What’s Best: eLearning or Conventional Training Approaches?

Stating The Problem

elearning is not a new technology. It’s been around in various forms since the 1980s, though today’s elearning is miles away from the rudimentary programs kids took in computer labs back when Macintoshes and Rubik’s Cubes were new.

However, even though elearning now has a fairly long use-case history, there are still many training managers (and others) who have doubts about its efficacy. But the fact is, correctly designed and applied elearning is an innovative technology that can improve companies’ safety training programs. It can improve training coverage, lower training costs, and increase compliance with training goals. elearning can reduce accidents and injuries. In short, elearning can increase the bottom line.

This is the big question that we are most often asked to answer: Is online safety training as effective as instructor-led safety training? After wrestling with this question for the past 10 years or more, we believe that neither instructor-led training or asynchronous elearning is inherently better than the other. The best training outcomes are achieved when they are used together. Let us tell you why.

What do we mean by “asynchronous elearning?”

Synchronous elearning involves a human instructor holding a course, via the Web, through an LMS such as Blackboard™ or Moodle™. Asynchronous elearning means that learners are assigned one or more modules of self-paced training, whether it’s through an LMS, streaming from a website, or even from a DVD or other medium. There is no instructor, per se, it’s just the device (computer, tablet or smartphone) and the student. The student’s progress is tracked and reported on the LMS. At its best, this type of elearning:

• Provides content in the form of text, voice narration (sound) as well as animation and illustration to leverage all three ways the learner learns – auditory, visual, and cognitive
• Has a high-level of interactivity, requiring more user interaction than just clicking “next”
• Features animation, simulation and gaming exercises where learners can apply the information in scenario form, which result in outcomes (desired and not desired)
• Is dynamically adaptive in such a way that the learner can choose multiple learning pathways
• Possesses analytics beyond simply score or pass/fail, where learner behavior within the course is captured for trending and continual improvement
• Is relevant to the learner’s role and industry in not only content, but in context as well
  At its worst, asynchronous elearning is simply a toggling PowerPoint slide deck with a multiple choice test at the end.

For purposes of this discussion, when referring to “online training,” we are referring to self-paced, online safety training delivered asynchronously.

What do we mean by “safety training?”

For the purposes of this discussion, we are defining “safety training” to include training objectives involving compliance with regulations, standards or organizational policies involving environmental, occupational health, occupational safety, and/or human resources subjects.

The Instructor’s Role

A college professor typically has at least semester or more to impart knowledge to students, and have the student largely take ownership for his or her own long-term learning. Contrast this with an instructor hired by an employer to deliver, for example, a HAZCOM course to group of employees. The instructor has been hired to train these employees on their rights and responsibilities under the standard, the hazards they are potentially exposed to, and how they can mitigate those hazards. The idea is to get them trained and back on the job, working safely. In this scenario, the instructor bears more relative responsibility to ensure that the learners absorb the material in a meaningful way than the college professor. With little exception, simply failing an employee because she didn’t pay attention during the lectures is not an option.

Differences in Learner Motivation

Employees almost always roll their eyes at safety training. They most often see it as a waste of their valuable time. Of course, there are some exceptions. A new employee who will be assigned to work at heights will generally see his Elevated Fall and Rigging training as critical. And yes, a new firefighter will clearly see the value in her First Responder HAZMAT Technician training. But nevertheless, the vast majority of assigned EHS training is seen as a bureaucratic requirement meant to “check a box.”

Verifying Competence and Measuring Outcome

It’s widely understood that with safety training, it’s not enough to show that an employee has been trained. Showing that the learner was able to parrot back information in the form of a multiple choice test is not sufficient, though this approach is common in corporate and industrial training programs. Ideally, employees must demonstrate that they actually learned and achieved competency in performing the job safely.

An effective EHS training program must, through job hazard analysis, establish direct links between identified hazards and impacts associated with the employee competencies required to mitigate them, as well as the training designed to deliver those competencies.

Designing Effective Training: Instructional Design and the Competency-Based Approach

Safety training and other types of employee training can generate greater employee “buy in” through good instructional design, which in turn relies on a good understanding or adult learning theory. In terms of learning, adults have different values and priorities than children. Adults value knowing why they are being required to learn material, and having the necessary information explained as clearly, concisely and logically as possible.

Tying training to identified competencies in such a way that adults will understand and pay attention to them is not always easy. When designing this type of training, it’s best to take a methodical approach such as instructional systems design, also known as ISD.

The most common ISD model is called the “ADDIE” model – Analyze, Design, Develop, Implement and Evaluate. In the “analyze” and “design” phases, the audience is carefully defined and their needs are recognized. The subject matter is clearly outlined, and the most logical order of presentation is derived. This approach perfectly dovetails with the typical adult learner’s needs: targeted, common-sense information designed to fulfill a specific, defined goal.

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