How to ensure learners engage with e-learning is a question that often crops up in TrainingZONE's Any Answers section. In response to one such question David Medcalf offers the following tips.

a. Make sure that e-learning / CBT is the right solution (or part of the right solution) for your training need. The right media, for the right material, for the right audience.

b. Make sure the materials address the needs of the audience, in the right language and at the right level, reflecting the culture of the audience/organisation.

c. Ensure the materials are professionally produced, using people who can show they understand how adults learn, and can sensibly apply the various educational theories to their varied clients' needs.

d. Take the time and expense to investigate and understand the training need properly.

e. Map out the training against your required competencies or objectives and sell the training in terms of what this will enable the learner to do / achieve.

f. Use high quality images and graphics that reinforce the learning, and reflect the organisation’s values and goals.

g. Avoid the gimmicky use of animations and other tools that might distract and annoy the learner.

h. Ensure you have a sustainable organisation-wide learning strategy in place that is supported by management, forms part of the annual reporting cycle, is visible, easy to access, and talked about.

In my experience, any learning that has failed to address these points during the development and launch process will also fail to engage the learners and make them want to move forward.