We’ve all heard the claims about the potential effectiveness of blended learning, but how do you realise this potential when developing your blended learning strategy? Try a learning campaign.
For many years now the benefits of blended learning have been touted. Extension of the learning process, embedding of knowledge/skills/know-how, appealing to people with different learning styles, providing consistency and reinforcement and cost effectiveness are just some of the benefits that can be gained from the implementation of a blended approach.
We’ve been trialling blended learning approaches in the corporate world and have found there is much to be learnt from marketing and advertising strategies. Here are some of the techniques we’ve used that are achieving very positive business and learning results.
Develop a cohesive and exciting campaign to support the change
When devising your blended learning strategy, map out a campaign of events that will create a meaningful user experience, support the learning process and provide data to help you access the effectiveness of the campaign. Events could include a pre-workshop teaser, e-vite with assessment questions, face-to-face workshop (which links to the collated findings from the e-vite), follow-up e-learning modules, learning portal, access to online tools/content, coaching tools and activities, further refresher face-to-face modules and assessments. Choose the right learning methods for each stage of the learning process.
All events in the campaign need to be branded with a consistent look and feel, build upon each other and deliver a fully integrated and holistic program.
Use a range of learning techniques that suit your audience
Draw on a broad repertoire of learning techniques that align with your organisational learning culture. The design of the program will be heavily influenced by the way in which your target audience uses technology voluntarily. Influences include online communities, user forums, blogs, online dating sites, online collaborative games, location-specific content for mobile devices and podcasts/vodcasts listened to online, on iPods or mobile devices.
Support on-the-job application and coaching
Integrate tools that support on-the-job application and coaching interventions from managers. Our experience has highlighted the invaluable role managers play in supporting the blended campaign’s effectiveness particularly in the usage of online learning components and coaching interventions. Bring management on-board and firm up their support before the learning campaign is rolled out.
Track completion and link learning to accreditation processes
If possible set up a system to manage campaigns, track completion of each element of the campaign and report on return on investment. For large numbers of users a learning campaign management system is critical to minimise administration and provide data that helps you evaluate campaign effectiveness. When we couldn’t find an off-the-shelf system to manage the campaign we developed our own system to automate and manage all components of the program. When tracking is possible you can link completion of campaign components to an accreditation process. For example accreditation to a sale training program may require completion of the pre-workshop questionnaire, workshop attendance, e-learning module completion, completion of 3 coaching assessment and a pass-mark on the online assessment. Establishing an effective accreditation process will help maximise take-up/usage, communicate the importance of the campaign, increase learning/business outcomes and deliver sustainable behavioural change.
Experiment
Experiment with new technology and associated blends of learning interventions. Track effectiveness of your campaigns and continually strive for that perfect blend. Lisa Vincent
Director
Savv-e
Evolve 
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