Training changes, the organization changes｜An education system that does not belong to any particular department and a change in awareness. Sugitaka's educational DX challenge

Dependence on on-the-job training and impersonalization of knowledge are issues

What kind of knowledge is required of your employees for training due to the nature of your business?

Our company's main business is rental of temporary construction equipment, but it is not enough to simply have knowledge of the equipment. Since most of our customers are in the construction industry, basic knowledge of the construction industry as a whole is also essential. For example, a wide range of skills and expertise are required, including knowledge of building construction procedures and contracting.

On the other hand, many of our mid-career hires come from different industries. In fact, I myself used to be in a completely different industry. Therefore, I understand the difficulty of acquiring such knowledge from scratch.

What challenges did you face before introducing learningBOX?

Our company had been working to create a curriculum for acquiring basic knowledge and skills in order to update employee training, starting with new employee training. Previously, we had relied on on-the-job training (OJT) for the majority of our training, which resulted in a lack of knowledge and inconsistency in training levels. A particular problem was the double and triple effort required to create educational materials.

At each business site, the knowledge required by each customer differs. For this reason, there were no common teaching materials prepared for the entire company, and each time a new employee joined the company, the person in charge of each department had to re-create the materials from scratch each time. It was not unusual for it to take two to three hours to prepare the materials.

Furthermore, when I was in charge of training new employees, the materials that were already in place were out of date and did not match the situation on site. Therefore, I had no choice but to re-create the materials myself in the end.

What is the background behind the growing need to review training management methods?

For in-house group training programs, post-training tests were administered on paper or scored and tabulated using analog methods, which took a lot of time for administrative and analytical work.

Furthermore, as we were developing our curriculum to improve the situation where knowledge was dependent only on specific personnel, changes in social conditions made face-to-face training difficult.

As a result, there is a rapidly growing demand for a system that allows students to receive the same quality of education regardless of their location.

The quiz/testing functionality and cost-effectiveness were the deciding factors.

How did you learn about learningBOX and what interested you?

I learned about it through an Internet search. The first thing that caught my attention was the overwhelming cost performance. I was very interested in the fact that the cost was affordable and easy to start small during the phase of rebuilding the education system.

We had been using Excel, Word, and paper to create and grade tests, but we wanted to make these tasks more efficient. We wanted to make these tasks even more efficient, and learningBOX, with its extensive learning management functions, met our needs.

The variety of question types allows students to not only answer the questions, but also to think carefully about the test. I felt that this helped to enhance the effectiveness of the learning process.

Are there any particular points that you appreciated about learningBOX during the consideration phase?

There were two points that we appreciated: First, the "unparalleled flexibility" of being able to build our own specialized educational materials. The scaffolding and temporary construction equipment industry we deal with is a very niche area, so commercially available educational materials alone do not adequately cover the knowledge required for practical work.

LearningBOX has a system in place that allows administrators with no IT expertise to easily create and update tests and slides that incorporate specialized knowledge. The flexibility of being able to easily maintain such an "in-house dedicated education platform" fit our needs perfectly.

The second is "cost performance that is easy to sustain. Not only was the initial cost low, but the running cost was also very low, even when considering future company-wide implementation. This excellent cost-effectiveness was a major support for our management decision when we considered the long-term perspective of providing education equally to all employees.

What were the deciding factors in your final decision to introduce the system?

As mentioned earlier, the fact that we were able to meet both the requirements of "in-house production of proprietary teaching materials" and "sustainable cost structure" was the deciding factor in our decision to implement the program.

Another major attraction was the ability to import existing in-house content such as PowerPoint and PDF files as teaching materials without modification. Another important factor in our decision to use learningBOX was the fact that we felt we could smoothly start using it without having to recreate teaching materials from scratch.

Utilize existing materials as they are, drastically reducing the man-hours required to prepare content.

What is the process from introduction to start of operation?

The business decision to implement the system was very smooth. Because we started out small, with just 300 accounts, the approval process did not require a lot of documentation, and the decision to implement was made quickly.

Furthermore, we feel that the introduction of the system went more smoothly because we created folders that each office could freely use to allocate expenses and adopted a system in which expenses are divided among the offices.

When the program was launched, existing PowerPoint documents and PDFs were uploaded and utilized as is, rather than having to recreate educational materials from scratch, which greatly reduced the man-hours required for content preparation.

What is your content creation structure?

Basically, each department is entrusted with the creation of educational materials. In some cases, educational materials held by the education department are open, and each site uses them as a basis for on-the-job training with its own modifications.

