'WATCH-TRY' SIMULATIONS FOR ENGAGING NEW HIRE TRAINING
A Case Study on Onboarding Training for a Leading Global Travel Platform
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THE SUMMARY
The Challenge: Redesign the New Hire Training curriculum (classroom and online) for their sales, business development, and customer success divisions. The main challenge was that their software was being updated during the project.
CommLab India’s Solution: A highly interactive simulation-based eLearning curriculum with 3 learning paths for different divisions.
The Result: Despite the frequent software updates, all modules (of more than 250 minutes total duration), could be completed in 5 months.
THE CLIENT
Our client, the world’s largest travel platform, helps more than 460 million travelers each month – from planning to booking to taking a trip – making every trip their best one. Travelers across the globe use their site and app to discover where to stay, what to do, and where to eat based on reviews of those who have been there before. With more than 859 million reviews on 8.6 million accommodations, restaurants, experiences, airlines, and cruises, our client helps travelers find the best deals on accommodations, book experiences, reserve tables at delicious restaurants, and discover great places nearby. As a travel guidance company available in 49 markets and 28 languages, the platform brings people, passions, and places together, makes planning easy no matter the type of trip.
THE RELATIONSHIP
The client heard about us through our inbound marketing efforts (blogs, webinars, etc.) and approached us through the ‘Contact us’ form on our website. We started working with the client in March 2022 on our first project that was worth $40940.
They chose to try us out as we are one of the very few eLearning vendors offering multiple services under one roof – classroom to eLearning conversion, Flash to HTML5 conversion, eLearning translations, and LMS services. Our ability to roll out large numbers of courses, within timelines, and at a pricing that works, and our expertise in most of the popular eLearning authoring tools (Articulate suite, Lectora, Captivate, iSpring, dominKnow, etc.) was also a big plus.
THE REQUIREMENT
Their requirement for us was to redesign their New Hire Training curriculum – to update, revise, and restructure their classroom and online training programs for new hires in different divisions (sales, business development, and customer success). The goal was to reduce the current 12-week training program to an 8-week self-paced one.
How does a leading online travel company reduce the duration of their new hire training across divisions, yet make it more effective and engaging?
Through interactive eLearning, of course!
The initial scope of the project required us to create a training curriculum of 14 eLearning modules for new hires in 3 learning paths. The inputs were the already existing training materials (3 courses in RISE, 3 PPTs from classroom sessions, and 2 videos).
The scope was later changed due to the addition of new content. So, we were required to create 21 modules, the duration of each around 10-20 minutes. These 21 modules were to be divided into 3 learning paths – Path 1 for all learners, Path 2 for the Business Development (BD) team, and Path 3 for the Customer Success (CS) team.
THE SOLUTION
A 10-member team (that included 4 instructional designers and 6 courseware developers) worked on this project, along with a dedicated project manager. The authoring tool, Articulate Storyline 360, was selected for course development as it allows more interactivities than Articulate Rise that was being used by the client earlier.
The 21 modules (each around 10-20 minutes in duration) were categorized into 3 learning paths.
- Path 1: 6 modules on Introduction, Overview, & Basics, meant for all learners
- Path 2: 6 modules in BD Task Guide for the BD team
- Path 3: 9 modules in CS Task Guide for the CS team
An infographic of a roadmap was used at the beginning of each module to represent the three paths.
Simple click-and-reveal interactivities were used to invite learner participation. Paths 2 and 3 also used ‘watch and try’ simulations.
Because of the very tight deadlines, the development of the modules in all 3 paths was started simultaneously. But as the software was being updated and most of the simulation screens were being revised frequently, there were a lot of delays and rework.
Another challenge was the very raw condition of the inputs that required a lot of research and to-and-fro between the team at CommLab India and the subject matter experts from the client’s side. Poor image resolution of the screenshots of the tool application (for the simulations) was another issue. As the team did not have access to the tool, it meant we had to constantly check image quality and put in a request for better images frequently. There was also a lot of time spent waiting for some screenshots or videos.
Once the modules were developed, the review process was made very easy and quick with the help of the Storyline 360 review link that simplified the gathering and sharing of feedback from the four reviewers.
THE RESULTS
Despite the initial hitches, we could complete the development of all 21 modules (a 250+ minute curriculum) in 5 months.
Rapid eLearning Solutions to Fast-Track Employee Learning
Train your learners anytime, anywhere, in any format, on any device!