Robust evidence

Thanks for the feedback over recent weeks to the blog posts.  We know that these are challenging times and we are all adapting as we go.

This week, I wanted to follow up the recent post around “learning vs training” and its counterpart, but “eLearning doesn’t work, does it?”  We know you have all had to complete lots of eLearning recently and we are delighted to hear those who used to think “they couldn’t use a computer” actually can, with a bit of support and guidance, just like anything new really.

However, it is important to give consideration to the “Why”.  Why are we doing all this eLearning and the “impact” of learning. Now don’t get me wrong, we have been delighted to hear from our customers, such as: “Click has been a life saver over recent weeks” and my personal favourite: “our CQC inspector was shocked how well prepared we were”.

Why?

Why are we doing all this eLearning?  We are doing it so we can stay up-to-date with legislation and new ideas, but mostly so that our practice remains current.  Let’s just repeat that: we are doing the eLearning so our practice stays current, we are NOT doing the eLearning, so that the training matrix stays the right colour (green).

Whilst that might be a lovely by-product, it is not the main reason.   For instance, we’ve just launched PPE (COVID-19) Essentials, following on from our hugely popular Coronavirus course.  Both of these require constant updates, due to the nature of the pandemic.

Impact?

If we know why we are doing the eLearning, then the next logical step is, how do we measure its impact?  CQC will be looking for exactly the same thing and if you want to join us for a free Module 5 webinar for Lead to Succeed to find out more, just click here.

The real reason we do the learning is so we can put it into practice; the impact we’re looking for, however, is a change in behaviour, attitude and skills.

Robust evidence

Lastly, we need to collect the evidence for CQC, not only of the impact of the learning, but the continuous improvement of the service and the people providing the service.  The only way to do that will be to include input from a manager or supervisor during supervision, spot checks, team meetings and so on.

So, if you are looking for eLearning to support your service and there is very little input from the managers, team leaders or supervisors, then it’s just training, plain and simple.

However, learning plus evidence of competence is what you need for Regulation 18.