Leveraging Collaborative Learning In The Workplace
Before we get into some examples of Collaborative Learning in the workplace, let’s start with the basics: what is Collaborative Learning, exactly?
Collaborative Learning is a training methodology where employees share their knowledge and expertise, teaching and learning from one another at the same time. This group learning enhances the training experience by capitalizing on each employee’s skills, ideas, and institutional knowledge.
Examples Of Collaborative Learning In Action
Here are 3 great examples of how Collaborative Learning works in practice, including the types of Collaborative Learning that can best support your teams.
Putting Peer Engagements And Interactions At The Heart Of Learning
Collaborative Learning focuses on peer engagements and interactions at every level of the learning process. Every team member is able to declare their own learning needs, helping to reinforce individual responsibility for training outcomes and ensure training is truly relevant for every learner.
This way, learners can respond to these needs by working with others to convene project teams and create and ship courses based on their own knowledge and expertise. This helps to make sure that expert knowledge is captured and made accessible for everyone’s benefit. This focus on peer engagement isn’t just great for learning, either: it also helps to give companies a competitive edge. For example, at 360Learning, we use peer learning to drive our collaborative onboarding process, helping new hires to ramp-up as quickly as possible.
Using Subject-Matter Expertise To Keep Learning Content Relevant
Because learning materials need to ship quickly to stay relevant, the best Collaborative Learning examples are built around ongoing iterative improvements to courses. Rather than course material being set in stone, authors and learners can make suggestions to update information, add new elements, and point out new developments in the field. It’s then easy for course creators to integrate that feedback, since courses are created in easy-to-adapt modular fashion, not as a monolithic content piece that can’t be adjusted.
They can also recognize others for their contributions to learning, which helps make training a shared goal to be celebrated. This is a big part of Collaborative Learning in practice.
This communal learning aspect is a core element of Collaborative Learning, as it helps organizations of all kinds to identify, recognize, and celebrate subject-matter experts in employee training. Leveraging this specialist expertise is a great example of Collaborative Learning in practice, as it helps businesses and companies everywhere make the most out of their most valuable asset: their institutional knowledge.
Setting Up A Continuous Feedback Loop
With Collaborative Learning, nothing ever stays the same for long. As soon as you’ve created, published, and refined a new course or module, your learners will provide their thoughts and feedback on your material, helping it to stay relevant and suitable for their needs. Within the best Collaborative Learning examples, every course features evaluations, providing an essential feedback loop. This makes every course a commitment to continuous learning, and keeps teams focused on sharing and gaining knowledge in the most effective way possible: through peer interaction.
This continuous feedback loop is one of the best examples of Collaborative Learning in practice. It recognizes that everyone has a part to play in building great learning experiences for employee training. Not only that, but a great learning asset is never done evolving–there are always improvements to be made.
Conclusion
Looking for insider secrets to change mindsets about online training and get employees actively involved in the process? Download the eBook How Collaborative Learning Boosts Engagement Rates To Over 90% to discover how the collaborative approach breaks down barriers and maximizes your organization's L&D potential.
References:
- "Because I said so": Why Top-Down Management Doesn’t Work
- Learning Needs Tool: Ship Training Your Team Actually Wants With Collaborative Learning
- Authoring Tool: Create Impactful Courses in Minutes With Collaborative Learning
- Experts Engagement Tool: Leverage Subject-Matter Expertise With Collaborative Learning
- How We Use Peer Learning to Keep Our Company’s Competitive Edge
- Reactions: Deliver Engaging and Up-to-Date Courses With Collaborative Learning
- Why Collaborative Learning is the Next Phase of LMS eLearning
