Leveraging Applied Learning to Boost Workforce Productivity

Transform the way your teams work with applied learning features.

Employee learning and development (L&D) has come a long way from classrooms and offsite seminars. Technology has opened the door to elearning, which lets workers train on their own and at their own pace. Learning management systems (LMSs), cohesive platforms that host and manage learning content, let organizational leaders monitor success and respond to trends.

But for all that, development is still something of a passive process. Workers identify and seek out the subjects they want to dive deeper into, but at the end of the day, they’re often reading or watching material in a bubble—disconnected from the situations where it’s most useful.

That’s where applied learning comes in. As knowledge platforms mature, grow, and incorporate new capabilities like AI, they can respond to context and integrate ever more closely with employees’ day-to-day activities. That puts targeted learning opportunities directly in line with the flow of work, and makes it possible to intelligently enhance the way jobs get done. When the knowledge you need is delivered at precisely the right moment, that’s applied learning, and it’s a core design principle of Pinnacle Series. 

By introducing applied learning, organizations can unlock an all-new level of workforce productivity. The “how” comes down to six key characteristics of the applied learning process.

1. Applied learning happens fast 

Pinnacle Series is built to deliver learning straight to the moment it’s needed most. The platform integrates with leading industry software, making tips, and reference materials available directly in the flow of work. In addition, Pinnacle Series features enhanced search capabilities and an AI chat function that can surface bite-size, relevant content in an instant.

What this means is when workers hit a hurdle, they don’t need to stop work and go hunting for a solution. The answer they need to clear their logjam is just a moment away, letting them stay on a roll and not lose time to endless searching. And while support from managers and teammates will always be essential to a high-performing workforce, asking your team for help does multiply productivity costs as more team members are pulled away from work. Applied learning gives individuals the tools to maximize their self-sufficiency and save peer learning for the moments when it’s needed most.

2. Applied learning maximizes efficiency through relevance

Context is king in the applied learning process. Learning content should be hyper-relevant to the moment, addressing the work an employee is doing right now so that the new knowledge comes into play immediately. Workers get the biggest bang for their buck—they maximize the return on their time spent learning, and no time is wasted on material they already know.

Pinnacle Series accomplishes this with fully customizable skill assessments that clarify employees’ strengths, gaps, and opportunities. These assessments roll seamlessly into individualized learning paths and courses that home in on the knowledge that will help workers most.

3. Applied learning sticks around longer

Two key factors help to cement learning faster and keep it in memories longer: format and application. If information is delivered in a way that matches the material and the context, it’s easier for learners to internalize. And if learners can immediately turn around and use what they’ve learned, then that knowledge is far more likely to stay with them and be useful in the future.

The precise targeting of an applied-learning framework like Pinnacle Series delivers custom content that’s tailored to fit the time, place, and need of users: workflows to walk users through standard operating procedures, for example, or a microlearning video that demonstrates a specialized technique. Once users internalize the new information, it’s not only something they no longer need to look up, it’s something they can build on and improve.

4. Applied learning builds worker confidence

With reliable reference material at their fingertips, employees are better equipped to dive into unfamiliar situations. If they hit a snag or encounter something they don’t know, they’ve got the collective expertise of their organization and the wider industry to fall back on. Employees can move faster, more independently, and more decisively—and their track record of success builds into a virtuous cycle.

When workers learn that their organization supports them and that they can trust their own judgment, they become more willing to take creative risks and innovate. Confident employees are more free to deliver at their full potential for their organization, revealing value that you might not ever have expected.

5. Applied learning keeps work quality high

A comprehensive knowledge platform like Pinnacle Series lets you create your own custom materials, acting as a central repository not just for reliable information about your industry, but also about your unique organization. Within this applied learning framework, you can establish a north star for your organizational values, procedures, and hard-earned expertise. 

As your team navigates work, this north star is readily available to them. Guidelines and documentation are easy to share, from communication policies to the latest blueprints, meaning nobody needs to fly blind. Workers can make decisions based on the best available information, and as a result, the chance of mistakes—and of having to go back and fix them—is minimized.

6. Applied learning scales up readily

So far, the focus has been on the productivity benefits for individual workers. But a robust applied learning platform like Pinnacle Series has the added advantage of making those benefits easy to multiply. The Pinnacle Series framework centralizes and structures knowledge so it’s accessible throughout the organization, with adaptable, powerful content management and permissions tools to make sure it gets to the people who need it most. 

Level up from the daily grind with applied learning by Pinnacle Series.

Pinnacle Series is a knowledge platform designed to make your day-to-day smarter. With thousands of hours of learning content from leading industry brands, fully customizable learning tools, and intuitive user experience, Pinnacle Series offers a new approach to your organization’s most valuable asset: knowledge. To learn more about how Pinnacle Series can deliver a new kind of productivity for your workforce, request a demonstration today.