How hybrid events accommodate your evolving workforce

Libby Cross, Senior Marketing Executive

More than ever, employees are expressing their evolving preferences in the direction of more remote and hybrid work. It is becoming more urgent for learning & development professionals to solve this significant question: How can I effectively facilitate the learning & development of all of my employees, no matter how or where they work?

One way learning and development programs can improve effectiveness is by adding hybrid events. Not offering this option, means you run the risk of some employees not feeling connected to your company. It also makes it harder for staff to keep up-to-date with their training.

Learning Pool has helped plenty of organizations implement successful hybrid systems managed by their learning and development program. You can do it, too.

Connect Your Whole Workforce

Connection is critical. As employees connect with each other at work, they feel empowered to do their best work and are more likely to stay. Companies also rely on connections among employees to communicate their most important values. If employees aren’t connecting, it doesn’t matter how well-intentioned your company culture is – it’s not being facilitated without connection.

For example, consider onboarding new employees. The first few weeks are formative. How often do your in-person employees meet other employees and have training meetings together? Is it the same amount for your hybrid and remote-only employees? These employees could be falling through the cracks and failing to connect. Could there be some room in your learning & development program to meet together, even if the main benefit is connecting?

Beyond just the first few weeks, employees are much healthier when they feel like they belong at work. The first step to doing that is connecting them to events. One article by Qualtrics titled “8 Employee Retention Strategies That Work” says that one of the best strategies is to foster a sense of belonging at work. The article claims:

“According to our research, only 20% of employees who feel they don’t belong are engaged versus 91% of those who feel they do – that’s three and a half times more. A sense of belonging not only meets your employees’ basic needs, it inspires their work and drives better business results.”

The benefit of increasing your entire workforce’s connection is a two-way street. Hybrid events create a culture among all of your employees, but they also open a whole dimension to your learning and development program’s greater profile.

Increase Employee Training and Retention

One of the obstacles to a trained workforce is how often the modern workforce switches jobs and careers. Much of the workforce used to switch jobs very rarely. Today workers might switch jobs more than 12 times, and even that number is on the more conservative end of estimations according to a survey conducted by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics in 2019. Then as pandemic conditions swept the world, the working world started rethinking their careers.

If the past few years have signaled anything, it’s that companies that can effectively onboard, train, and track the learning of their new employees quickly will have a competitive advantage. This makes hybrid events more critical than ever in onboarding efforts.

Hybrid learning events help you keep a workforce that remains trained and up-to-date. They also allow for learning & development programs to extensively track learning experiences – creating a more full picture of your workforce and how well they train. And when you have a better understanding of that, you can train your employees and retain your talent before they consider employment elsewhere.

Build a More Diverse Data Profile

Are you tracking how often your learners attend events? Some of the most significant learning moments can take place in environments like workshops or other learning events.

“Progress is made where progress is measured,” is a quote attributed to American fitness guru and nutrition expert Jack Lalanne.

Traditionally, measuring how successful these events were was managed through paper sign-up sheets and then taking attendance. A system built for event tracking makes it simple to build a complete data profile for each of your learners.

Venue from Stream Learning Suite

A superpowered way to automatically measure the progress of your learners in hybrid, in-person, and remote events, is the new Venue capability in Stream Learning Suite.

If you’re interested in Venue’s event management capabilities and you aren’t yet a Learning Pool customer, get started here. And if you are already a Learning Pool customer, your account manager would love to help you quickly get started!

Conclusion

Effective hybrid events connect your organization. The benefits from improving connection result in a two-way street: Your training will be universally accessible to your employees, and your desired company culture will be reciprocated throughout your whole organization. Productive hybrid events help facilitate the learning & development of all your employees no matter how they work.

Learning Pool created Venue to make event management for learning easier for you – but it doesn’t just stop there. Venue integrates with the rest of Stream Learning Suite, where they can be recommended learning modules whether or not they register for any particular event.

Venue is now a feature of our Learning Platform, find out more here.