Millennials, COVID-19 and Technology

Millennials, COVID-19 and Technology

The effects of the COVID-19 outbreak are unprecedented in living memory. Almost unique in peacetime, the changes to society, work and leisure are far-reaching, with major measures to prevent the spread of the virus in place in every country touched by it.

The crisis has shone a light on the central role of technology in our society. If our reliance on modern tech was something to be concerned about beforehand, it has become nothing short of vital now. Perhaps the Millennial generation – long mocked for their supposed obsession with technology over real-world interactions – are specially placed to adjust to these changes.

The Role of Technology

With many people confined to their homes for the foreseeable future, our internet connections have to stand in for many of the building blocks of normal life:

  • Work: Those who are able to work from home have been told to do so. This has created an army of remote workers, many of them working from home for extended periods for the first time in their careers.
  • Education: Since schools closed, many parents and family members are finding themselves in the role of temporary teachers. The internet provides endless content for activities to keep children happy, engaged and learning during the closure period, as well as providing a handy way for teachers to put work online for their students.
  • Social Lives: With gatherings forbidden, technology allows us to remember that “social distancing” only refers to physical distance. Keeping in contact with our friends and family remotely is more important than ever. When phone calls and social media posts just aren’t enough, video calls can give us that much-needed dose of human interaction.
  • Shopping: People have been advised to shop online for essentials where they’re able to. It’s not always possible – due to the greater demand, delivery slots are harder to come by – but where it can be done, it avoids unnecessary interaction with others and helps to stop the spread of the virus.

While for many people this is a revolution in how they live their lives, for many millennials, it is an intensifying of habits they already had.

Coming of age in the early 2000s, millennials were the first generation to fully embrace social media and go through the latter stages of school and university with broadband internet access close at hand. Keeping in touch with friends in far-flung places, ordering items online and doing work – or school work – at home is second nature to many. Though it is of course a generalisation, it may be the older generation who are feeling the most strain from the coronavirus lockdown.

Every generation expresses a preference for some flexibility in where they work from, but this has been particularly strong for millennials. For years before the crisis began, this age group were showing a strong desire to work from home where possible. It’s hard to predict what long-term effects the coronavirus lockdown will have on working practices, but with widespread home-working becoming the new (temporary) norm, it could be that more employers follow this line in the future, adapting their business demands to the needs of millennial workers.

Pulling Together

Now more than ever, society needs to pull together – and that needs effort from people in all age groups.

This period has been full of examples of the best social media has to offer the world. For example, within a few days of the shutdown there were hundreds of Mutual Aid groups on Facebook, where local people who were vulnerable, self-isolating or running low on essential supplies could ask for help. There have also been successful fundraising efforts to help those most at risk of the virus, such as the Robin Hood Fund in Nottingham.

Video calling technology has also been useful for connecting older people who cannot leave their homes or receive visitors to their families – proving that far from pushing people apart as opponents of such technology have suggested, it can actually bring people separated by circumstances closer together.

Helpful Resources

Here are some more helpful tips and resources to help you while remote working:

Remote Working awareness course

Try our Remote Working awareness course to stay safe and healthy away from the office.

Information Security awareness training

With the flexibility to work from home in the current climate, it’s a great time to refresh your knowledge of keeping business information secure and working safely online. Try our awareness training courses on key information security topics to working safely and securely away from the office.

Business Contingency Plan (BCP) for Infection Outbreaks

A blog post with helpful tips for businesses on drawing up a business contingency plan and ensuring business continuity.

Mental Health While Working Remotely

A blog post with helpful tips on how to care for your mental health while working from home for longer periods.

Four Tips For Keeping Safe Online When Remote Working

With the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus globally, a majority of businesses are following up on the official advice of social distancing, encouraging employees to work remotely and ensuring business continuity. While remote working has its benefits, it could also lead to potential cybersecurity risks for employers and employees.

Here are some helpful tips for ensuring cyber safety and information security when working remotely.