Currently, we are creating more than 10 new pieces of content per year, and we are also focusing on creating video content.

Very easy to use with or without IT knowledge

How do you feel about the actual use of the system as an administrator?

Regardless of their IT knowledge, sales and office employees use the system smoothly and without problems, and find it very easy to use.

The UI is simple and easy to understand, and the administrator can operate the system without hesitation once he/she understands the system structure. In addition, the authorization settings (Management rolesIt is also convenient to be able to perform (1) in detail, making it easy to manage according to the operations of each department.

Furthermore, "Prerequisites and Disable skip playbackThe system is well equipped with a variety of functions to ensure learning, such as the "learning system" and other features that promote steady acquisition of knowledge. We also find it very convenient that we can flexibly create the optimal learning environment for each assignment.

What has been the response from the participants?

New employees have commented that they can learn at their own pace in their spare time and from any location. Sales employees, in particular, use learningBOX as a knowledge base, as the expertise required for each project differs.

In the past, many questions were asked to those around them for reasons such as "I don't know where to look up" or "I don't have educational materials," resulting in inconsistencies in the content depending on the respondent.

Satisfied with the generous support system even after introduction

What do you think about the support system of learningBOX?

I am also very satisfied with the support. Whenever I have questions, even if the information is on the website, they explain it in detail, including supplementary information, to help me understand it better.

What was especially helpful was the timing of the change in our management staff. The new person in charge was given a detailed lecture on how to operate and manage the system one by one, and the handover went smoothly.

As we continue to operate the system, we feel great confidence in the fact that such a generous support system is available.

Wide range of applications from basic knowledge acquisition for new employees to specialized training

What specific training programs and situations do you utilize?

Currently, we use LearningBOX not only for new employee training, but also for a wide range of situations, including training for mid-career hires and specialized knowledge acquisition. In particular, new employee training for sales employees spans a long period of time from April to December, and we use the learningBOX to review knowledge even after assignment.

In addition, a series of "uploading of teaching materials, implementation of comprehension tests, and review through questionnaires" is packaged and deployed at each training session. This system makes it easy to measure the effectiveness of training.

Visualization of education and change in awareness throughout the company

What effects or changes have you seen since the introduction of the system?

The greatest achievement has been the easier access to information and an environment that allows online learning regardless of location or time. Previously, the training system was not sufficient and we had to rely on on-the-job training. However, the introduction of learningBOX has created an awareness to promote online learning and at the same time, to conduct OJT in a systematic manner.

After the introduction of the system, everyone has speedy access to accurate knowledge. As a result, the speed of self-solving has increased, and a "cycle of review" has been established, in which the same content is learned over and over again. This has allowed for the uniform enhancement of skills without relying on individual experience, leading to improved performance throughout the organization.

Another significant change for the entire organization is the ability to visualize data on the acquisition of individual skills and knowledge, which has been difficult to quantify in the past. I feel that awareness of education has increased throughout the company.

Has there been any impact on collaboration between departments?

After learning of an example of how the Sales Department (hereafter "Sales Department") was using the curriculum, another department that manages equipment (hereafter "Equipment Department") began its own efforts to create its own curriculum last year.

Previously, the Education Department was primarily responsible for content management, but now each department has been given the authority to freely create and utilize content that makes the most of the unique characteristics of each site. This new system makes it easier to promote on-the-job training and skill development at each site.

As a result, knowledge sharing between the equipment department and the sales department has become smoother.

Aiming to establish a hybrid educational system

What are your broader goals for the future?

In the future, we intend to strengthen our hybrid training system that combines face-to-face training and e-learning. While knowledge acquisition will be efficiently advanced through the use of learningBOX, face-to-face training will focus on role-playing, case studies, and other practical content that is highly effective because it is face-to-face.

We also intend to strengthen our efforts to create an environment in which employees can learn independently and tailor their learning to their own challenges by preparing a variety of training programs according to job type and year. We would like to establish a "culture of self-learning" throughout the company, in which each employee can work on improving his or her skills on a daily basis.

Preventing "gentrification" of education and steadily consolidating knowledge

Finally, do you have a message for those who are considering implementing learningBOX?

I think learningBOX is a tool that can be easily utilized in any industry, not just niche industries like ours. In particular, it is a very easy system to implement for companies that cannot devote a lot of resources to education, or for companies that are highly specialized and cannot fully utilize existing teaching materials.

The intuitive operability and extensive testing functions will be of great value to you when you actually use the system. In addition to cost-effectiveness, it has all the functions to prevent "gentrification" of education and to steadily consolidate knowledge.

Thank you very much for your valuable insights!