How to Create Effective Training Materials

Training materials provide employees with the knowledge they need to succeed and excel in their jobs. They can focus on specific areas of their role, the wider industry, or even provide training on your business processes.

They’re a key way to help upskill staff and can benefit both employees and employers. By boosting staff knowledge, this can help increase productivity and satisfaction, as well as boost business output in the long run.

In this guide, we’ll provide guidance on how to create training materials, as well as some examples for inspiration.

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What are training materials?

Training materials are a type of informational content that often make up training courses. These materials are made to help employees expand their knowledge on certain subject areas, as well as to help them retain and utilise their learnings.

Companies may create training materials to boost employee knowledge, but also to cut down on training costs. These materials can be re-used and referred back to, while being easily shareable across a business. They can also be updated as time goes on if anything changes.

Some training material examples include:

• Workshops, webinars and presentations

• Guides and documents

• Online courses

• Employee handbooks, booklets and manuals

• Lectures, seminars and interactive meetings.

Why are training materials important?

The primary aims and benefits of creating training materials are educating employees on certain areas, honing skills and refreshing knowledge. However, businesses can benefit from training staff in this manner in a number of different ways.

Training materials can:

• Save costs. These in-house resources are often reusable. This means they can be shared with all employees and new starters – even workshops and presentations can be recorded for future reference.

• Save time. When companies create standardised training materials and documents, they don’t have to be repeated across multiple sessions and groups. Employee handbooks, for example, can be instantly shared with all new starters.

• Be implemented at scale. Similarly, training materials can be rolled out across multiple departments at once. This helps ensure there are no gaps in employee knowledge, and it saves time and money on further training.

• Ensure consistency. Sharing resources across a business and to all employees helps create a common understanding of expected business practices – and a shared knowledge pool. This way, you can ensure everyone has the same base knowledge, and that everyone is hitting training goals.

Discover free training material examples.

How to create training materials for your business with Adobe Express.

So, how do you get started? When you create your training materials, you’ll need to make sure you tailor them to your business, industry and employees. Keep in mind that they should be revisited regularly to make sure they’re accurate and up to date.

While you can save a lot of time and money with mass enrolment, that doesn’t mean that’s the whole problem ‘solved’. Materials should be constantly tweaked and reworked to ensure they accurately reflect current understandings.

1. Choose the focus for your training materials.

To choose the focus of your training materials, you may want to consider:

• Existing processes. Are there any key business processes that you need to ensure employees understand? Perhaps there have been some recent changes that need to be relayed?

• Knowledge gaps. Have you, your team leaders or managers identified any employee knowledge gaps that need resolving? Which ones are a high priority for your business at the moment?

• Feedback. One of the best ways to find inspiration when creating training materials is through employee feedback. Ask them directly what they want to see in their resources and go from there.

2. Make the most of Adobe Express templates.

Once you have your focus and initial content, it’s time to build out the bones of your resources. And you don’t have to start from scratch.

You can begin by exploring different content templates on Adobe Express. Some great examples of training material templates you can use include:

• Presentations. Perfect to help you create interactive training materials that address employees directly and add a little bit of personality into your approach to staff education.

• Employee handbooks. Employee handbooks can be used as in-depth informational guides on essential company processes. They can easily be shared electronically across your whole business.

• Posters. Course posters can help advertise upcoming training courses – like workshops and webinars – or helpfully summarise key information.

• Slideshows. These can be created to be used as part of other training materials like workshops, but they can also be saved, shared and used as long-term, referrable resources.

• Infographics. Great when you need to helpfully summarise key takeaways or data-heavy sections. They can also help encourage knowledge retention.

3. Add your company branding to the materials.

Creating training materials can take a lot of work, so you need to put your mark on them. You can use Adobe Express to create a unique Brand toolkit that you can implement across assets. Then, use the One-Click, Apply Brand tool to add your brand fonts, colours and logos to all your materials.

4. Invite other colleagues to collaborate.

Creating effective training resources relies on utilising multiple perspectives to ensure you’re hitting the mark. Not only can this help you spot any gaps and issues, but it also helps you consider different angles and opinions on what should be shared, and how. It’s important to lean on the expertise across your business, encouraging insight from others who have experience in different areas in the company.

Adobe Express allows for seamless cross-team collaboration across different materials and platforms. Share, receive and action feedback from different team members, and create something everyone can be incredibly proud of.

• Knowledge gaps. Have you, your team leaders or managers identified any employee knowledge gaps that need resolving? Which ones are a high priority for your business at the moment?

• Feedback. One of the best ways to find inspiration when creating training materials is through employee feedback. Ask them directly what they want to see in their resources and go from there.

 5. Think about accessibility.

While we’ve listed this as the final step, accessibility and inclusion should be something that’s considered from the start. Your training resources need to be accessible and inclusive of all employees. Everyone should have access to the same level of training and quality of resources, and it’s your responsibility to ensure this.

Some easy ways to do this are:

• Avoiding hard-to-read colours and fonts. Colour accessibility is important. For example, some people find it difficult to read white text on a black background, and you should never use light text on a light background. You should also use clear, consistent brand fonts.

• Adding photo alt text, video captions and voiceovers. Video captions can make it easier for those with hearing difficulties to understand the content of a training module. But you may also want to include  voiceovers on any videos or online modules to cater to those with visual impairments.

• Offering materials in different formats. This can provide better accessibility for those with visual, audio and motor impairments. Plus, everyone learns and processes information differently, so it’s always a good idea to provide options.

Learn more about designing accessible content in our useful guide.

5 tips to improve your company’s training materials.

1. Understand the wants and needs of your employees.

Speak to team leaders and managers – people who know your employees well. They’ll have great insights into knowledge gaps and shortcomings. You can also ask people directly what they want to see from company training resources.

2. Clearly define the purposes and aims of the material.

People are more likely to engage in materials that clearly illustrate their intentions and benefits. Employees will want to know what they’re learning, why they’re learning it and how it will benefit them.

3. Make sure the right team members are involved in design and delivery.

Cross-team collaboration is key when creating training materials targeted at multiple employees. Everyone will be able to bring different insights to the table – the more eyes on a project, the less likely it is that issues can slip through the gaps.

4. Choose the right content formats.

Think about (and ask) how your employees best like to work. For example, you could consider video webinars, PDF booklets, browsable presentations and infographics. It all depends on the information you’re aiming to communicate, and the people you’re communicating it to.

5. Consider interactive or eye-catching elements to maintain interest.

You’ve created an in-depth, important employee handbook – great. But is it interesting? Is it eye-catching? Easy to read? You not only want employees to consume information, but you want them to retain it. If people aren’t engaged, it’s likely things will go in one ear and out the other.

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