Fostering a Culture of Learning Pays Bottom-Line Benefits

Many see employee training as a necessary evil – a boring to-do that interferes with “real” work and often ends up on a back burner, or at best is limited to checking the boxes of required courses completed.

But the truth is that an engaging, effective employee training program of ongoing learning is vital to motivating, retaining and boosting the value of your most important (and expensive) asset: your people. And if you’re smart, you’ll do more than ensure your staff are completing required courses; you’ll create a culture of learning that imbues your entire organization with an eagerness to improve skillsets, climb the ladder of success and explore new opportunities at your company.

As of the writing of this article, the unemployment rate has dropped to under 4% in the U.S. This number alone should have you thinking very hard about how to hold on to the talent you’ve already got: you don’t want your best people going elsewhere to advance their careers when creating an upward pathway at your own organization can prevent it.

Enjoyment in learning

EasyLMS, for example, combines motivational techniques, “gamification” and career pathing to inject enjoyment into learning while cultivating future talent. Employees are proud to add achievements and badges to their learning “trophy cases,” to compete with one another, and to demonstrate their initiative and skill-building dedication to leadership.

Once you have a great learning solution such as this in place, all that’s needed to activate your culture of learning is a strong buy-in from management, emphasizing to staff that ongoing learning is a priority, a free career-builder that can create new opportunities for them at your company. And it’s important that managers stay on top of who’s learning what, provide recognition and encourage “learning boosters” to ensure the new knowledge really takes hold.

Career opportunities

The career opportunities you’re creating, by the way, are not necessarily the next rung up the ladder your employees are already on. Sure, a leasing agent might typically move up to a property manager position, followed by regional manager. But what if they discover that they love the marketing aspects of their job? A comprehensive learning system such as EasyLMS can help them follow their passion – and instead of losing the employee to another company with an opening for a marketing manager, you help them plot the learning path that will move them to the marketing discipline within your own organization.

Companies that view their people as static assets – X number of people in this position, Y in that – are making a big mistake. Employees are a fluid resource. In the multifamily business, someone in a particular position today with a certain set of skills will most probably not be in the same position even five years from now. Will they boost their value and opportunities while working for you, remain the same, or go somewhere else to get ahead? The choice is yours.

Learn more about how EasyLMS helps foster a culture of learning and pay the bottom-line now here.