your one-stop shop to overcome the challenges of selecting digital learning content.

You don't have to compromise quality or quantity with the world's largest eLearning Library. The Go1 Content Hub includes specialist and generalist top-tier providers all in one place, so your learning initiatives always hit the mark. 

For popular topics, we work with a range of well-regarded partners to ensure coverage. We proactively, tactically approach partners to find content to meet gaps in our library. Accordingly, the Go1 Content Hub has the diversity and quality of content required to combat digital content monotony and meet a wide range of learning needs. 

For further insights on selecting digital learning content, be sure to read our articles on what the modern learner needs and mapping learning content to skills. 

Selecting digital learning content is a vital step for any L&D team. However, it shouldn’t be a painful one. It’s our goal to simplify this process, so we’ve compiled everything you need to know about selecting digital learning content for your next project. 

Everything you need to know about selecting digital learning content for your next project

It's a question that constantly plagues us, especially as we work from home more and more.

There's a lot of pressure on organizations at the moment to do something to minimize the challenges this can have on their employees.

We teamed up with leading experts AP Psychology & Consulting Services to look at the important role that training can play in supporting people in this new landscape.

What do we mean when we say employees are 'thriving'? 

AP Psychology & Consulting Services defines thriving at work as the following: 

Employees are happy, healthy and highly productive. 

They feel safe to express themselves and their opinions and raise concerns. 

There are policies and procedures that promote the mental health, wellbeing and safety of individuals and everyone around them. 

eLearning isn't a magic bullet, but well-timed education can make a world of difference.

Here are some points to consider, to help you get the most out of your online training:

eLearning works best when paired with clear policies, procedures, and workplace actions that support it.

It requires a clear statement from the workplace and leaders that protect and promote appropriate behaviors in the workplace.

It is greatly improved with context, either through videos or messages from the workplace, to demonstrate how that learning can be applied and how important it is to the workplace.

We need to learn in a variety of forms. Often people need to hear the same thing from multiple sources and in multiple ways and a large library of eLearning is ideal for this.

Online learning is highly effective when paired with blended solutions like workshops or virtual meetings guided by experts.

L&D professionals are often hamstrung by competing priorities. There may be support for an initiative, but no funds. Or there are funds, but no time. Or often, neither funds nor time feels available.

If you are stuck for a place to start, AP Psychology & Consulting Services recommends taking the following steps: 

There's a system of building blocks that allow people to thrive at work.

The first is creating a psychologically safe environment, which is a fundamental responsibility of every workplace.

The next is providing education and support for people's mental health.

The last is providing the tools and space for people to manage their own wellbeing in the way that works best for them.

An ideal workplace program might look like:

Leaders set the standard and lead by example. If we educate them, support them, and help them to thrive at work, they'll set the standard for the rest of the workplace.

Give your leaders access to the resources they need to learn more about what it takes to be a psychologically safe leader. And give them time to learn and practice those skills.

Complement this with policies and procedures for your workplace.

Give people a clear and obvious place to point to to know what is expected of them and what is and isn't okay at work.

Make sure your employees have training resources that they can use to skill themselves up. Ongoing education is a fundamental aspect of thriving at work.

MHA have a full Mental Health Month toolkit you can download, as well as policy and procedure links and advice on their website.

For our local Salt Lake City residents, MHU has set up a fantastic new suite of programs and films that they're launching this May.

💡 A tip from us: work with experts - don't try and take on everything yourself. We're excited to be working with AP Psychology & Consulting Services to help guide us on our own journey.

Visit the Go1 Content Insider - April Edition to learn more about what's available in the Go1 Content Hub

Go1 customers can access guides and six new playlists that have been developed in collaboration with AP Psychology & Consulting Services to help you roll out a program like this. Just ask your CSM or get in touch.

L&D professionals are often hamstrung by competing priorities. There may be support for an initiative, but no funds. Or there are funds, but no time. Or often, neither funds nor time feels available. If you are stuck for a place to start, there's a system of building blocks that allow people to thrive at work. 

To engage your audience, you must first understand them. What motivates them? What does learning mean to them? What has their learning experience been so far? And, most importantly, why is learning important to them? 

Although understanding your audience should be a fundamental skill in any L&D professional’s toolkit, a fast-paced environment, lack of resources, and clashing priorities can all lead to L&D teams skipping this step. 

Unfortunately, doing so can be a fatal error, as failing to understand your audience can lead to some all-too-common problems. Stop us if you’ve heard these before. 

Problem 1: L&D doesn’t take enough time to understand and promote the impact of their learning program on the learner. Therefore, the learner doesn’t understand the value of the learning, diminishing the program’s impact and engagement. 