Work on Secure Network

The first and most important step to working remotely is making sure you are connected to the Internet, ready to connect with your workplace, communicate with colleagues and access business information online. Failing to work on a secure network can make you vulnerable to a cyber-attack, compromising your systems and business information in such a critical time.

Top Tip:

Make sure you are using a virtual private network (VPN) or a secure home network with strong end-to-end encryption, for example, Office 365 SSL session. Using an unsecured network such as public WiFi could inadvertently create an access point for hackers and cybercriminals to exploit and make your systems susceptible to cyberattacks.

Secure Your Personal Devices

With so many employees working remotely, many organisations have authorised the use of personal devices when working from home. Using your personal device for work is fine as long as you are keeping it secure and have the most up-to-date software and settings running on it.

Top Tip:

It is very important to make sure that you are running the most up-to-date anti-virus software on your device. Anti-virus software carries out regular scans of your computer and removes any malware detected. Make sure you are combining the anti-virus software with a robust firewall – software that monitors incoming and outgoing network traffic on your machine. This will ensure that you are significantly reducing the risks of cybercriminals successfully infiltrating your machine.

Beware of Phishing Attacks

Beware of cybercriminals looking to exploit the current situation on the coronavirus pandemic. Phishing attacks are designed to gain unauthorised access to confidential information through email.

Security experts are reporting a substantial rise in phishing email scams related to the coronavirus – the worst they have seen in years. The BBC has followed up on reports of individuals and businesses being targeted with phishing emails. The campaigns include tax refunds from the HMRC, email attachments from the World Health Organisation (WHO), bitcoin donations to help fight the coronavirus and scare tactics aimed at giving up work or personal email details.

Top Tips:

  • Never click on links in emails that you receive from people you don’t know.
  • If you’re not expecting an email, always examine the content of the email thoroughly and look out for grammar or spelling of the email – these are the tell-tale signs of a phishing scam.
  • If the email is claiming to be from public bodies such as the HMRC or the WHO, don’t open these emails as these are well-known phishing scams circulating currently.
  • If in doubt, always forward the email to your IT team first and get help in verifying if the email is legitimate.

Keep Business Information Secure

Any business information you access from home will be protected by secure login and password. Be it your work email, online business applications and communications tools. Weak credentials are easily exploited by cybercriminals and setting secure passwords is your first line of defence against hackers trying to gain unauthorised access to businesses’ systems.

Top Tip:

Use strong and unique passwords each time and make sure they are a combination of letters, numbers and characters. Apart from setting up secure passwords, try using multi-factor authentication for your organisation’s systems. Multi-factor authentications work by verifying user identity by multiple credentials, normally a password and a code sent to the user’s phone by text or an additional security question.

Effective information security is key to optimising business information while remote working. Keeping information security risks under control will not only protect your own interests, but also those of your organisation, your customers and all other individuals or organisations that you hold information about.

Helpful Resources

Here are some more helpful tips and resources to help you while remote working:

Remote Working awareness course

Try our Remote Working awareness course to stay safe and healthy away from the office.

Information Security awareness training

With the flexibility to work from home in the current climate, it’s a great time to refresh your knowledge of keeping business information secure and working safely online. Try our awareness training courses on key information security topics to working safely and securely away from the office.

Business Contingency Plan (BCP) for Infection Outbreaks

A blog post with helpful tips for businesses on drawing up a business contingency plan and ensuring business continuity.

Mental Health While Working Remotely

A blog post with helpful tips on how to care for your mental health while working from home for longer periods.

Refresher Training in the Age of Home Working

People have been predicting a sharp rise in working from home for years. Sadly, it’s come to pass in a way few would have predicted, and nobody would have wished for.

The Covid-19 crisis continues to change the way we live and work in profound ways. Even for workplaces that can shift to a largely remote working model, it is a large change to make with very little preparation time. Individuals too are transitioning to performing their roles in ways they wouldn’t have predicted a few weeks ago.

In the midst of these difficulties and fast-moving changes, how does your training plan fit into all this?

