A textbook example of how to commission and roll out a bespoke e-learning course for your workforce.
Established 2003
Trusted Worldwide
Flexible and Friendly
Established 2003
Trusted Worldwide
Flexible and Friendly
The background
British Sugar, part of the Associated British Foods Group, is the UK’s leader producer of sugar, with an annual output of around 1.2 million tonnes from its 5 sites across East Anglia
The company has a diverse workforce of 1200 staff, with a significant proportion originally from Eastern European countries.
The challenge
We were approached by British Sugar’s L&D team in summer 2023 with a request to put forward a proposal to develop a new bespoke module on Conscious Inclusion for the entire workforce
On signature of contract, our first step was to run an e-learning design workshop for the L&D team at the company’s headquarters in Peterborough.
This was followed by a period of working very closely with the team and with an external Diversity, Equity and Inclusion specialist on preparation of the storyboard for the module.
The delivery
Our partners at Colab Creation shot and edited the video introductions to each topic – and in fact we strongly recommend this approach, even where budget is limited, as it can make a significant difference to learner engagement.
Throughout the process of working up the storyboard, and producing early versions of the module itself, British Sugar sought feedback from their DEI stakeholder group, and this is best practice for organisations wanting to maximise buy-in to interventions of this kind.
Moreover, the module was just one element of a wider project to ensure that everyone across the workforce understood how they could make a contribution to the DEI agenda.
Finally, through our partners AST Language Services, we translated the module into Polish and Lithuanian, these being key languages in the workforce. Given that all workers speak English, why do this? The answer is that, even where it is not strictly necessary, a relatively modest additional investment can pay dividends in terms of staff feeling appreciated.
The module was launched to the workforce through British Sugar’s existing LMS in February 2024.
The results
The L&D team had fantastic feedback on the module, with one employee commenting: I would also add there feels a real difference in the quality of this learning modules to others that I’ve completed – it feels much more polished and professional and definitely shows that we have invested in this module as we really see the value and importance of Inclusion and Diversity.
The verdict
We are receiving such good feedback about the quality of the learning experience which I am very grateful for… We agreed we are happy to recommend you [as developers] if anything new comes up, as we had such a great experience.
Sarah Ramsden
Head of Talent and Leadership
British Sugar
The lessons
- If you’re going to roll out an e-learning course to address a training need, make it part of a wider plan.
- Create a stakeholder group to get involved in the co-creation of the course, or make use of any appropriate existing group.
- Use video to personalise the learning, especially where the topic relates to culture, attitudes or behaviours.
- Let staff know that the course is coming; don’t surprise them by having it appear out of nowhere on their LMS homepage.
- Explain why it has been commissioned (or purchased as a catalogue course) and why it has been assigned to them.
- Seek feedback at all stages.
Might a bespoke e-learning course be useful for your organisation? Book a call to find out how cost effective it can be.
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Are you our next success story?
Why not book a video call with one of our friendly team to find out how we can train your staff, too?
