How Covid-19 Is Driving More Virtual Learning Innovations

Are virtual learning innovations here to stay?

The past year has seen great changes to the way businesses operate. Learning and development departments have had to adapt to operational changes, new policies, and a largely remote workforce. 

Innovative uses of virtual learning technologies have provided a way for organizations to keep employees connected, engaged, and productive despite the challenges posed by a year-long global pandemic. 
 

Virtual learning has permeated onboarding programs, formerly in-person events, and provided moments of levity during stressful times. Here are a few examples:

Virtual Onboarding

First day in a new office is always a little exciting and a little nerve-wracking. Typically, new employees can expect to be introduced to their new team and leaders of other departments. Their manager might take them out to lunch or facilitate some other type of icebreaker activity. 

Now picture starting a new job working remotely. When employees can’t walk around the office and introduce themselves in person, it’s much harder to learn who’s who and find answers to the myriad of other first-day questions.   

When the Covid-19 pandemic forced everyone to work from home for an unknown period of time, companies jumped to virtual onboarding and discovered that it can be just as effective and engaging as in-person onboarding, with the right tools and strategy. 

The key to virtual onboarding success? Having an organized plan and a user-friendly learning platform to centralize and track all onboarding activities. 

Some ways companies successfully employ virtual onboarding include using Zoom breakout rooms, adding polls or mini-quizzes to video onboarding sessions, creating intranet scavenger hunts, and more.

Immersive Virtual Events/Experiences

From conferences to concerts and workshops to workouts, in-person events across the globe were cancelled in 2020. Virtual reality came to the rescue. 

When the coronavirus pandemic forced the Center for Information & Study on Clinical Research Participation (CISCRP) to cancel their live health fair in Chicago, they partnered with an agency, Illumina Interactive, to create an engaging virtual health fair that felt REAL and earned high marks from exhibitors and attendees alike. 

With their new virtual health fair experience, CISCRP was able to maintain consistent attendance rates, despite the switch to virtual, and even increase the number of sponsors and exhibitors. They were also able to reduce costs compared to hosting in-person events.

Virtual Instructor-Led Gamification

Everyone needs a break now and then, especially workers who found themselves trying to balance working from home with homeschooling young children or welcoming college-age children back home when dorms closed.

Out of the pandemic and state-wide lockdowns, virtual happy hours were born. Restaurants began offering virtual wine tastings, online classes on everything from improv to succulent terrariums popped up, and apps like Teleparty (formerly Netflix Party) emerged to let distanced friends and family watch television together, no matter where they were. 

Naturally, businesses followed suit, adding games and ice breakers to video conference calls as a way to help employees stay connected to each other. Virtual instructor-led games like Jeopardy!® or other trivia games add some fun to Zoom calls and virtual training. Adding games to virtual meetings ensures active participants and better knowledge retention. 

Adding games to virtual meetings also creates opportunities for team challenges, enticing prizes, and a much-needed break from work or home stressors. 

While it’s unknown how long Covid-19 will be around, these virtual learning innovations are clearly here to stay. The benefits—engagement, productivity, ROI, and employee morale—are too good to call virtual learning technology a passing trend or short-lived buzzword.

Stephanie Ivec is the Content Marketing Manager at eLearning Brothers, and the primary contributor to the eLearning Brothers blog where she provides training tips and covers eLearning Trends. She's also a featured author in Learning Solutions Magazine, eLearningIndustry.com, and HR.com. Having written about eLearning for over 8 years, she has impacted the industry by motivating her readers to create engaging learning and making online training effective and enjoyable. Visit www.elearningbrothers.com  Connect Stephanie Ivec