A Remote Model of Learning

The key word for getting businesses through the coronavirus outbreak is “adaptability”. With eLearning, adaptability is one of its greatest strengths.

Employees working from home and juggling their job’s demands and a sudden increase in childcare responsibilities will need extra flexibility with hours. Rolling out eLearning courses is the perfect solution. Courses can be taken whenever it suits the learner and you can be sure that everyone is getting the same information.

Modern eLearning is designed to be accessible. People can take their courses on whichever device is most convenient or comfortable for them.

Training for Remote Workers

There are many topics that lend themselves to being the focus of refresher training during the period of coronavirus.

Cyber security is one of the most obvious. Being outside of the traditional working environment – for the first time for many – it can be easy to forget the basics of protecting yourself and your data. Some refresher training in this area can remind people of cyber sec’s importance and protect them, and your business, from anyone trying to take advantage of the situation by exploiting poor cyber security.

With such an upheaval in working practices, it can help to get a refresher on risk assessments. Spotting potential hazards is just as important at home and we might even forget to look out for them because we’re generally more at ease in a familiar environment.

Social media has been buzzing with people sharing their (often very improvised) home working stations. While amusing in many cases, it’s important to remember the need for good display screen equipment (DSE) set ups. Though this can of course be challenging in a household with minimal free space or with several people working from home at once, employers still have a duty of care to their employees to help them avoid musculoskeletal problems from bad DSE usage. Providing refresher training can help jog people’s memories.

Remote working is in itself a new challenge for many. Sending out general remote working training can be very helpful at a time like this. Even in a crisis, there are benefits to this style of working, and many might find themselves feeling more productive. Yet staying connected to others and being aware of the issues around remote working can be helpful.

One area that might be overlooked is mental health. Workplace stress was a huge, widespread issue even before the coronavirus outbreak. Current events will be exacerbating existing anxiety. Employers should do all they reasonably can to watch out for their employees’ mental health and support them where they need it. Stress management courses might help people to handle their current work stress – or even help with the stress from other areas of their lives.

Refreshing eLearning

Everyone involved in training knows it is not just a simple “one time and done” job. Our brains don’t work like that. We need our knowledge to be topped up and used regularly, with training filling in any gaps that might be left over from the first time round.

This is where eLearning really comes into its own. Training schedules can be adapted year on year to make sure the basics are still covered, but people aren’t taking the exact same course over and over again. People can take short courses to address any small gaps in knowledge.

Not at Home?

It’s important to remember that not everyone has the luxury of switching to a remote working model. Many jobs can’t be done remotely, including those of key workers such as hospital staff.

For their benefit and everyone else’s, we are making our Preventing the Spread of Infection course free for the next 12 months.

Looking After your Mental Health While Working Remotely

Looking After your Mental Health While Working Remotely

The government are now advising us to avoid all but essential social contact, and as many organisations implement voluntary or mandatory remote working policies in response, it means a lot of us are facing a new challenge.

Perhaps you’re used to working in the office, or only work from home on the odd day here and there. Even for those used to working remotely, being forced to do so in the midst of an infectious outbreak can feel daunting and it’s important to support and manage our wellbeing during this time.

Try to stay focused – it will help

Rightly or wrongly, it’s likely your boss is concerned about your productivity whilst working remotely – particularly if it’s unusual at your organisation. Now, whilst many of us can be trusted to get on with the job at hand during this time, it is true that you will have to battle distraction in order to do so.

At the moment, one of the biggest distractions is the news. Checking for COVID-19 updates, or clicking on news alerts as and when they pop up, is going to be hard to resist.

But employees should be wary of scrolling themselves into despair. Relying on unreputable sources for news about the outbreak can fuel anxiety, making it difficult to concentrate and putting your mental health at risk.

Remember, many news sources rely on click-bait and scaremongering for views, so schedule “news breaks” – maybe 1 or 2 a day – and stick to them. Turn off news alerts and choose your outlets carefully, ensuring they are quality sources (try Gov.uk or the World Health Organisation).

