Onboarding Learning Portals: the Latest and Greatest

Earlier this month, we talked about the great onboarding training we designed for Domino’s. We crafted courses that met the pizza chain’s specific needs through onboarding best practices. However, we created more than courses for Domino’s. We also designed and built a learning portal: a one-stop locale for all their training materials.

What is a learning portal?

In addition to developing customized learning solutions for our clients, we also build award-winning learning portals. We don’t talk about our portals as much as we should, but we’re going to change that—starting with this blog post.

If you’re not familiar with the term “portal,” you might be familiar with the term “LMS” aka learning management system. Learning management systems allow employers to “create, distribute and track training anywhere.” They’re a place for the employers to store and manage their training materials and track learning progress. LMSs also commonly have cross-device functionality. For example, if a learner opens a training course on a desktop and later goes back to the course using a tablet, then the LMS tracks the progress so that the learner can pick up where they left off. We refer to our LMSs as portals.

How does a learning portal contribute to onboarding training?

For one thing, a portal is the medium through which the training is dispensed. It helps new hires know where to go. Starting a new job is difficult enough without having to navigate scattered onboarding training. It’s better for new hires to have a single known location where they can find what they need.
A portal also makes it easier for a supervisor to oversee a new hire’s progress. Supervisors can check off tasks that new hires complete or assign them specific training paths.

Additionally, like any website, a portal is designed to retain users. It’s supposed to be interesting enough and easy enough to use that the experience is seamless. If the experience is boring or difficult, return visits are reduced, and the lack of retention in the training program can lead to a lack of retention of employment. Statistics show that the onboarding experience is directly related to employee retention. In other words—a good portal can help new hires stay engaged in onboarding training. A bad portal can contribute to new hires becoming disengaged and deciding they’d rather work elsewhere.

What does the AllenComm portal do for Domino’s?

The portal we built for Domino’s was designed to do three things: “provide franchisees complete control to customize how and what they assign and track for their team members, empower employees to master core skills, and empower managers and admins to optimize and validate employee progress.”

With the help of the learning portal, Domino’s franchisees can assign training to initially onboard new hires and to continue to help employees improve after their formal onboarding period ends. They’re able to customize the training experience to build a foundation of personalized learning from day one, which optimizes the new hire’s progress. We’ll talk more about the ways Domino’s uses their portal later this month!

What will AllenComm portals offer for onboarding in the future?

We have some exciting new ideas for the future of our portals. Using the lessons that we learned from our onboarding work with Domino’s and other clients, we’re developing an exciting LMS that clients can use exclusively for onboarding purposes. Using this revolutionary new “onboarding hub,” AllenComm clients can help new hires:

• chart their learning aspirations by creating a personalized plan of action
• meet with industry and company experts and colleagues to gather stories, share insights, and troubleshoot roadblocks
• identify and locate key people, resources, and functions of their immediate work surroundings
• gain enthusiasm and maintain motivation by seeing progress and success immediately
• connect with colleagues, mentors, and other helpful people
• organize and access important tools through the hub dashboard links

We’re proud to say that not only do we make great training, we also make great LMSs to house it. We look forward to using our new onboarding hub to make more portals for clients like Domino’s.

If you’re looking for a more flexible LMS for your onboarding training or other corporate training, reach out and let us know how we can help.