Since March of 2020, learning and development teams have been rushing to move their face-to-face content to virtual platforms like Zoom, Webex, MS Teams, and Adobe Connect.

At first, this wholesale conversion to virtual was a stop gap measure. The focus was getting the content online temporarily - just for the few months while we were working at home. But a few months turned into a year and a half! As corporations are contemplating bringing workers back into the office (or not), they are also considering what role virtual classrooms will play in their long-term learning strategy. (Spoiler – InSync’s clients tell us virtual training will continue to play a much bigger role than it did pre-pandemic!)

During the pandemic, virtual live instruction was widely adopted to meet immediate training needs.  Forbes noted that adoption of virtual technology in learning and development has been greater in the last ten months than in the previous ten years. 82% of corporate L&D executives see virtual live instruction as a key element of their implementation strategy moving forward.

The team approach when creating learning experiences can make all the difference in whether a virtual session is successful or not! It feels amazing when a producer can seem like they are anticipating the needs of the facilitator or speaker before they even ask. However, even if it seems like we can read minds, the anticipation is a skill that is developed over time with experience. It is fantastic to produce learning events as a partner with the facilitator and a support for the participants.

In the world of virtual classrooms, there are many reasons why a session may be ineffective and tiring for both participants and facilitators. Whether the technological tools are used too sparingly or interaction between participants is not encouraged enough, a session can feel stagnant and end up not being successful. I’m sharing some of my observations I’ve made in the online classroom along with suggestions to help ensure that your sessions are engaging, fun, and learners are energized with new knowledge to apply to their jobs.

Nothing changed our workplace more, and more quickly, than the Covid-19 pandemic, and we all need coping skills to keep up. Facilitators need to be especially vigilant in order to ensure their learners are positively connected to the learning experience. 

Karen Vieth revisits  “Seven Facilitation Techniques That Nurture Emotional Engagement in the Virtual Classroom” in our Virtually There session Emotional Intelligence and Engaging Your Audience in the Virtual Classroom. on March 10. She ties EMOTIONAL ENGAGEMENT to EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE, and discusses how important it is to the workplace, providing techniques to help facilitators nurture emotional engagement.

Read the blog below, originally published in 2019, to learn more about how effective learning involves an emotional component.

This is the third installment in a series that explores actionable approaches virtual classroom facilitators can use to improve learner engagement through purposeful facilitation.

We often frame corporate training as a compulsory process: complete these requirements and move on to the next task. It's a reinforcement of a "Push" learning culture that is content-centric, and not a personal experience.

Effective learning involves an emotional component. Employees want to do well on the job. They hope to have the skills required to meet their goals. They stress about balancing their professional responsibilities while upskilling. The training function has an obligation to recognize these emotions, and facilitators can improve virtual training experiences by addressing them in their delivery approach.

Keeping learners engaged - it’s the boundless task as a facilitator.  There are a whole heap of ideas and tactics that work but here’s one I have used that may be a bit different… Shock your learners!  Embarrass yourself!  Give them what they never expected, SING loud and proud😊

Lynette Van Steinburg has been contributing to the InSync Training team as a virtual producer since 2018. In this blog post, she shares some tips to help both the learners and the trainers stay focused without getting burned out.

In my previous post, I discussed the importance of strong design for virtual delivery, and how to achieve it. This post addresses the challenges you’ll encounter when proposing these design approaches to your stakeholders.

Wait a minute...

With the unexpected arrival (at least at a much greater level) of teleworking and online teaching due to the Covid-19 pandemic, many trainers and facilitators have struggled to find the most suitable solution to deliver their classes to their students.

This boom in live remote learning has caused much debate about whether or not platforms help facilitators meet the expectations of their own students (and themselves) or whether online teaching is less stellar and effective than face-to-face classes.