Designate a Workspace

Without a physical office to escape to, it can be hard to keep work and home life separate. Not everyone has a ‘home office’ and it’s likely you’ll be using personal equipment to get your job done.

Blurring the line between work and home can be bad news, though. It means you never truly ‘switch off’ and, conversely, become less and less productive. Home life can also suffer from the imbalance.

Remember, your workspace doesn’t need to be its own room, but you should take steps to make if feel ‘apart’ from the rest of your home.

Choose an area with good natural light (avoid screens facing windows which can create glare) and ensure you have a comfortable, supportive chair. ‘Entering’ work might be as simple as flicking on your desk lamp or opening your notebook – whatever works for you – but this physical signal means you are ‘at’ work mentally.

When you are done for the day, make sure to close all tabs and programs related to your job. Turn off your lights, close your notebook, and tidy other desk items away.

They key here is to do whatever it takes to ‘leave’ work.

Transition in/out of Work

Lack of commuting time is often touted as one of the benefits about working from home, however, you may find it’s not all it’s cracked up to be after a few weeks have passed.

You see, the time between work and home, whether you drive or take public transport is important. It’s wind-down time which allows us to mentally prepare for our evening routines. Many of us use this time to read or listen to our favourite music – it’s a time when our brains ‘switch off’ and enter a more relaxed state.

Without this time, then, our brains don’t always have time to hit reset and this can make it difficult to switch from thinking about that big deadline to thinking about … well, anything else. In other words, jumping directly into leisure time can make work bleed into our personal lives, and this can mean bad news for mental health.

If you can, try to think of a ‘transition’ activity. Perhaps, you enjoy walking the dog, or browsing for a new dinner recipe. Whatever it is, developing this as a habit over time will help your mind wind down after a hard day.

Communicate

If your office is suddenly working from home, it means a lot of the social interaction you’re used to getting is cut off.

For a while this might seem a blessing, after all, it means less distraction and noise! But it’s important we don’t forget that we need to be around others. We are social creatures and it’s the random interruptions throughout our working day that keeps things feeling unique. Without them, working alone can get dull and, even worse, can feel isolating.

The key here is to maintain communication – especially with your manager/team. Come up with a plan between you for staying in touch, how often you will check in each day, and how you will communicate on group projects and new assignments.

It’s likely you’ll encounter new challenges as you begin to work remotely for long periods of time, and that’s fine. Think about who you might normally go to for help and drop them a line. Just because you’re not in the same building, doesn’t change your working relationship.

With the advent of collaboration platforms like Microsoft Teams and Slack, it can be tempting to stick to text-only communications, but you might find it’s best to pick up the phone at least once a day. Doing so can help relieve feelings of isolation and loneliness and is likely to prevent miscommunications.

Working remotely for the first time or due for a quick refresher course? Try our Remote Working awareness course to stay safe and healthy away from the office.

Creating a Business Contingency Plan (BCP) for Infection Outbreaks

It’s difficult to think of an area of everyday life that isn’t affected by the worldwide coronavirus outbreak, and business is no exception.

It’s natural for employees and corporate leaders alike to feel anxious about the future. However, by keeping the issues in perspective and working calmly to draw up a plan, businesses will be best placed to weather the approaching storm.

If you have an existing business contingency plan, now is the time to review it to make sure it’s still fit for purpose and tailor it to the specific case of Covid-19. Here are some tips to make sure you’re as prepared as possible:

Communication

Clear communication is always important in business. In a time of crisis, it’s crucial. Employees may be anxious about their health, their families, and the financial implications if they are unable to work in the usual way.

Communication should be as clear as possible, with little room for interpretation or confusion. Strike a balance between providing much-needed information and avoiding unnecessary panic. When discussing Covid-19 specifically, base any advice on official guidance from expert organisations such as the World Health Organisation (WHO).

If you’re transitioning to a home working model, ensure all employees know who to contact for technical help and updates on their workload. If possible, this should be worked out before any changes occur; the first days of the new routine are more susceptible to disruption, so minimising this is the key to a smoother transition.

