6 Ways To Make Asynchronous Learning Interactive And Engaging

Market volatility, lagging revenue, and the high risk of recessions are causing anxiety around job security.  Employees are eager to sharpen their skill sets to tighten their grip on the job. However, unfortunately, with their current workload coping with the instructor-led is not a walk in the park.  Even if employees manage to attend a training session, their mind hovers around their pending work. They end up wasting precious hours without absorbing the essential information. 

As per research, 85% of employees would be interested in training timings that fit their schedule.

Employees expect flexibility in learning to balance skill development with work. Hence whether it’s an L&D debate or a LinkedIn Poll, Asynchronous learning is grabbing more votes and attention compared to synchronous learning. learn more about the difference between asynchronous and synchronous learning. 

Why are companies choosing asynchronous learning over synchronous learning?

Research shows that digital learning typically requires 40% to 60% less employee time than learning the same material in a traditional classroom setting. This makes asynchronous learning a clear winner. 

“Synchronous learning” reminds us of school/college, where the dissemination of knowledge happens in real-time. In a synchronous setup, employees must be physically present or attend a live session at the same time as the instructor. 

As employees mature in their roles, they need more guidance and a clear roadmap to build core skills for surviving the tides or recession. Therefore employees are not inclined toward this form of learning. This is leading companies to transition to a flexible asynchronous way of learning where employees can learn at their own pace. 

6 Ways to Make Asynchronous Learning Interactive and Engaging for Your Employees

Like several L&D professionals, are you finding it challenging to make asynchronous learning interactive and engaging? 

We’ve found 6 ways L&D professionals can make asynchronous learning activities interactive and engaging for your employees.  

1. Leverage a Learning Experience Platform – LXP – to Deliver Immersive Learning Experiences

Technology has made our life easier, so why not make the most of it to level up learning? 

Many L&D professionals have realized that their biggest mistake is not using the right software to deliver asynchronous learning at scale. 

With an innovative LXP you can provide a consistent learning experience across the organization and upskill different teams. Let’s look at an example of sales to understand how you can make the most of  LXP features for driving asynchronous learning.

• Create structured sales enablement process to improve the sales results
• Personalize learning to address unique skill gaps for helping employees push deals stuck at different sales stages. 
• Curate sales-driven content, create courses, and streamline it on one platform 
• Evaluate KPI, for instance, the number of deals closed, and accordingly assign courses. 
• Track the learning progress of each sales rep and have an on-to-one meeting for feedback

2. Plan and Set Goals – The core components for engaging learning experiences. 

Asynchronous learning is like an open field where employees might mill around if the boundaries are not set. 

Hence it is imperative to outline the goals and expectations to keep learners on the right track and engaged in an asynchronous setup.

So, instead of just creating and assigning learning programs, you should streamline the entire process. 

Here is what you can do to create a plan and set goals…

• Commence with a learning plan and created a checklist to follow while implementing learning programs.
• Conduct a need analysis to understand the learning requirements of each team.
• Identify the skills for each role and create a skill catalog.
• Through manager and self-assessment, ask each employee to identify their skill gaps.
• Based on the skills gap, create a content strategy and determine the sources to amass the information for skill development.  
• Group employees with similar skill gaps and define the KPIs that would be measured for each group.
• Conduct live sessions with each group to provide a clear vision of what impact the courses will have on individual employees’ performance and career growth.
• After conveying clear expectations, create a journey with various learning modules like Informational e-documents, videos, scenarios-based activities, etc. 
• Provide a brief introduction for each module detailing what skill will it help develop and what learners will gain after completing the course. 
• Assign courses to the employees on the learning experience platform along with the due date.
• Activate email notifications on the LXP, so employees receive regular reminders to complete the course. 

3. Real-time Assessment – The vital ingredient for tracking learning progress 

To ensure continuous learning in an asynchronous setup, most L&D managers link it with performance reviews where employees are asked if they achieved their learning goals. So some employees enroll in the courses and mark it as done but don’t really learn anything. 

With an LXP, you can create assessments to be taken after each course. This helps you understand if employees are really learning or just moving ahead in the learning journey  

To make asynchronous learning interactive, conduct a wide array of assessments like: 

• Objective assessments: Add multiple choice questions that the learner can quickly attempt and move on to the next course. 
• Subjective assessments: Here, the learners are expected to answer the questions in 100 to 150 words.
• Practical assessments: The learner are asked to take up a practical test to ensure they are able to do what they learn. 

Example: After completing the course on conducting an SEO audit, the learners were asked to conduct an SEO audit for the website and identify low handing keywords and broken links. 

4. Leverage Leaderboards – Strike a healthy competition to motivate learners 

Healthy competition is a beneficial tool that helps extract the best out of the employees. Employees feel motivated to walk the extra mile and learn more when their efforts are recognized. Here are a few ways to accomplish this:

•  Use the leaderboard to rank employees as they complete the courses and assessments. 
•  Create different leaderboards for various groups and customize them as per their company’s brand language. 
• Offer badges for the learners who were on the top of the leaderboard. 
• Discover the shift in learning engagement and real-time action.
• Identify low scorers and discover what is preventing them from engaging in the learning program.  

5. Social learning – Leverage the online discussion platform

In the corporate field, employees learn lessons with each new experience. Hence they have a lot to share with their peers, which is why it is pivotal to implement a social platform where employees can learn and grow together.

Many L&D professionals focus on learning in silos, which builds a wall around the learners and confines them to limited learning materials. However, finding an LXP that features a social learning platform helps to facilitate collaborative learning for your employees.

You can use a social media platform for:

• Knowledge sharing: Post daily bytes about the product to ensure the entire company conveys the same message while branding, marketing, or selling the product. 
• Use-case-driven learning: Encourage employees to share a use case of how they addressed a specific issue
• Query resolving – While learning, employees cane become stuck. Encourage them to post their query, allowing a subject matter expert would answer it instantly

6. Feedback – A vital step to improve 

During asynchronous learning, it is crucial to find out if the learning programs are driving value or being ignored by the employees.  To do this, we recommend that you:

• Develop a detailed survey and share it with the learners to obtain feedback.
• Leverage leaderboard points as an incentive to ensure employees take the survey.
• Have one-on-one discussions with employees to understand their expectations.
• Review the feedback received and enhance your asynchronous learning program.

The right learning experience platform can make your asynchronous learning program interactive, engaging and result-driven. An AI-powered LXP, like Disprz, enables you to personalize the entire asynchronous learning experience. It is a  next-gen skilling platform strategically crafted for knowledge workers. It moves beyond basic learning and focuses on end-to-end skilling by evaluating the current proficiency level and crafting the path ahead for each employee. The AI-based platform provides personalized and intelligent learning recommendations based on the job role, interest, and employee learning preferences.