4 PRACTICES

FOR CREATING A HIGH-IMPACT

LEARNING CONTENT STRATEGY
Introduction
DEVELOPING AN EFFECTIVE CORPORATE
LEARNING STRATEGY CAN POSITIVELY
IMPACT PERFORMANCE, PRODUCTIVITY
LINK TRAINING TO
AND ENGAGEMENT. SO HOW DO 1 BUSINESS OBJECTIVES
LEARNING LEADERS ENSURE THEIR
EFFORTS ALIGN WITH ORGANIZATIONAL
PRIORITIES? IT'S ALL IN THE STRATEGY.

In a research study by IDC and

ENLIST EXECUTIVE
OpenSesame of 250 organizations with SUPPORT FOR
more than 1,000 employees, four learning 2
TRAINING INITIATIVES
and development (L&D) strategies stood
out as key factors in the success of the
best-performing companies:

ENSURE HIGH UTILIZATION

OF E-LEARNING BY
3 MAKING IT ACCESSIBLE
AND MEANINGFUL

GET MANAGERS
4 TO SUPPORT AND
REINFORCE TRAINING

2 4 Practices for Creating a High-impact Learning Content Strategy

 1 Link training
to business
objectives

To drive business outcomes you need

to ensure your employees have the WHAT HAPPENS WHEN LEARNING IS
right skills and knowledge in order LINKED TO STRATEGY?
to meet your objectives. So, training

20% GREATER
should be fundamental to how your
business objectives are achieved, not
an afterthought. executive commitment
to training

What do we mean:
• Learning should contribute
to meaningful, observable
performance outcomes
10% HIGHER
MANAGER SUPPORT
• Learning becomes part of the way of the training
your business expects to achieve its
objective/initiatives/strategy

32% GREATER gain

in employee performance

38% IMPROVED
employee productivity

3 4 Practices for Creating a High-impact Learning Content Strategy

 2 Enlist executive
support for
training initiatives

Learning initiatives should have a WHAT HAPPENS WHEN TRAINING

“sponsor” whose responsibilities include HAS EXECUTIVE SUPPORT?
behaviors covered by the training.
Your sponsor doesn’t need to be an
“executive,” as long as it’s someone
sufficiently responsible to assure content HIGHER RELEVANCE
relevance and commit the target & CONSUMPTION
learners to participate in the learning. 
 of training content


What do we mean:
• Reach an agreement with your
sponsor on the expected impact of
your L&D initiative 50% HIGHER
• Build a program that includes RELEVANCE SCORES
leveraging highly relevant content to when organizations have a
support the expected impact formal executive sponsor


• Measure and report back on outcomes

5x MORE COURSE-
CONSUMPTION at
organizations with high
sponsor engagement

4 4 Practices for Creating a High-impact Learning Content Strategy

 3 Ensure high utilization
of eLearning by
making it accessible
and meaningful

A recent IDC study shows that WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOUR

the more eLearning courses your ORGANIZATION OFFERS RELEVANT,
organization offers, the higher the
JUST-IN-TIME COURSES?
likelihood that your employees will find
courses they want to take. Utilization of
eLearning increases even more when
your organization selects courses that 10% MORE EMPLOYEES
are highly relevant to the employees’ TAKE E-LEARNING COURSES
jobs, roles, career aspirations, etc. when the courses are highly
relevant to their jobs

What do we mean:
• Training only works when
employees take the course – so
make it relevant!
22% MORE E-LEARNING
COURSES are taken by
• Offering “more” training may be employees when the courses
better, but only if these courses align are highly relevant
to business objectives
• Employees must understand how
the courses will help them improve
on-the-job performance 50% MORE
E-LEARNING COURSES
are taken by employees
when organizations offer
highly-relevant courses to
their job and career growth

5 4 Practices for Creating a High-impact Learning Content Strategy

 4 Get managers
to support and
reinforce training

Managers play an important role in WHAT HAPPENS WHEN MANAGERS

encouraging their employees to set aside
SUPPORT AND REINFORCE TRAINING?
time to do training but also to apply
the training and knowledge gained to
their everyday responsibilities. To ensure
training is used to improve performance,
provide your frontline managers with
the training and development they need
to coach and mentor their employees. 11% greater improvement
When managers engage in ongoing
in EMPLOYEE PERFORMANCE
coaching conversations with employees
they can more readily identify learning
and development opportunities that
will benefit their career as well as your
business.
21% greater improvement
in EMPLOYEE ENGAGEMENT
What do we mean:
• Using coaching conversations to
set clear goals, drive accountability,
provide regular feedback and support
employee development
• Modeling the behavior/knowledge
they expect of their employees
• Building a strong, trusting relationship
with employees

6 4 Practices for Creating a High-impact Learning Content Strategy

 Companies who employed these best
practices saw the following benefits when
compared to companies who did not:

IMPACT: COMPARED WITH ORGANIZATIONS

WHO DON'T USE THESE STRATEGIES

50% 21% 30% 38%

Greater utilization of Greater gain in Greater gain in Greater gain in

eLearning content engagement employee retention productivity

CREATE A LEARNING CONTENT STRATEGY THAT DRIVES

BUSINESS OUTCOMES

As organizations sharpen their focus on ROI, the emphasis has changed from how good
their training is to how well the training is used to improve performance. By using the
above practices you can create a learning content strategy with measurable impact on
the achievement of your company's business objectives.

7 4 Practices for Creating a High-impact Learning Content Strategy

Need help getting started? Saba and
OpenSesame can help!

With Saba and OpenSesame you get a complete learning solution: a best-in-class LMS platform
with the most comprehensive content available to support your learning strategy. OpenSesame’s
eLearning courses integrate seamlessly with Saba’s full talent development platform to provide your
employees with real-time access to cutting-edge content that is matched to their learning plans.
Need help? We offer Professional Services to help you create a learning content and governance
strategy that fits your culture and drives business impact.

Sources:
• IDC, Leveraging eLearning for Impact: More than Just a Library, 2017
• IDC, IDC InfoBrief, Best Practices in Learning and Development of High Performing Companies, 2017

Contact us to learn more: www.saba.com/get-started

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