Updates should be timely, clear and regular. Have a plan for how each individual will be contacted for work matters whilst at home.

Areas of Strength and Areas of Difficulty

It stands to reason that some departments and business functions will be able to adjust to a remote working model more easily than others. Identifying these as early as possible means you have more time to work out a plan for the trickier job roles.

Remember to take workplace stress into account. Change on this scale, even of a temporary nature, and living through a pandemic can aggravate existing mental ill-health conditions. Employers have a responsibility to protect the health and safety of all staff. Make a plan to keep lines of communication open and make sure nobody feels isolated. If you are able to offer significant flexibility in terms of working hours, this can help anybody feeling burdened by unexpected extra childcare duties or looking after older relatives.

Remote Working

People who work remotely have some advantages under normal circumstances, but during times of crisis there can be extra challenges too. Acknowledge this may be a big transition for some workers and draw up plans to support them through it.

As people become used to remote working, it can be a benefit: people might find they are more productive and refreshed without commuting and more comfortable in their home environment. Some short-term teething difficulties are worth pressing through to keep your business up and running throughout the coronavirus outbreak.

Since it is a big change for people who are usually workplace-based, it is worth considering extra training on remote working to get people through the transition.

Plan for the Long Term

Unfortunately, nobody knows for sure how long contingency measures will need to be in place. It’s entirely possible they could last for several months. Likewise, in a fast-moving situation such as a pandemic, everything can shift from day to day – so normality could return earlier than expected, too.

It’s possible that a review of your company’s sick pay and compassionate leave will be needed to get your staff through this difficult period. Should schools close in your area, people may need extra flexibility in working hours for childcare reasons. As far as possible, employers should try to meet these requests and have back up plans in place for cover if needed.

Business Continuity Plans

Writing a business continuity plan (BCP) that incorporates all of these elements will go a long way to ensuring you’re as prepared as possible for the effects of Covid-19.

It also has the purpose of making sure everyone knows what to expect should social distancing measures like widespread working from home be introduced. In a time of uncertainty, this can have a reassuring effect on staff.

FREE COURSE: Preventing the Spread of Infection

With dozens of new coronavirus cases per day, businesses are being urged to take preventative measures against its spread – with the reminder that office keyboards are 20,000 times dirtier than a toilet seat.

In a bid to help companies employ best practice, here at DeltaNet International we have launched a free short course on preventing infectious diseases.

It offers users an interactive experience with real-life video scenarios and multiple answer questions.

Our MD Darren Hockley commented: “We hope businesses will make use of the course over the coming weeks. It takes just five minutes to complete but could make all the difference when it comes to keeping your workplace coronavirus-free.”

Access our course for free HERE.

The New Workplace Problem: Leaveism

The New Workplace Problem: Leaveism

When you imagine your next days off, what do you see yourself doing? Taking a holiday away, indulging in your favourite hobby or spending time with loved ones? According to the increasing popularity of leaveism (or leavism), many of us will be using our next precious break from work to catch up… on more work.

The other side of the coin to presenteeism, leaveism is the misuse of annual leave or other designated “rest and recharge” time to keep on top of work. Using annual leave to cover up an illness, whether mental or physical, also falls under this banner. And its use could be setting unrealistic expectations for us all, leading us towards burnout.

Why Does Leaveism Happen?

According to the statistics, we’re a stressed-out nation – and our workloads are making us this way. 44% of people suffering with work-related stress, depression and anxiety cited workload as the main reason, with 14% saying it was lack of support.

Like it or not, we’re a hyper-competitive culture. The pressure to always feel “on top of everything” is overwhelming. There can be a lot of shame involved in admitting we can’t cope with the work on our plates, even if rationally we know this shouldn’t be the case. Unfortunately, there are also long hours cultures where asking for help is stigmatised – although increasingly, discussions around mental health at work are tackling this attitude.

