At Ethena, we love working with companies who want to shoot for the compliance moon. Whether your team needs to reach 100% completion due to federal or state requirements, or because you need to strengthen company culture, we want to help you stick that moon landing with our compliance training best practices.
After working with hundreds of the world’s fastest growing companies, we’re sharing our favorite best practices for compliance training. Join us as we ‘launch’ our ideas to maximize compliance training effectiveness. By taking these steps, even if you miss hitting the moon, at least you’ll land among the stars.
Proven best practices for compliance training
After working with so many customers to build tailored compliance training programs, we start to notice trends around what tends to work best. At the end of the day, the data makes all of that work worth it. We have already received over 2 million pieces of positive feedback from happy Ethena learners. Our data-backed insights have been gleaned from working with the most well known and culture-forward companies out there. Here’s what you need to know to set up your compliance training for timely and impactful training.
1. Factor in the target audience from the start
Are you guilty of leaving the target audience selection to the last minute before assigning training? Identifying the learner audience is a key part of making sure that your training will be successful. Do contractors need to be included? What about seasonal workers? Pick a target audience, then you can make small adjustments as needed later on.
2. Plan how to help struggling teams in advance
We bet you already know which department will have trouble completing training by the deadline. Take a proactive approach by designing your training launch with that team in mind. Actively carve out the time in the team’s calendar to complete their training. That way, if your Engineering team struggles to complete compliance initiatives, you can help them by scheduling training into their calendar in one or two-hour-long training blocks.
3. Find an executive-level champion
Companies see much higher completion rates when they have an executive who enthusiastically buys in to compliance training as a tool to drive culture. Pinpoint which executive at your company acts as a champion for compliance training and understands its impacts and value. Not only will having a cheerleader at the top help push your team to 100% completion, their positive outlook will also benefit company culture.
Ever met an exec who can’t get on board with compliance training because the content you’re working with is just that bad? Well, Ethena’s training usually gets the opposite response from higher ups! Seeing is believing – show them one of our courses and you might even get the CEO to endorse our training during a company-wide all hands meeting as the best they’ve ever done (like we heard a CEO did after taking our course)!
4. Steer clear of compliance fatigue
Do you hear an office-wide exasperated sigh when the next round of compliance training is announced? When it comes to training, more isn’t always better. If training continues to be scheduled during busy times in your company’s calendar, learners may experience “training fatigue.” Whether you choose to have training completed quarterly or yearly, it’s best to create an intentional rollout strategy that fits the quiet times on the company calendar. That way, learners don’t feel like they’re slogging through training after training over the entire year. New courses will hold their interest, and the lessons are more likely to stick.
Want to know which time of year you should deploy corporate compliance training? We’ve ranked the best and worst months to build your compliance training plan.
5. Tease learners with the goods
If you’re like us, we can bet that you get all jittery with excitement when it’s time to announce a compliance training course. (Okay, you might not, but we bet you will if you use Ethena!) Pass your excited energy onto your team by sending out announcements that pique their interest about the upcoming training. Make sure that the rollout information you’re actually putting in front of your team members is enjoyable and engaging.
At Ethena, we love to use well-placed illustrations, comics, and even gifs in our compliance training courses! Craft an intro message that conveys the same excitement and tone (gifs included). Of course, it’s still important to note to learners that compliance training touches on some really serious issues. However, that doesn’t mean that learners can’t expect to have fun while doing it.
6. Use relevant workplace examples
We love it when learners can see themselves and their workplace represented in their training. Learners appreciate seeing relevant examples that actually pertain to real-life workplace interactions and relationships. When these are included, learners are more likely to respond positively and have a larger retention rate. Include examples that learners actually deal with on a daily basis, rather than those that only focus on scenarios that are unlikely and obvious.
7. Be mindful of “beginning & end” syndrome
When it comes to compliance training deadlines, we have found that the normal patterns of human behavior hold true. Most learners will complete their training at the very beginning when the training launches, or at the very end when the deadline is approaching. Whether the deadline is 30 days away or 90, the results of this “beginning & end” syndrome are typically the same.
The best thing that you can do to stay on top of this human phenomena is to send frequent reminder notifications to the entire training group. Send out reminders in a variety of ways so that they’ll catch a learner’s attention whether they’re more tuned in through email, Slack, or MS Teams. Reach out to all managers in the middle of the deadline period to remind them to bring up training deadlines with their team. Keep training at the forefront of everyone’s mind so that they’re not scrambling to finish it at the end.
8. Reward early completion
The best things in life are fun! There’s no reason why reaching compliance training completion shouldn’t be the same. Does your company use internal badging or points systems? Take advantage of a reward system that’s already in place to celebrate early completion. Alternatively, open up a raffle to learners who complete their training within the first 15, 30, or 60 days. It’s in the company’s and learner’s best interest to complete compliance training. Your company can use any and every compelling idea at your disposal to make that happen.
How to select a compliance training platform that suits your team
Whether you have a large HR and compliance team or you’re a team of one, you’ll want a compliance training solution that helps automate the process and makes training memorable so that learners retain key information. Here’s what to pay attention to when selecting a compliance training solution:
- Automatic integration: There can be so much manual work behind the scenes in setting up a compliance program. Time wasted in spreadsheets can be replaced by seamlessly integrating with tools like your HRIS. With all the key information about employees flowing into your compliance training tool, you can automatically ensure the right person gets the right training based on things like department, seniority, and state.
- Content: You want to select compliance training that is engaging as well as effective. The same old boring training videos just aren’t going to cut it. To ensure employees will retain key information, make sure you take your content from mundane to memorable.
- The platform: The best platforms are able to give a quick bird’s eye view of stats and reporting. Check out what functionality, the learning center, and back-end admin capability all look like. Tools that help managers understand who on their team has and has not completed training can save you a ton of time, as can automatic reminder messages.
- Branding: If you have a very specific brand voice that’s echoed throughout your internal communications, you want to make sure that your training reflects that. Take a look at your company branding and culture, and then select a compliance training program that mirrors both.
Ethena can put you on the right track for compliance training success
At Ethena, our aim is to provide the best compliance training experience for learners, administrators, and leadership. We tailor each implementation and onboarding experience to your organization’s size and goals, and then create training that fits your business best. To get you off on the right track with more compliance training tips, take a look at our 10 dos and don’ts for getting to 100% completion.
Our experience working with companies of all sizes from around the globe has taught us the best strategies for tailoring custom training plans, as well as the essentials for effective training delivery. Want to learn more about the compliance best practices we strongly believe in? Check out our recent webinar Getting to 100% completion – without the complaints.
