The role of ethics and compliance training in businesses is getting a lot of attention lately. While it’s always been an important part of any mid- or large-sized organization, COVID-19 and the Black Lives Matter movement have forced many companies to get more introspective on how effective and enlightening their training programs really are.
With that in mind, here are some signs your ethics and compliance training program needs an update, which can ultimately pave the way for employees to feel more engaged, motivated, and on the same page as leadership.
Rules Change
Compliance laws are constantly emerging and evolving, making it a continuous challenge for learning teams to stay on top of the latest legislative initiatives and regulatory changes. But when a business is unable to adopt new compliance practices quickly, it puts itself at risk of sizable fines, the threat of legal action, and damage to company reputation.
While some rule changes might only require a simple markup of your existing training program to fill in gaps, others like GDPR or CCPA, for example, may involve helping employees learn all-new concepts and complex legal topics.
Learning teams that stay well-informed on changes in business, their industry, or even within society are better able to respond as things evolve. By paying attention to what’s happening in government and around the world, courses can be adapted, training materials can be added, and learning gaps can be bridged effectively as new issues or regulations emerge.
The tricky part, however, is having a learning program that can move just as quickly.
You’re Not Using the Latest Training Tools
Evolving with new regulations can put a lot of pressure on learning teams to act at the right moment. Yet, not every organization is equipped with the right tools to develop and launch new ethical principles and corporate practices in a timely way.
As businesses become increasingly digital and mobile, ethics and compliance training programs that lag behind could stand out for all the wrong reasons. If training is outdated and lacks the digital sophistication to get updated quickly and regularly, now is the time to shift your program from its traditional training roots and plant the seeds for a more modern way of learning.
With state of the art eLearning, your organization can harness the latest technologies to deliver innovative learning experiences that are easy to access from any device and boost learner retention. But an added benefit for compliance teams is that eLearning solutions make updating training modules easier, meaning learning teams can spend more time staying close to the legislation and internal policies that shape and impact the organization, and less time whittling away at out-of-date programs.
Employees Seem Bored During Training
One thing learning teams understand all too well is the difficulty of creating an ethics and compliance training program that is both engaging and motivating for everyone in the organization. As employee needs and expectations shift with advances in training delivery, even the latest tools aren’t going to make an impact if your training content doesn’t keep their attention or inspire positive changes in workplace behavior.
When it comes to content, traditional training programs haven’t been exactly user-friendly. Whether they’re bursting with complex legalese, text-heavy modules, or unrelatable scenarios, these types of training programs are no longer delivering learning effectively – or compellingly – and it’s one of the main reasons why ethics and compliance training has earned its somewhat lackluster reputation.
While equipping your team with the innovative tools is a great first step in modernizing your training program, taking a new approach in how information is presented will result in a better payoff. And here’s where storytelling comes into play.
Powerful and meaningful lessons can be taught and learned through storytelling. It’s something we learn at a very young age and carries on through adulthood. The problem is that many businesses forget this important lesson when it comes to training – or at the very least, neglect to make it the core of their program.
Whether we’re speaking about quizzes, videos, simulations, gamified training, or any other type of content found in today’s modern training regimen, stories help employees make the connection between what’s happening inside a training scenario and within their own workplace. It teaches valuable lessons. But more than that, it educates employees on company rules and federal regulations in a more entertaining and much subtler way.
For learning teams, applying storytelling elements to a training program can be challenging. One way to make the transition successful is to find the story in the content needing to be leveraged. Instead of focusing on the content itself, look for ways to communicate important principles through real-world scenarios that employees may encounter at work. By doing so, you will get their full attention, and have more opportunities to instill the lessons that guide them to better behavior.
Interactive Services is a leader in helping organizations develop creative, story-driven ethics and compliance training programs that inspire employees to do the right thing, even when nobody’s watching. Discover how we can help your business create a more ethical and compliant workplace while driving new levels in employee engagement by signing up for our free 7-day trial!