A good story needs a great storyteller to pull it together into something epic. It’s much the same way as how good ingredients and a great chef make the perfect match for creating a mind-blowing dish.
As you infuse Epic Meaning into your training programme, you’ll be sure to notice a burst in engagement. But if the engagement isn’t kindled properly, you may soon see it peter out. And if this happens, all your hard work will have been for nothing.
That’s why you should never underestimate the importance of the programme administrator! Admins hold an immense amount of responsibility in ensuring the project is successful. They are not only responsible for the day-to-day running of your training initiative. They can also help to keep the embers of engagement burning by maintaining Epic Meaning on an ongoing basis.
What is Epic Meaning?
Epic Meaning is all about creating a sense of purpose. It drives us to do something that matters. Epic Meaning is activated when you inspire your learners and get them excited about being a part of a bigger purpose or plan.
Epic Meaning is a great way to motivate employees as they believe they are engaged in something bigger than themselves. By harnessing the power of purpose, you can change behaviour and eventually transform your organisation.
The Admin
Admins have complete access and visibility over all users, content and Admin features. Among other duties, they are responsible for managing teams, maintaining consistent design and driving learner engagement.
For instance, they can access and view content, create posts, schedule events, create training paths, push and pull learning content to individuals, batch different types of content and much more. They can monitor training outcomes and make changes as required.
As such, their role on the learning platform is extremely important. Your Admins act as guardians of Epic Meaning as they have the power to maintain a sense of purpose throughout your training solution. If they let things slip, the entire approach may be at risk. So, it’s up to them to keep your training approach consistent.
Here are a few of the things that your administrators can do to maintain Epic Meaning on your online learning platform:
1. Use Narrative
Storytelling has been used for centuries. It has been an important tool to retain and pass down knowledge throughout history. As such, it’s no surprise that narrative and storytelling can also be extremely useful in your learning.
Weaving narrative into your training is a compelling and stimulating way to disclose the content. It does not only make learning more engaging but makes the information easier to remember and share. In fact, we are 20x times more likely to remember content if it’s told in a narrative.
Similarly, adding narrative into your training is an excellent way to flood your content with Epic Meaning! When our brain encounters a good story, it releases oxytocin. Oxytocin is known as the love chemical, and it’s released when we connect with someone or something.
And the more connected we are, the more engaged we feel. So, your Admins should focus on building a strong narrative through your training content. It is a fantastic way to evoke learner engagement, which is the key to boosting productivity and changing behaviours.
2. Keep Your Content Flowing
Imagine this: you are really engaged in a game and have been working hard to level up. Then suddenly, you reach the end and that’s it.
The same can happen in learning! You never want your learners to feel as though they have peaked and cannot improve any further. As such, you should encourage your learners to embrace the idea of continuous learning and progress.
That’s why it’s crucial to leave your theme and narrative open-ended. This allows your admins to add new content that helps the story to continue and grow. A consistent stream of fresh and exciting content will also ensure that engagement is maintained for the foreseeable future.
Up to date content filled with Epic Meaning is also a great way to make content more valuable to your learners. This is extremely important as one in three employees say that uninspiring content is a barrier to their learning.
And just as with any content strategy, your admins should update older resources where necessary. Business moves quickly, which may change your theme or narrative. Updating old content helps you to ensure your content maintain a sense of Epic Meaning throughout.
3. Stimulate Discussion
Your admins should also focus on stimulating discussion and participation wherever possible. Clever use of social learning is a brilliant way to keep your training programme at the front of your learner’s minds. This will also help them to take the Epic Meaning on board.
If you are using a social learning platform, you have all the tools you need to stimulate discussion. The Academy LMS is packed with social features, such as Live Chat, Social Feeds, Clubs and Groups, the Experts Area and more. These features encourage engagement and forge new opportunities for Epic Meaning.
In addition, 87% of employees identify social knowledge sharing as essential. Therefore, social learning is not only necessary for Epic Meaning but for supercharging employee learning.
As such, your admins should make sure they are checking in on a regular basis to kick-start conversations and to comment on learner posts. They can also host competitions to encourage learners to engage with the community and share what they have learned so far!
Sending reminders and push notifications helps to bring your learners back to your learning software. This will reinforce the platform as the first point of call for learners’ training needs.
4. Mix Up the Imagery
There are many ways to instil Epic Meaning into the minds of your learners. One of the most effective ways to do so is to get your imagery right. While images are essential for Epic Meaning, they also play a key role in learning. Imagery can help learners to store information longer, aid better comprehension and act as a stimulator for emotions.
As such, before you start crafting your training interventions, you should consider the imagery and theme you are going to use throughout the learning management system and your training content.
If your learners log in to the LMS day after day and see the exact same images every time, the impact of Epic Meaning will inevitably start to fade. To avoid stagnation, the admin should mix things up every now and then to keep your programme fresh and exciting!
As long as your theme and imagery are consistent, you can have some fun playing around with it. For example, if your theme includes characters, you can give them a Christmas or Halloween makeover.
Here at Growth Engineering, our philosophy is to wage war against dull online learning. We do this by transforming your learners into superheroes. As such, you won’t be surprised when you spot superheroes in our brand imagery and training content.
Imagery helps to immerse your learners in your theme and narrative whilst reinforcing the message you are sending to your learners. Once engaged with the Epic Meaning, your learners will take more interest in training and get more out of the experience.
5. Reward Your Learners
We all love being rewarded. Getting rewarded, whether big or small, can trigger the release of feel-good chemical dopamine and stimulate the production of the ‘love hormone’, oxytocin.
They are great incentives to get learners more motivated to keep progressing in their learning journey. As such, rewards are an excellent way to drive engagement, create motivation and make your learners more effective.
Real-life rewards have the power to make the Epic Meaning transcend your training programme and become so much more. Our Reward Centre in The Academy LMS allows you to set up your own real-life rewards effortlessly, which can be anything from an online voucher or concert ticket to a ‘day off’ pass or charitable donation.
Whatever the reward may be, your admins play a pivotal role in making sure that they are related to your theme or narrative of your training programme. For instance, if your theme focuses on learners rising their way up the food chain in the jungle, make sure your badges and achievements are animal-related.
And even better, if your budget stretches to real-world rewards, offer your learners tickets to the zoo or the opportunity to become a lion tamer for the day.
6. Tie Everything Together
A great admin will infuse Epic Meaning into absolutely everything they produce on the learning platform. In fact, you will never find them pushing out bland and unbranded pieces of content.
By linking everything back to your theme or narrative, you will be able to tie everything together to create a cohesive learning experience. This reinforces the idea that everything the learner does contributes to their training. And you will see increased and maintained engagement as a result.
Final Words
Now you know all about maintaining Epic Meaning! As you can see, the role of your administrators is a big one. They have the power to infuse your training programme with Epic Meaning and to fuel unprecedented levels of learner engagement by maintaining a sense of purpose throughout your training content.
With Epic Meaning, you can ensure your training interventions speak directly to your learners. Soon enough, they will see all their learning efforts coming together into something special!
Are you looking for more ways to deliver Epic Meaning in your training? Then you are in for a treat! Explore our guidebook, ‘Your Guide to Epic Meaning’, now!
Drive Unlimited Learner Engagement
Create Serious Business Impact
