What is scaling in business? How do you scale your training business?
What is holding your company back to tackle those barriers head-on?
Scaling in business means setting a platform to enable and support growth in your organization ie., a sustainable way of growing your company. In other words, when your business is able to achieve huge demand for customers without incurring any additional cost is scaling. For that to happen, in the growing stage, we need to build a good strategy, acquire the right tools and employ the right talent. For example, Google does scaling up successfully by adding a lot of customers without any additional investment. Scaling is a lifeline for your business for long-term success.
it is not an easy task to scale your training business. You started your business to sell your product/services in the market and get a return on your investments. Scaling the business and growing the business are often used interchangeably. But, they are two distinct concepts. By growing the business we mean, achieving massive growth within a short period of time by using excessive manpower and resources which makes it vulnerable to a lot of issues because they don’t have the processes in place for sustainable growth. it lacks a strong foundation to support rapid development. But, learning how to scale mitigates these risks by ensuring a strong base that will not only support sustainable growth but also generate revenue in the long run without a substantial increase in cost. This is called Scaling.
Scaling your training program to match your company’s goals and requirements is a significant challenge. Providing a quality training program has a direct impact on the overall success of an organization. Corporations are constantly looking for skill-based and result-oriented training courses to upskill their employees. That’s the reason why it is imperative to understand the importance of scaling a training program, the benefits of doing so, and, the steps required to sync your training program with the overall requirements and goals of the company.
There are a few reasons why you should scale your training business. One is obviously to expand the current business ie., rolling out new products, hiring new employees, rapid Onboarding, new roles, and team structures, etc., Coordinating the workflow among the employees can simplify the scaling process. Another obvious reason is to address business challenges viz skill gaps (ie., re-skilling and up-skilling,), compliance needs, and leadership, etc., By providing more training opportunities, the employees can implement those skills in their jobs. Additionally, you can develop a culture of learning in the organization thus enabling the employees to be more creative, innovative, problem solvers, and better decision makers. Finally, when leads are increasing dramatically, such that it is not possible to handle the existing potential leads, scaling up helps in such situations.
Yes, the era of delivering standard training modules is an outdated concept. With the continuously evolving markets, training businesses need to change their strategies to prove appealing to potential clients. When we are talking about scaling a business, we are referring to the strategies for growth that aligns with our company’s vision and goals.
To scale your training business seamlessly, the following tips can be implemented:
- Define the scope of your training program: Identify the areas where you would like to scale up your training program, taking into account your organization’s needs and performance objectives. Develop a calendar and goals that fit your business needs and evaluate the progress periodically and implement changes wherever necessary.
- Use micro-learning in your program: create stand-alone information nuggets that are brief and focused. Because of time constraints, employees resort to consuming information in micro chunks. This helps to reduce the cognitive load on the learners, as well as, increase the retention power. A report suggests that one of the trending concepts used by leading training businesses is micro-learning. According to a study, the global micro-learning market size is expected to grow by USD 2.7 billion by 2024 at a compounded annual growth rate of 13.4%. As per deployment type, cloud-based microlearning modules have a higher demand than on-premise platforms. Also, cloud-based solutions are cost-effective as compared to on-premise micro-learning solution because it involves lower initial investment.
- Include eLearning as a cost-effective process: Providing training through eLearning helps boost employee performance. More and more trending courses can be added, and old and outdated courses can be removed. eLearning makes information easily accessible to employees/students. Through eLearning, digital content can help address the learning needs of a geographically diverse workforce.
- Harness the power of the Internet of Things (IoT): By IoT, we mean, a network of connected devices, embedded with sensors, connected to the internet, that are capable of analyzing and transmitting data. IoT can help businesses increase efficiency by automating tasks and enable optimizing processes by providing real-time insights. Their applications are spread across industries ranging from healthcare, banking, and financial institutions, education, logistics, etc., As far as IoT is concerned, the pie is massive, and there are chunks available for anyone willing to put their hands into this technology. Training can be provided to college students and professionals in IT Sectors. Aspects such as data volume, network security, identity management, and privacy pose a huge challenge to any industry.
- Adaptability and Flexibility: As your business grows, there will be a stage where your existing infrastructure will not be able to handle the current processes/operations, and the last thing you want is to lose your valuable customers due to that. Hence, you need to tweak your processes as you grow. It is always a good practice to improve on the core and scale up rather than reverting back, time and again, and doing it all over again after you have achieved a certain growth. Thus, you need to ensure that your processes/operations are working seamlessly for achieving sustainable growth.
- Create a dynamic team: Creating a strong support base of staff that is flexible, and can grow with the company’s targeted growth, is a prerequisite for scaling a business. To maintain sustainability, your team must work on establishing relationships with customers, suppliers, partners, and other organizations
- Create a strong customer base: Having a strong network around your business can propel your business into the future, and give you strength and leverage as you grow. It is essential for the business to thrive and move along the tide of an ever-changing customer preference. Building a strong rapport with your customers will help your product sell itself and also build a solid Brand.
- Showcase your expertise: You are an expert in your domain. Share your expertise with as many potential customers as possible through social media, blogs, seminars, workshops, etc. Once your customers recognize your expertise, they will do business with you.
- Grow your Market Share: Market Share is the percentage of the total market that you control. When you grow your market share, you control more of the market and thus gain a competitive advantage over your competitors, which ultimately improves your brand value.
- Focus on customer Loyalty: Focus more on the customer you already have, and create customer loyalty with your business. For example, Netflix was able to dominate the market from Blockbuster (now defunct video rental company, and once a market leader), because they saw the value in customers being able to receive movies at home as entertainment rather than just video for rent. Then they changed the product line from mail-in service to streaming so that they can anticipate the growing needs of customers.
- Innovation: The markets will always be searching for something new, and you are the one who should be providing that space to the customer. Yes, It requires anticipation and determination to identify new opportunities and serve your customers through fresh and innovative approaches.
No matter how successful you are in your business, you are always going to face the need to uncover new opportunities. With the help of the above tip, you can effectively scale up the capabilities of your existing environment. Also, as the markets evolve, our training methods should also transform to address the future needs of employee training.
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