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BECU: Building a Blended Approach
September 06, 2007
By Lorri Freifeld
Boeing Employee Credit Union (BECU) is all about blending. The Washington-based credit union with $6.9 billion in assets and 850 employees offers 160 e-learning courses and dozens of instructor-led training (ILT) courses (including coursework from The Credit Union National Association and the company's own customized courses), with many of the programs taking a blended approach.
The company's first attempt at blended learning early in 2006 was a success, says Sheri Sala, performance and project support manager at BECU, which spent $750,000 on training in 2006 and earmarked nearly $1 million for 2007. "We created a new way of personalizing amounts that members had access to in their accounts (via the ATM, point-of-sale, and provisional credit). We used an online course to teach the basic concepts and some general rules. Then, we had instructor-led classes co-facilitated with a trainer and a business unit leader that taught the application of those limits and amounts. We used scenarios and role playing to help staff learn how to interpret the information on the new screens to answer member questions. While people grumble when we introduce role playing, they often say it was the best part of the class." Sala says the program was effective because people came to class with some background and general understanding of the new concepts, so the valuable classroom time could be spent teaching the application. Then the business unit leaders talked about how each position actually would use the new screens.
BECU also took a blended learning approach to sales coaching for managers. "We needed to teach managers how to better set sales goals, communicate those goals, and coach their staff to attain the goals," explains Sala, a 16-year training veteran. "We used a blended approach with some basic introductory material in an online course, followed by an instructor-led course to show the application and practice the skills. We then did a 30-day WebEx-type session as a follow up with all participants to see how the course helped them be more effective in these areas."
In addition, BECU has started bringing subject-matter experts and line managers into the classroom as co-facilitators. "This also helps with the practical application of the system/product," says Sala. "Other successful techniques for us are 'teach-backs' (the students create a presentation— in one case, an ad for a product—and use it to teach the rest of the class about their assigned portion); case studies (students are assigned a case—or choose a real-life problem—and apply the course methodology to the case); and real-life scenarios (similar to role playing, we take recorded calls from our Call Center and have new representatives work through the call)."
In the last few years, BECU has been rapidly expanding its in-store branch network— relatively small, efficiently staffed centers, stretching about 125 miles north to south. It also added a Contact Center 300 miles away. "Knowing that not all training should be delivered electronically, we have been challenged with coming up with creative ways to deliver some content face-to-face," Sala says. "We are making greater use of virtual classrooms, branch managers, and regional meetings. We also are combining topics into full-day sessions to make the travel more worthwhile."
BECU recently experienced higher than expected turnover in its Contact Center, Sala says. In response, the company rebuilt its new-hire training program to include topics a subject matter expert or line manager could facilitate. "This lessened the required time in the classroom for our training staff [an 11-person department], so they were able to facilitate other training (rather than just Contact Center)," Sala notes. "This had the added bonus of higher buy-in from the department's leadership team, as it was involved in the redesign, content, and delivery of several topics throughout the four-week program."
To benchmark success, BECU conducts Level 1 and 2 evaluations, as well as less formal follow-up sessions for many courses. "We look for student acceptance of the courses (high scores on reaction- level evaluations), as well as high scores on the knowledge-based evaluations and tests," Sala says.
While the organization generally embraces e-learning, Sala says the greatest obstacle is the training staff's lack of skills in developing effective e-learning. "We recently hired someone with these skills and hope to have him up to speed with our program needs and creating better courses," she says. "Our learning management system from CornerStone OnDemand makes delivery easy and convenient."
Going forward, Sala is working with Cornerstone to roll out Extended Enterprise training. "We'd like to offer training to all 500,000 BECU members as a value-added service," she explains. "We're also looking into performance management."
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