Congratulations! You’ve been named head coach of an extended enterprise training program. You’re now in charge of training a complex, network of partners — each with their own playbooks, strategies, and training needs. But don’t sweat it! With a bit of strategy, you can tackle these challenges head-on. Let’s dive into the unique extended enterprise training challenges, and how understanding these can help you pick the right Learning Management System (LMS) to turn this challenge into a championship run.
Let’s talk geography. Your partners aren’t all playing in the same city; they’re spread out across the globe. We’re talking about hundreds, sometimes thousands, of partner locations across different regions and continents.
And they’re organized differently in different regions. Your North American dealers might be grouped into regions and districts, while your EMEA (Europe, Middle East, Africa) partners are organized by country, with local independent resellers.
Orchestrate multiple partner networks, each with its own unique structure, and make sure training stays consistent across the board.
It should allow you to organize North American partners one way and Asian partners another. Each with its own course catalog but sharing courses across catalogs. This is one of the extended enterprise training challenges many LMSes struggles to overcome.
Brands and product lines are the star players on your team. Not every partner sells or services every brand or product line at every location. Imagine training a quarterback then putting them in as a kicker—it’s not going to work out. Training your Dallas partner on a product line they don’t sell is like running drills for a game they’ll never play. This is one of the extended enterprise training challenges that most large manufacturers face.
Act like a seasoned coach, knowing exactly which players belong on the field. It should link brands and product lines to specific courses, certifications, skills, and locations.
If partner’s Houston location focuses on brand A and their Dallas location on brand B, your LMS needs to ensure each location only gets assigned the training relevant to the brand they support. It needs to ensure that certifications and skills are automatically updated based on the brands each location supports.
Let’s not forget about the field support networks—the unsung heroes working the sidelines. These are the support teams—sales, service, and training squads—that come in to assist partners. But here’s the kicker: not every partner taps into every support network. A full-service dealer might need all three, while a reseller might only require sales and training.
Reflect this sideline strategy, adapting to the different structures of each support network.
Flexibility is key—your LMS should allow partners to be organized so that field staff can access the training of the partners they support, ensuring everyone’s on the same playbook.
This way, your sales support team can track the progress of their partners’ sales reps, while the service support team focuses on training technicians.
Let’s focus on the learners—the multi-tasking athletes who juggle multiple roles across multiple locations for multiple partners. Imagine being a salesperson by day, a service technician by night, and a parts manager on the weekends for three different partners. Exhausting, right?
Allow learners to have multiple profiles within a single account. It needs to offer learners a unified training experience—a single playbook for the learner, but segmented views for each manager they report to.
In other words, while the learner sees all the courses they need to complete, each coach only sees the courses relevant to their partner. This is another one of the extended enterprise training challenges many LMSes struggle to address.
If you thought managing multiple locations was tricky, try catering to a diverse team of players. Extended enterprise learners come in all shapes and sizes—different roles, backgrounds, and skill levels. It’s like coaching an Olympic team where the athletes range from sprinters to artistic swimmers, each with their own training needs and goals.
Provide tools to define and manage learner audiences based on various criteria, allowing you to tailor the training experience to each group.
This might mean adjusting the user interface, creating custom workflows, or pacing courses to suit different learners. By tailoring the training experience to each audience, you’ll keep everyone—from the rookie sales rep in Tokyo to the seasoned service tech in Houston—motivated and ready to compete.
And then there’s the matter of cultural differences. Training that hits home in one region might completely miss the mark—or worse, cause a foul—in another. What’s considered a winning play in one culture might be seen as a penalty in another. This is one of the extended enterprise training challenges especially important for organizations with a global partner network.
Be culturally aware, offering options that account for these differences. This might include course versions with varying the content to align with regional norms, while still being recognized by the LMS as the same course. Or, modifying the LMS’ data labels and content to align with regional customs.
Engagement and motivation—the ultimate game-changer in any training program. It’s tough enough to keep your own learners motivated, but when it comes to partners who aren’t even on your payroll, the challenge is even greater. How do you get partners to spend time on your training programs when they have their own games to win? The answer is incentives and rewards.
Offer tools for gamification—certifications, badges, leaderboards, cash incentives, and rewards systems that tap into the competitive spirit.
After all, who doesn’t love a little friendly competition or the promise of a trophy at the end of the season?
Let’s talk about the rulebook—compliance and regulatory requirements that vary across regions and industries. Keeping up with these can feel like playing a game where the rules change every quarter, especially when new regulations come up faster than you can say “penalty.” This is one of the training challenges that can differ from region to region.
Be your assistant coach for compliance, helping you navigate these tricky rules. It should track who has completed what training, send reminders for certifications nearing expiration, and generate reports to satisfy even the strictest referees.
With the right LMS, staying compliant doesn’t have to feel like overtime; instead, it becomes a manageable part of your winning strategy.
Language barriers are another significant challenge, especially in global extended enterprises. Miscommunication can lead to missed plays, mistakes, and ultimately, a losing season. It’s like trying to call plays in a different language—eventually, the whole game plan falls apart.
Include multilingual support, offering training materials and page content in the native languages of your players.
This goes beyond simple translation; it’s about ensuring that the content is easily understood by the target audience. For example, courses and content might be available in British, American, and Australian English. By breaking down language barriers, you ensure that your training is effective.
Finally, we come to the ever-accelerating pace of change. Whether it’s new products, technologies, market trends, or evolving regulations, keeping your extended enterprise up-to-date can feel like trying to catch a fast break. Blink, and you might miss something crucial.
Be agile enough to keep up with these rapid changes. This means having the ability to quickly update content, modify workflows, roll out new courses, and communicate changes to all team members.
By staying on the cutting edge, you ensure that your partners are always equipped with the latest knowledge and skills, ready to take on whatever challenges come their way.
Managing the extended enterprise training challenges is difficult. But here’s the silver lining: by understanding these obstacles and the specific LMS features needed to overcome them, you’re well on your way to building a thriving partner training program.
Partner training has the potential to significantly impact your organization’s performance. By choosing an LMS that addresses the challenges you face—whether it’s managing geographically dispersed teams, handling diverse players, or staying compliant with ever-changing rules—you can turn these extended enterprise challenges into opportunities. And who knows? You might even enjoy the game along the way. After all, the journey of extended enterprise training, like any great sport, is as much about the challenges as it is about the victories.
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