5 Benefits of LMS for Employee Induction in Retail
Retail companies invest significantly (both in terms of time and money) on the recruitment of seasonal staff, particularly around Christmas time. The new employee induction, on-boarding and training phase plays a key role when trying to get vast amounts of new employees compliant, trained and up to speed efficiently.
Gone are the days when there was time for manual or classroom inductions and the on-boarding phase was a 2-3-day long ordeal.
With modern technology, onboarding goes one step beyond and engages new employees even before they set foot in the door on day one.
Learning Management Systems can be used to deliver training documentation and standard operating procedures in order to generate employee enthusiasm ensuring they remain engaged and contribute to the bottom line faster.
1. Faster Seasonal Employee On-boarding
Making use of digital solutions like a cloud-hosted learning management system will improve the new employee onboarding process. As well as providing tangible time-saving benefits, the LMS affords greater visibility and control to the HR manager.
This ‘digital’ approach will take away the administrative headache of high-volume seasonal onboarding projects reducing both time and errors.
The LMS provides a centralised database containing all the relevant onboarding information like welcome documentation, standard operating procedures, staff handbook, contract and compliance documentation etc. The system provides total visibility for both the hiring team and the new starter.
2. Pre-Start Reading and Training Manuals
Employee training is a fundamental part of the employee induction process. If you want a confident employee who is ready to hit the ground running and ready to provide you with results, then you must invest the time and resources to train and support them from the moment they accept the job.
80% of retail employees have said that they would have settled in quicker had there been a better onboarding process. Through using an onboarding system like an LMS, important documentation and necessary pre-reading can be sent ahead of the start day so new starts and HR both know what needs to be completed and most importantly have a database record of when it has been completed.
3. Adhere to Compliance Laws, Rules and Regulations.
Retailers are subject to numerous regulations and compliance standards which can include the Health & Safety Authority, environmental waste, Consumer Protection Commission and now in Europe, there is even G.D.P.R.
You and your employees need to know and understand the current compliance regulations, and in achieving this, a Learning Management System can be an invaluable tool.
Compliance laws can change on a regular basis and updating traditional course material to reflect these changes can result in being a time-consuming and costly task. However, using an LMS gives you the ability to easily add new compliance standards to your online training within minutes.
Because of this efficiency, your e-learners can always stay on top of the latest compliance rules that they need to know so that your business can avoid incurring costly penalties.
With an LMS you can also ensure that every employee is on the same page when it comes to expectations and company policies, which can help to boost customer service levels, customer satisfaction and retain employees.
4. Reduce Learning & Development Costs.
An LMS gives you the power to completely do away with instructor costs and printed materials. By delivering training online it means you can save a sizable sum on your Learning and Development budget to invest in other training areas. You will no longer need to worry about printing and binding manuals or booking space for training because all the information you need is contained within the LMS and delivered directly to everyone to take the training online.
5. Tracking Learner Progress and Performance.
The top Learning Management Systems provide training managers with the ability to keep track of learner progress, ensuring that employees are achieving their training goals. Many of the top Learning Management Systems feature powerful reporting and analytics tools that allow you to pinpoint areas of your staff training program that may be lacking. If you discover that your employees are struggling to achieve certification on a training module, you can assess the module content and make the necessary modifications.
LMS is an Effective Retail Training and Compliance Solution
It can’t be stressed enough that the secret to efficient training and onboarding of hundreds of high turnover or even seasonal employees across multiple locations in the retail sector can be cost-effective and achievable using a learning management system. The LMS can be implemented to systematically train and onboard hundreds or thousands of seasonal staff in tandem whilst keeping everyone in the loop, always.
Also, creating automated employee onboarding and training programs it is a great way to introduce your new staff to a company’s culture, standard operating procedures and policies while making them feel more welcome and getting them up to speed faster.
The main ROI of employee onboarding comes from the impact it has on your employees’ lifetime value. A successful onboarding workflow or process gets new hires off on the right foot and they become productive much faster.