Compliance is mandatory to operating a successful business. But the coronavirus crisis has elevated its importance, and reinforced that it must be more than a check-the-box activity.
Compliance training had its genesis as a defensive mechanism more than 20-years ago, an auditable trail of efforts to reduce regulatory sanctions in the instance of a legislative breach.
Since then, well-executed compliance training has become a long-term investment in the longevity of organisations.
With every business facing unique challenges, leaders need to reconsider how compliance training is delivered to their staff in this environment, in ways that are cost effective, relevant and make sense.
Here’s how businesses can improve overall learning and retention rates, and take compliance from check-the-box, to a pillar of organisational culture.
1. Tailor training to company and staff to ensure relevancy
To engage staff in training, it must be relevant. It does not make sense, from a productivity or financial perspective, to train every staff member in every piece of legislation.
Rather, leaders should consider training staff in what impacts them from a sector perspective and a role perspective. For example, making sure marketing understand anti-competitive conduct, while finance is across tax changes and money laundering legislation within the jurisdiction they operate.
In delivering training modules relevant to the individual, and calling out how specific legislation effects a specific role, compliance becomes an exercise not only in law-abidance but an educative experience in performing better in a job.
The result? Increased learning engagement and retained knowledge resulting in decreased likelihood of a breach and its associated reputational damage.
2. Checking adequacy of knowledge
The purpose of compliance training is to provide employees with a well-rounded understanding of the regulatory environment of their industry and the policies and processes around that in their organisation.
But, if not measuring adequacy of knowledge, how can an employer know if employees have had an adequate learning experience and actually understood course content?
Speaking scientifically, testing has been proven to reinforce knowledge by pushing information from the front of the brain to the hippocampus – the part of the brain that retains knowledge. In simple terms, without engaging with the information learned, a person is 97 per cent likely to forgot what they have learned within three days.
Testing staff post-training is a vital step, and will ensure not only that staff have completed training, but understand how to apply it to their role and not partake in non-compliant conduct.
3. Keeping the shift online interactive
Coronavirus has impeded the delivery of face-to-face training, and accelerated the pre-pandemic shift to online training.
As of 29 June, 4.3 million or 32 per cent of Australians were working from home as the virus shut down offices across the nation. Mirrored globally, this has meant a substantial increase in the digital delivery of training programs is under way across all segments of the workforce.
When executed to the highest level, online training brings a multitude of benefits: real-time reporting to track who has and hasn’t completed training; scheduled roll-outs to the right team at the right time; and, paramount in the current environment, employees can complete course content anywhere and at any time.
Online and in-person training do not need to be mutually exclusive. However, in a displaced work environment, a collaborative blend of online modules and role play scenarios delivered over video conferencing software means although trainer and trainee may not be face-to-face, personal interactivity and engagement can still be achieved.
4. Maintaining consistency with legislative change
Compliance training is not a one-time activity. With legislation changing regularly, especially in relation to health and safety provisions during the pandemic, a responsive approach must be taken to ensure staff are regularly trained and comply with current legal requirements. Ensuring staff are trained annually shows a consistent and ongoing approach to the organisation’s commitment to compliance training.
Engaging a compliance partner can take the stress out of not only developing a suite of courses that are suitable for your staff and the work they do, but are interactive, and constantly updated to reflect legislative and environmental changes.
Finally, compliance training is an investment, not a cost
Recognising that every business is different is the fundamental difference between run-of-the-mill training, and engaging compliance that is aligned to an organisation’s goals, ethics and culture.
Your staff, organisation and brand deserve a compliance training solution that is engaging, delivers consistently, and promotes brand protection through improved knowledge and consistent staff behaviour.
Anything less is, at best, a waste of budget and at worst, a massive reputational risk.
For 20 years, Safetrac has been a leader in engaging compliance solutions for all types of business. For 10 consecutive years, Safetrac has been recognized by the LearnX foundation, along with a number of their clients (Air New Zealand, Toyota, Chubb, Australian Unity, Fisher & Paykal, Salmat, David Jones, Acciona and Cricket Australia) with creating the best compliance training program in Asia Pacific.
Our collaborative approach ensures we fully understand your business and budget to find the best solution for your staff – to train them now as well as to re-engage them year-on-year.
It’s one of the reasons why, in our 20 year history, no Safetrac client rolling out our compliance training annually has been found by a regulator to have an inadequate compliance training program in place.
Contact us today to learn more or preview any of our courses – available as SCORM or through our online compliance platform.
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