5 ways to use playlists to make your training more engaging

Playlists are a popular way of assigning a group of videos on a specific topic or skill to your members. A playlist consists of your own handpicked combination of Typsy lessons, courses and mentor sessions, and even your own custom content.

If you have been in management for some time, you have probably already had this experience: You have training requirements for each of your staff, but you aren’t quite sure how to get them to complete a mountain of tasks or really engage with the material.

Here are five ways the playlist feature in Typsy sets out to help you create relevant, engaging, and meaningful training that will be easier for your staff to complete. If you have never built a playlist in our system, you can learn exactly how it is done HERE.

1. Building a culture of learning

Company culture has a lot to do with how employees respond to training and learning opportunities given to them. Learning is no longer a singular event, in a formal setting. Managers should be encouraging employees to constantly grow and learn both on the job and through assigned training. One way to do this is through a blended learning structure within your organization. By providing short, frequent training to staff, managers can build a culture of learning within the organization that will ensure employees are expecting new training regularly. No matter what stage your company is in its learning culture, it is always possible to adjust and change. Getting started with small steps is key to resetting the current culture. A great step to take before taking on a full playlist in Typsy could be to assign a single lesson to staff through our quick assign feature, learn more about it HERE.

2. Choose your content

Ahead of building a playlist, have a short brainstorm about the training that is most necessary this week for your staff. By choosing topics that are going to be the most relevant for their current position and required tasks, you will be helping increase engagement with training, as well as job performance. In the Typsy Library, we offer both lessons and full courses for your members. Lessons are short, focused training, usually around one topic or task. Courses are in-depth training, usually made up of seven to fourteen individual lessons. Brainstorm on how you can best deliver training through a playlist. You may want to focus on one topic, such as service or management. Alternatively, you may want to design several playlists that each have a little bit of everything in them. Getting started with relevant playlists is key, and in the long run, you can start to develop a more structured training program that touches all subject areas necessary.

3. Design your training plan

Good managers also know when to push training, and when to pull back. This means that not overloading your employees can be quite important for higher training engagement. We usually recommend giving your staff about 15-20 minutes of online training per week. You can also supplement this with in person and blended training, as time allows. The amount assigned can change based on your busy and slow season, or deadlines and events your staff have in their day to day lives.

For playlists, Typsy usually recommends using individual lessons, to keep your training short and sweet. In practice, this would look like breaking up everything you are wanting an employee to learn about into multiple playlists. Human nature says that if we are given three hours of training with a due date in three weeks, most of us would wait until the last day to finish all three hours of work. Learning this way not only produces a lower engagement with the content but also means that information retention will be affected. By continually assigning short training at regular intervals, your staff will start to expect new training and that it will be both relevant and achievable. To build that culture of learning, keep an eye on the playlist timer, built into the Typsy system, which tells you when you have hit just the right amount of content for your new playlist.

4. Custom content additions

To further the idea of delivering relevant content to your staff, custom content filmed at your venue can also be both engaging and fun! With Typsy, you can upload your own lessons and content using our custom content feature. Once you have a lesson on the system, why not build it into a playlist using other Typsy videos? Your staff will appreciate being able to learn from both our experts and their peers at your organization. By blending the material in a playlist this way, you will be able to personalize training to your venue, while backing it up with our industry professional’s videos. Filming can be quick and easy- start by filming tasks that you often have to train or re-train staff on. This could be anything from where to report for their first shift, how to use the equipment in your venue, or even notes on how staff can describe new dishes or wines. In practice, building these custom videos into a playlist may be a video from the Typsy library on common cocktails, sent out with a video on your bar’s cocktail of the month.

5. Blended learning

Blended learning has become hugely beneficial to the hospitality industry due to its flexibility and cost-saving abilities. It is recommended that organizations use a mixture of in-person and online training resources to take advantage of this trend. Using playlists in Typsy, you can achieve this by first assigning your playlist and then assessing your member’s learning in person. From your training report page, you can select a playlist that you have assigned out, then an individual who has done their training, and assess them in person. You will be able to determine if they have demonstrated the task or skill the way the content set it out for them, or if they need to go back and review. You can also leave helpful comments for your staff along the way! The great thing about assigning out playlists is that your staff can go back and watch the material provided as many times as needed, to gain clarity on their newfound skills.

Remember, to build a culture of learning in your organization, the most important first step is to just get started by sending out a lesson or two to staff. Recruit other managers and shift leaders to help you ensure that staff are engaging with and completing their training in a timely manner. From here, building playlists could be a great way for you to consistently deliver relevant training to all departments of your organization.

Still have questions about online learning? Reach out to Typsy at hello@typsy.com

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