Does Your Partners’ Training Hit the Target?

As an extended enterprise, your partner network is vast. You have many partners you need to ensure are operating with the most up-to-date information on your brands and products. With multiple businesses spread across the country or even the globe, you want to make sure that your partners are receiving the appropriate training to best represent your organization and perform at the highest partner levels.

So, how are you making sure that your network members are getting the appropriate training? Your partners in warm weather climates don’t need to undergo training on snowmobile products. And your partners in land-locked, agricultural areas won’t need training on your marine elements. 

The ability to separate your training and how it is delivered is key to making sure the desired information is conveyed can make or break your partner relationships. If your partners are bombarded with training that is not relevant to them, they may choose to work with a different manufacturer that has fewer hoops to jump through. 

You will want to make sure your organization is supported by a learning management system (LMS) that can support the intricate needs of differentiation that your extended enterprise encompasses.

The Wrong Tool for the Job

Delivering the proper training to your partner network requires efficient and integrated tools that can accommodate your organization. Just like a technician who needs the right tool for the job, you need to look at your LMS in the same way.

There are many LMS platforms to choose from that will boast a wide array of features and capabilities that you might be interested in implementing as part of your training program. However, most corporate LMS platforms will not be able to accommodate the differentiation, complexities, or dynamic nature of an extended enterprise training program. 

Corporate LMS platforms are structured for environments that are checking training boxes for the sake of human resources. These types of training, while important and necessary, are not what is going to drive your business forward. Aligning the LMS with the culture of your business is the first step in selecting the best LMS for your needs. 

Most LMSs are focused on static training programs that check the compliance box and the annual nature of corporate training programs. Extended enterprise training programs that are driving the bottom line are focused on skills-based training that defines the operations of your business. Skills-based training is dynamic and constantly changing as new products and services are released, updated, and removed from the portfolio of what your partners need to support. Your training should be tied to the measurements of competency to better understand how it impacts the bottom line of the business or key performance indicators (KPIs) of your organization. 

You need to know that the investment you are making in an LMS is going to pay off. Without measurable elements of training, how can you verify that you’re getting your money’s worth? You need an LMS that gives you the ability to compare your training performance with KPI metrics to ensure that there is an impact from your training program. 

The Levels Of Differentiation You Need In Your LMS

With the ever-changing landscape that extended enterprises face, there are many levels of differentiation that you will need to accommodate the different partners in your network. Your products and services will not be offered by all of your partners and not in all areas of the country. In addition, only certain partners will sell, while others might be servicing. And then you’ll have partners, such as dealerships, doing both sales and service.

Streamlining the training for each partner is a must to ensure that the information they obtain is relevant to their operations. You don’t want your service partner taking sales training. And your salespeople don’t need training in service or certification.

The ability to differentiate between not only the partner but also the roles within your partner’s business is key. Your dealerships will have employees who perform different roles and sometimes have multiple roles. Ensuring that those employees are only required to take the training that is specific to their job(s) will ensure that training is efficient and focused for them overall.   

Does your LMS have the ability to be that specific? If not, you may consider an extended enterprise LMS. 

LatitudeLearning Checks All The Boxes

Created with the dynamic nature of extended enterprises at its heart, LatitudeLearning offers a one-stop shop for managing your training needs. With the ability to create a customized learning path for each role within your organization, LatitudeLearning makes it easy for you to clearly define roles, skills, learning paths, and certifications that are relevant to your partners. 

In addition, LatitudeLearning also understands that different partners will offer different brands, products, and services based on their location or what might be in season. The customizable nature of the training objects in the LatitudeLearning LMS makes it easy to ensure that only the appropriate training is deployed to the partners who need it. 

Although it may seem complicated to have so many levels of differentiation in your LMS, LatitudeLearning allows you to deliver your training in an effective and flexible manner, with targeted catalog features that are assigned to specific roles within your organization. This streamlines the process once the roles are defined and helps you automate the training that is delivered based on the responsibilities or location of the role.  

Training programs are an investment, and you will want to see how your investment is paying off. LatitudeLearning makes it easy to track performance with KPIs to quickly identify where your training is making an impact and which components of your training aren’t. With this information, you can make data-driven decisions and increase the efficiency of your training program. 

Ready to get the most out of your training program? Request a free demo today.