All these factors can make us feel like we must use our spare time to work more. We might even think that if we just use this one day to catch up, we’ll be back on track and won’t have to worry about that ever-busy “to do” list piling up – at least until the next time it happens.

Sadly for the person feeling pushed into working all hours, leaveism doesn’t work. Overworked people are less happy, less productive and less protected against mental illnesses, which can often result from too much work stress and not enough time spent doing leisure activities.

Getting the Balance Back

Managers and business leaders play a huge role in reducing leaveism. After all, if an employee is so overworked that they don’t feel they can even take a long weekend, the responsibility for that falls to their manager – because clearly, something in that scenario isn’t right.

Just like with all forms of work/life balance, modelling a good example can be very powerful. A manager working themselves to burnout and making a point of being available always, including at weekends and on leave, can give employees the impression they’re under the same obligation.

Just like presenteeism, leaveism must be strongly discouraged. Since a company’s culture can be so affected by the managers in it, this too falls to those in positions of authority in an organisation. If they hear about an employee using their free time to catch up on work, they should talk to them about it – not in an accusing or negative way, but with the attitude of “what’s going wrong, and what can we do to better help you with your workload?”. This should of course be followed up by concrete actions which bring the employee’s workload under control and improve their mental health.

Work and Life Split

Working remotely or from home brings so many benefits. However, it can also blur the lines between home and work life, especially if people are working in the same space as they spend their leisure time. This can lead to problems such as social isolation and make leaveism more of an issue – especially if they want to make it known that they’re being productive during their time away from the office.

Remote workers aren’t the only ones who might be particularly prone to leaveism. People whose jobs have recently become busier (for example, through a promotion or a company restructuring that has left them with more to do) should be offered support if they need it.

Managers need to be alert for the signs of leaveism. If they receive an email sent during an employee’s day off, they should check in with them to make sure they’re coping with their workload.

Ultimately, it’s important to remember that a happy, rested workforce is not only morally the right thing to aim towards. It’s also best for business. Overworked, unhappy staff make more mistakes and are less productive. Huge numbers of younger workers in particular have left jobs due to mental health concerns, so companies that want to retain talent need to tackle these problems.

Preventing the Spread of Infection

Infectious diseases often spread when bacteria, viruses, or other germs are passed from person to person, for example, through touching, kissing, or coughing and sneezing near uninfected people.

Infectious diseases can be caused by:

  • Bacteria – These one-cell organisms often help humans (e.g. by aiding with digestion), however some are responsible for diseases like pneumonia and tuberculosis and are treated with antibiotics.
  • Viruses – Even smaller than bacteria, viruses cause a multitude of diseases, e.g. the common cold or flu. Antibiotics cannot kill viruses; they are treated with antiviral medication.
  • Fungi – Many skin diseases, such as ringworm and athlete’s foot, are caused by fungi.
  • Parasites – A parasite is an organism that lives on or inside another organism and some of them can spread diseases, e.g. malaria.

There are simple things you and your colleagues can do to stop the spread of infectious disease in your workplace (and at home!)

  1. Hand Hygiene

Hand hygiene is widely acknowledged to be the single most important activity for reducing the spread of disease, although many of us don’t wash our hands thoroughly enough after using the bathroom, handling food or animals, or coughing/sneezing.

Remember to wet your hands thoroughly and lather soap for at least 20 seconds on the front and back of your hands, in-between fingers, and under nails. Always ensure hands are dried completely after washing and use warm water whenever possible

2. Cover your mouth and nose

Many diseases are spread through coughing and sneezing – remember, germs can travel 3 feet or more!

If you are unwell, you should avoid close contact with others (try to stand at least 1 metre away) and cover your mouth and nose when coughing or sneezing. Keep tissues handy at home and work to catch coughs and sneezes and always throw away once used. Wash your hands after coughing/sneezing into them or using a tissue.

3. Stay home if you are unwell

It’s important not to fall into the trap of ‘presenteeism’ when unwell, as this risks spreading the illness to others (which could have a negative impact on the business at large) and extending your own recovery time due to lack of rest and recuperation.

