How nonprofits can navigate the journey to digital learning programs

The modern learner already preferred digital and on-the-go modalities for learning. In 2019, Accenture Research saw unprecedented consumption in video-based learning on mobile and an uptick in use of social learning, on-the-job training and mentoring to enhance performance. The global COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated this transition, increasing the demand for digital capacity building, training and programmatic learning. As the workforce responds to the pandemic and adapts to the new normal, training requirements for new skills and roles will greatly increase. Digital learning offers a safe, effective way to reach learners at scale.

Nonprofits are at the heart of the digital pivot.

We developed a guide to support our nonprofit partners in meeting the unprecedented demand for learning solutions. Accenture’s Digitizing Learning-Based Programs Playbook offers key considerations along the digitization journey to nonprofit decision makers, content and curriculum designers and instructors who deliver digital content to learners.

As decision makers seek to understand the journey that lies ahead, a rapid assessment of the organization’s current state: the level of ambition to invest in digital, the ability to reach learners through digital channels and the current understanding of learner preferences, will be imperative in shaping a potential digital roadmap. Accenture’s Digitizing Learning-Based Programs Playbook enables self-reflection to spur discussion across key capacity areas of an organization and supports leaders to develop a roadmap that addresses key gaps, highlights investment areas and builds success factors to pilot and scale digital learning.

Does your leadership have the ambition to invest in digital? Can you reach your learners through digital channels tomorrow? These initial questions can support decision makers in understanding the road ahead and which programs may be suited for digitization.

To understand how the learner will interact with program content, consider questions around the learner’s motivations, culture, language and how the content is relevant to their lives right now. To begin to design the learner experience, invest in understanding learner’s digital habits and digital literacy to engage through the right mediums.

The Digitizing Learning-Based Programs Playbook offers self-reflection and discussion questions to help identify potential gaps and success factors across your teams, and aspirational descriptions of digital-ready organizations for different levels of ambition and investment.

At Accenture, we design our digital learning programs through a pragmatic model called “Durable Learning” that is based on Accenture’s research centered upon learning sciences. This model is centered upon eight key principles that enhance learning durability: the likelihood that a learner will retain and use knowledge gained long after engaging with the context.

The more parts of the brain we engage, the more likely we are to retain content. When virtual, we need to work harder to engage multiple parts of the brain.

The Digitizing Learning-Based Programs Playbook translates these principles into practical applications and best practices that can be embedded into content design and learning session delivery to support learners to adopt learning mindsets and meet their learning goals.

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