Problem 2: The learner is being asked to do something new in an already busy working schedule.

Problem 3: The learning content is laborious and predictable in its delivery style (i.e. always long-form video with American accents)

To overcome these problems, we’ve identified a few essential steps that you can take. 

In a recent podcast, Lucy Dunleavy of Learnbox explained that when she was working in prisons to help reform inmates (some of the most challenging people to engage in learning), it was important to build ‘pre-learning’ into the process to drive success.

In the same way that you should stretch before starting a workout, your mind needs some preparation time before focusing on learning — particularly prescribed learning. That’s where pre-learning comes in. Think of it as a warm-up for your learners. 

You can build up to formal learning after starting your digital learning strategy with something like a book club, which is a perfect pre-learning tool. 

Using a provider like Blinkist to organise a book club that meets physically or virtually can get people used to learning. In turn, pre-learning gives you more exposure to your learners while also opening their minds to other learning possibilities.

Rather than throwing your learners straight into the deep end, ramping things up slowly with pre-learning can result in more open-minded and engaged learners.

Change is one of the only constants in life. Unfortunately, someone forgot to tell humans that. As habitual creatures, we can be highly resistant to change. Most of us are probably apprehensive about changing desks, let alone changing the way we approach learning.  

In L&D, resistance often comes from staff being used to the old way, which can be a roadblock to L&D’s progress and success — especially when it comes to engaging learners. 

For example, Emerald Works' 2020 State of Learning Report found that 36% of L&D leaders have traditional expectations that are difficult to challenge, while 29% of L&D teams say they are negatively affected by the pace of technological change.

How do high-performing teams overcome resistance to change? 

The good news is that high-impact learning cultures (defined as the top 10% of surveyed companies) are a shining example of what is possible when L&D teams embrace change. Among HILCs, only 18% say that leaders have traditional expectations that are difficult to challenge, while just 9% say they are negatively affected by the pace of technological change. 

The best part? More than half of HILCs (56%) say they increase employee engagement with learning, compared to just 22% of other organisations.

Resistance to change is natural. However, employees who are holding on to traditional expectations of L&D should be encouraged to embrace a growth mindset, moving on from ‘what always worked’ to ‘what is working now.’

One way to facilitate this change is by posing the question, ‘could there be a better way to learn?’ Often, the answer is a resounding yes! 

Different learner preferences and learning capacities

Failing to appreciate different learning styles and preferences is another impediment to learner engagement. 

According to Shift eLearning, the average employee has less than 1% of their working week to dedicate to learning. That equates to just 5 minutes per week. Given this, techniques such as just in time learning and learning in the flow are essential to engage learners on their own terms. 

CEB research finds that 57% of learners now expect learning to be more ‘just in time’ than it was three years ago. Similarly, Emerald Works' 2020 State of Learning Report found that “96% of time spent learning occurs in the daily flow of work and only 4% of time occurs away from the flow of work.” 

How can I cater to different learning styles? 

Given most learners are so time-poor, offering learning content that doesn’t suit their preferences is a surefire way to lose their engagement. Instead, learners must be reached in the flow of work in a way that suits their learning style, preferences, and capacities.

That’s where Go1 comes in. When it comes to meeting a wide range of learning needs, we have done the hard work for you. Decide what is best for your organisation on any given topic by selecting from a comprehensive collection of general and specialist learning libraries in the Go1 Content Hub. By accessing your content from one source, you'll never have to compromise on what to deliver, ever again.

For further insights on driving higher learner engagement, be sure to read our articles on aligning L&D to the organisation’s strategy and what the modern learner needs. 

To engage your audience, you must first understand them. What motivates them? What has their learning experience been so far? And, most importantly, why is learning important to them? To answer these questions we’ve identified a few essential steps that you can take. 

Digital learning content should drive higher learner engagement

Many of you have probably come across the term “sales readiness,” and if you follow investment news, the space has taken sales enablement by storm over the last few years. Why are so many global, high-growth enterprises increasingly turning to sales readiness and migrating away from an LMS or traditional sales enablement solution? 

The answer lies in the evolution of learning at these companies, which have come to see the clear ROI of sales readiness solutions and the immediate, positive long-term impact they’ve had for customer-facing teams. Many sales enablement and L&D leaders realize that an ongoing learning and professional skill development framework offered by a sales readiness solution can achieve what LMS and many enablement solutions are simply unable to do: unearth gaps in knowledge and skills, enable reps to retain knowledge, practice proficiencies and incrementally hone their selling skills. 