When you are unwell, don’t shake hands, hug, or touch others. You might also call ahead for any medical appointments to see if there’s anything you can do to avoid infecting others in the waiting room.

It is OK to accept deliveries such as food/medical supplies, so long as you avoid close contact with the person dropping the items off.

4. Prepare food safely

Many of us eat or prepare food at work, so it’s important to thoroughly wash and dry your hands before preparing food, after touching raw food (including fruits and vegetables), and after eating.

When cooking or re-heating food, always follow the instructions on the label and/or check your food is piping hot in the middle. This helps to kill certain germs such as salmonella and E.coli.

Don’t re-heat food more than once and ensure your fridge is kept at the right temperature for food storage (between 0°C and 5°C).

5. Keep work surfaces clean

Some infectious diseases can be spread by touching a surface or object that has been contaminated by an infected person. Regularly cleaning your work surfaces (such as desk, tables, printers, door-handles and kitchen surfaces) will help reduce the spread of infections.

Clean surfaces with hot soapy water or your normal household cleaning product. Always follow the manufacturer’s instructions on correct product use. Reusable cloths should be disinfected and then dried after use, as bacteria and viruses can still survive on damp cloths.

Want to refresh your employees’ memories on how to prevent infectious diseases? Try our new short-course, ‘Preventing the Spread of Infection’ which details best practice and hygiene standards to minimise the risk of spreading viruses and other infections in the workplace. This course is part of our health and safety suite.

5 Benefits of eLearning You Haven’t Thought About

Thinking of trying out eLearning in your business? The main benefits of eLearning are well-known, which is why so many companies are making the switch every year. Others are embracing the compromise solution of blended learning, which includes some elements of eLearning and some of traditional training, capturing the benefits of each approach.

eLearning is very flexible and, often, much more cost-effective. Learning and training administrators can sample the courses in advance of roll-out and can introduce new material to all their staff at once or split them into more specific groups to target their individual learning needs.

The benefits of eLearning don’t end there, however. Here are five you might not have considered:

Friendly Competition

The biggest challenge to a successful training program can often be summed up in one word: engagement.

With a great selection of challenge-based eLearning courses available, courses are more “gamified” than ever. This can tap into learners’ good-natured competitive side, allowing them to compare their scores against those of their co-workers. It’s even been known for people to repeat the courses twice to get the best score possible – a good outcome, as their knowledge of the subject is even more likely to stick this way.

Better for the Environment

One of the greatest developments of recent years is that people, and organisations, are becoming more aware of our duty towards the environment. Sustainability and green concerns are no longer fringe issues but are increasingly at the heart of many businesses’ future planning.

In this regard, eLearning provides many benefits. With eLearning, you can deliver the benefits of training to employees without increasing your carbon footprint unnecessarily. It reduces the need for travel that classroom training requires, either from the trainer or the people attending.

Consistency Across Sites

Organisations come in all shapes and sizes. Increasingly, they’re spread across various countries and consist of a mixture of office-based and remote workers. Since the employer’s duty to protect employees’ health and safety applies equally to all of them, regardless of where they’re based, it’s important to make sure they’re all receiving the same level of training.

The benefits of training to employees are therefore spread evenly. Everybody has the same opportunity to learn from the materials and everyone receives the same standard of training. Well-designed eLearning takes into account different learning styles and tastes.

Regular Updates

There’s no point in repeating the same eLearning courses year after year – just as there would be no point in repeating the same traditional course. However, refresher training is very important. Because both of these things are true, eLearning companies regularly update their material and add new courses to their catalogues, so the various topics are covered in more detail and in different ways.

Refreshing eLearning

With the advances in technology of recent years, the ability of eLearning to meet different needs across organisations is growing all the time. Research on information retention and how different people learn has progressed and eLearning has moved along with it.

Whether you prefer immersive, scenario-led solutions or more traditional informational courses, there’s eLearning for you.