Focus Magazine - Spring 2015 - 30

FEATURESTORY

Reimagining Customer Training
I By Steve Boller

s life sciences trainers, there is a strong likelihood
that your company oﬀers at least one product that is
highly complex for the end user. At some
organizations, this applies to every product they sell. ese
products probably represent a significant investment for
your customers - and they probably require you to provide
comprehensive training for the end user to be eﬀective.
When launching a new product, training your sales reps
is just the beginning. Consider the patient who drops out of
home dialysis therapy because the training provided does
not prepare them to operate the complex machinery - or
the hospital employees who do not know how to properly
administer your product to patients, causing the hospital to
switch to a competitor. In both scenarios, failure to
eﬀectively train the customer leads to an undesirable
outcome for both the customer and your organization.
Many organizations now combine on-site training with
e-learning and mobile performance support tools to
optimize the new customer experience. For example, Roche
Diagnostics' recently launched a customer training program
that uses cutting edge curriculum design and blended
learning techniques to drive customer success.
But what about your organization? How do you ensure
success for your customers? Consider the following focus
areas when developing your customer training:

Begin With the End in Mind
It's a commonly quoted adage. When it comes to
training, you'll need to identify both learning objectives and

business objectives. Define success ... then decide how
success will be measured. Roche identified key objectives
for the customer training such as reducing the number of
support hours required for new customers and
standardizing the classroom experience with the field
experience. All materials in the curriculum were designed
with these objectives in mind.

Basic Facts & Pre-Training
Product facts, features and processes quickly become
overwhelming for learners when presented all at once. It is
important to think of customer training as a curriculumwide process of knowledge transfer and not a one-time
"knowledge dump."
Roche's customer training includes pre-training that
takes only 45-60 minutes to complete, accessible from a
central online location. is e-learning approach has thus
far led to an increase in completion rates. Most importantly,
the e-learning is highly customized to the learner, with
diﬀerent modules based on role or product configuration.
Using a branching e-learning approach, Roche is able to
deliver relevant training to several diﬀerent learner types
through the same delivery method.

Practice and Feedback Opportunities
e-Learning is just the beginning in a customer training
curriculum. When the product is complex, face-to-face
coaching and practice opportunities are essential.
Roche's onsite customer training covers daily operations
and is truly focused on daily tasks and maintenance. "Nice
to know" information is intentionally le
out to streamline the experience for
learners. Most importantly, customers
practice using the product with the field
instructor present.

What's Needed, When It's
Needed

Customer
Training

Field reps and customers said they rarely
used large product manuals. ey needed a
reference tool that focused just on essential
processes and procedures. During onsite
training, Roche's customers receive an
operator notebook that provides "just-intime" reference information in a concise

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Focus Magazine - Spring 2015

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