The secret sauce behind sales readiness is “everboarding.” What is it? Rather than a single course or sequence of one-off learning modules to help sales (and customer-facing) teams essentially memorize the products and services they sell, sales readiness provides a deeper understanding and ability to learn and effectively apply skills. 

In other words, sellers are ready and prepared to have impactful,  productive interactions with prospects and customers. By further enabling sales reps to observe, learn, practice, and apply the knowledge and skills accrued through readiness programs, they can successfully bridge capability and enablement gaps. 

Here are five key components to enable your team to be sales-ready:

1. Take one step at a time: incremental, customized skills training and knowledge retention

You’re probably familiar with onboarding and ramping up sales reps and other employees, whether through HR or L&D or enablement programs. The key differences with a readiness solution are that it is asynchronous, personalized and ongoing. Yes, the core onboarding process includes what you think it would: HR compliance and tech skills training, an overview of the company, its products and messaging. But how long will it be before reps forget much of what they’ve learned? 

Research shows that people won’t retain much of what they’ve learned after just a week thanks to the “forgetting curve.” That’s why readiness solutions are essential for high-performing sales teams -- they provide ongoing learning through spaced-out micro-content, as well as regular updates and assessments to continually unearth knowledge gaps and ensure reps retain learnings in the long term. What’s more, readiness platforms provide innovative ways for reps to apply what they’ve learned all from the convenience of their mobile devices.

2. Practice practice practice: applied skills training  

A pro in any field will tell you the key to success is practice, practice, practice. That’s exactly why readiness solutions have become so popular with enablement and L&D teams. Leading sales readiness platforms like MindTickle allow reps to practice skills and apply knowledge with the help of virtual role-plays. 

Role-plays fill in the gaps between knowledge and delivery by simulating real-world scenarios, including pitches, demos, cold calls, emails, objection handling, etc.  Managers can give feedback to reps to improve pitches, focus on key terms and messaging, and learn from their peers.  

3. Become remote-first and always ready: virtual events, peer collaboration and live interactions 

Sales kick-off meetings are an important event that prepares sales teams for success. They boost engagement, align sales teams with the organizational strategy, offer key information to succeed in the field, celebrate wins and help sellers learn from losses from the previous year. 

The importance of SKOs and quarterly business reviews have only grown since last year’s pandemic-induced lockdown, requiring companies to look for virtual options to run engaging, productive sales meetings. Virtual sales events are integral to sales enablement and have naturally found a home on readiness platforms like MindTickle, the platform of choice for numerous organizations to make their sales events effective and engaging.

4 Deliver the right content in the right context: curated content 

“Content is king.” Remember the phrase that defined online interactivity over the last few decades? Well, it’s still relevant today, especially for sales reps who need to navigate increasingly complex sales cycles and interact with increasingly savvy buyers. One key challenge for L&D and sales enablement leaders is finding the right content for their programs and the best solution to make content available just when reps need it. If done manually, it’s time-consuming. 

Luckily there are not only content providers such as Go1, which offer excellent, relevant, and curated content, but also readiness platforms that can integrate curated content as part of a content management system. With this integrated solution in place, reps can consume content  when they need it most, be assessed or certified on it, and practice what they’ve learned from content in different real-life scenarios. 

5. Learn from the pros: Empower structured, 1-on-1 coaching sessions

Coaching can improve revenues by as much as 28%. More and more revenue and enablement leaders have added coaching to their everboarding processes. 

Initial onboarding and everboarding are critical aspects of enablement, but coaching is debatably the most important – and frequently more difficult – to implement because it’s based on reinforcing and building on a foundation through continual, structured, individualized sessions. Coaching requires structure as well as follow-ups that improve not just incremental knowledge, but specific skills and behaviors. 

It’s precisely because coaching can be more complex that many organizations have avoided it — to their own detriment — until comprehensive solutions like MindTickle came along with out-of-the-box, AI-guided coaching sessions built into its platform, easily integrating coaching with enablement and complementing existing LMS solutions.

A sales readiness solution is the best approach your organization has in readying your sales team and maximizing their potential to improve deal win rates and sizes by making them more capable and effective at selling. With a comprehensive sales readiness solution, you’ll be able to bring together all the above five key components and have the added benefit of gathering the metrics you need to improve training, content and coaching to continuously and incrementally improve team performance.

Our partnership with MindTickle provides teams with a comprehensive, data-driven solution for sales readiness and enablement that fuels revenue growth and brand value. 

Want to learn more about how you can leverage Go1 content on the MindTickle platform? Request a demo here.

A sales readiness solution is the best approach your organization has in readying your sales team and maximizing their potential. Gene Epshteyn, Senior Product Marketing Manager at MindTickle, shares his top tips for creating a sales-ready team. 