As we move further into 2024, AI's L&D teams continue to master the application of AI in the workplace. On the flip side, leading learning platforms are leveraging AI to simplify L&D workflows through automation, generative AI and more.

However, we need to be mindful that we are selecting the right solutions for our teams, organisations and learners. The right AI-powered tools for L&D teams in 2024 will keep control in the hands of human experts (L&D professionals), enable subject-matter experts (SMEs) to become super-creators and empower learners—all at pace. 

In this article, we discuss the benefits of AI automation in L&D. We’ll then dive into six steps for creating impactful courses by leveraging an AI-powered course authoring tool and finish with three key AI features that can help you upskill your people and meet your organisation’s needs. 

 

Benefits of AI in L&D

AI's high-level benefits for L&D begin with automation, efficiency and simplicity.

L&D teams can leverage AI to automate mundane and tedious daily tasks that consume a lot of time but are essential to our function. With the help of AI automation, teams can concentrate on more engaging aspects of their work while ensuring that repetitive tasks and compliance requirements are completed and handled effectively.

With the right course builder, L&D can also simplify and speed up the course creation process. AI-powered tools make designing, building, and reviewing courses and assessments much faster. In turn, you can empower people with personalised learning and advanced search options driven by AI-powered recommendations based on their learning and upskilling needs. 

To reap the benefits of AI-powered L&D authoring tools, we’ve developed a six-step process for creating courses that will make an impact and meet your learners' needs.

 

6 easy steps for impactful course creation

Many L&D teams face bottlenecks in content creation and struggle with low engagement rates, ‘L&D teams of one.’

However, by leveraging an AI-powered authoring tool in partnership with a collaborative learning approach, you can streamline content creation – and ensure courses are as engaging as possible. Here’s a six-step process to get you started:

1. Invite subject-matter experts: Your SMEs have a lot to offer. Invite them to co-author to make the most of their knowledge. Consequently, your content will appear more credible and their insights will make learning more engaging.

2. Create content effortlessly: An AI-powered authoring tool makes it easy for SMEs to create learning quickly and efficiently while empowering you to control your content strategy. Standout AI authoring features enable users to deploy their first course in just a few minutes.

3. Exchange internal comments for collaboration: To ensure the creation process is collaborative, L&D teams and SMEs should exchange notes to suggest discussion topics and areas for improvement. An authoring tool streamlines this process. 

4. Include interactive assessments for engagement: The most impactful assessments will be shaped to your learners’ needs. The more modern AI-powered authoring tools include a range of formats, including open-ended, multiple-choice and opinion questions, to ensure learners retain information while keeping them engaged. 

5. Publish and iterate based on feedback: This Reactions feature is an excellent example of how people can quickly and easily provide crucial feedback to you and your team. These features ensure that you’re designing learning experiences that match the needs of your learners.

6. Reward co-authors: Reward your SMEs for their collaboration. For example, 360learning sends notifications to your co-authors to reward them for their contributions. 

By following these six steps, you and your team will be on the fast track to creating more impactful courses. Now, let’s zoom in on the features that are powered solely by AI – and see how they can make your life a whole lot easier.

 

3 key AI features to ramp up your L&D practice

With the right AI-powered feature set, you can not only automate mundane tasks, but also stay in control of your output as you leverage AI to enhance your L&D practice. Here's a closer look at three powerful AI features that can help you and your team make an impact in 2024:

Feature 1: Prompt management

Many L&D teams are concerned about how to maintain oversight and control over AI-generated output – specifically, how to avoid accidentally producing non-compliant or misaligned training. However, with AI prompt management, L&D can ensure AI-generated courses comply with pedagogy and compliance requirements.

Admin-controlled prompts also enable the effective sharing of pedagogical knowledge with SMEs. This approach ensures that internal experts can focus on sharing their expertise while adhering to pedagogical best practices, keeping you in control of quality, consistency and compliance.

Feature 2: AI-powered course builder

The right AI-powered course builder will enable you to transform a document into a course in just two minutes. 

Often, the most time-consuming part of updating courses is adding new or updated assessments. However, a Suggested Questions tool, for example, provides you with a list of questions in various formats. These questions will have both correct and incorrect answers. You can easily edit them, saving you the trouble of creating assessments from scratch.

The most competitive learning platforms will include an AI-powered course builder for you to enter a title, course objective or learner audience. The AI will first review your learning platform for context and refine your prompt to include your inputs and the existing content on your platform, before generating a relevant course.

For example, 360Learning allows you to create custom courses, paths and catalogues based on individual job titles and skills. This will enable you to deliver targeted learning quickly.

Feature 3: AI-powered automation

AI-powered automation is an excellent solution for enhancing the scale of your courses, from advanced search capabilities to skill tagging.

First, with advanced search capabilities, people can easily find whatever they need. AI algorithms can recommend courses based on their learning activities, skills or course completion. By tagging skills to courses or paths, algorithms help you to make it easier for learners to find the right courses or programs for their learning journey.

Second, AI-powered skill tagging enables you to leverage your skills metrics more quickly and easily through a self-assessment workflow. This workflow recommends skills to learners based on any data from your HRIS. 

For example, a great tool for scalability is Globalisation solution, which uses AI to help translate courses to meet the needs of your global workforce regardless of the platform language. 
Experience an AI-powered course builder in action
Leveraging AI tools developed specifically for learning and development has the potential to transform our industry, to upskill our people and meet the business needs of our organisations. 

But to truly understand how transformative AI can be for your L&D practice, we highly recommend experiencing these AI-powered features in action. 

 

Daniel Quinn 

Account Executive & DIgital Learning Expert at 360Learning