People typically jump to an academic context when they hear the terms course outline or syllabus. However, employee training is another area where you can apply these terms. Creating a roadmap for learning that's both efficient and effective is one of the vital requirements for optimal results.
In a professional setting, there are various areas you might want your employees to learn, from diversity and inclusivity training to familiarisation with new technologies used by the company.
As with academic studies, however, the most effective training comes through well-planned subject outlines and training programs. If you make it up as you go along, your results will be correspondingly lacklustre.
In this article, we'll be exploring how employers, leaders and other key decision-makers can create a course outline or syllabus, from the course's initial inception all the way through to formulating employee assessment for the end of the course. First, let's take a more detailed look at what course outlines and syllabi comprise.
What is a course outline?
A course outline is a general pathway highlighting the subjects and topics covered within a course and the overall aims and objectives. It serves as a reference document for trainees and, in the workplace context, would be given (or sent digitally) to participants before the course commences.
What is a syllabus?
A syllabus is a more structured overview of the learning to come, complete with the requisite materials for each stage. Typically, a course outline will include the learning outcomes, assessments and their dates, training methodologies, grading criteria and computation, trainer or instructor contact details, and potentially further information like subject outlines.
Course outline vs. syllabus
A course outline is precisely that, an outline. A syllabus is often more comprehensive in its scope. Another way of thinking about it is as follows: You might give five different instructors the task of creating a professional training program. Each might develop a bespoke course outline, but they all draw from the syllabus.
Consider another example: Dave moved from Perth to Sydney midway through one of his high school years. His favourite subject was English. However, the teacher in Perth had a similar teaching style to the one in Sydney. The resources they used were the same, as were the grading criteria and the assessments that Dave had to complete, but the pathway to getting there was very different. In other words, the what was the same, but the how was different.
Another important distinction is that, whilst it might still be accessible to students, the syllabus is usually used more by the instructor themself, whilst course outlines are often documents purposely designed for the students or trainees undertaking the program (though, of course, the instructor might still use it as a reference document).
What is included in a course outline?
A well-formulated course outline should include the following: course objectives, learning outcomes, topics or subject outlines, contact details, any resources and information that the trainees require, how the program will be assessed, and any contextualisation to help employees understand the relevance of the training to their broader professional development.
The importance of a well-put-together course outline cannot be overstated. Giving your employees all the information they need before their training helps prepare them and makes them more likely to be engaged. Getting buy-in before training starts proactively through a course outline is easier than trying to "win" people onside once the course begins.
The importance of course outlines
By now, you'll have realised just how beneficial course outlines can be to decision-makers within the workplace. Here are the main benefits:
- A course outline gives you a defined and structured pathway to follow, making it easier for trainees and trainers.
- Course outlines reduce confusion, clarify timelines and ensure every participant has an easy reference point for information throughout the training program.
- Breaking the course down, module by module, lesson by lesson, and sometimes even further, offers your employees a more accessible and less daunting course. Without it being segmented, defined, or compartmentalised, a course can seem like an overwhelming monolith, reducing employee buy-in.
- A course outline can help the trainer show stakeholders a course's overall benefit and progression, laying it out in simple terms with explicit objectives rather than more nebulous, subjective benefits that don't have as clear an ROI.
How to create a course outline
There's no one set way to create a course outline because it is highly tailored and individual, specific to the organisation and its needs. That said, you can certainly take some general steps to steer you in the right direction when creating an engaging program.
No matter the course topic, even if it's highly subjective, you need to find ways to measure outcomes and goals objectively so that your learners can demonstrate tangible improvements from pre-course to post-course.
1. Analyse company priorities and goals
Before planning the course, you must understand what your employees need to learn. Designing an innovative and impressive accounting course for your team is all well and good, but if they have little need for those skills in a day-to-day professional context, it renders the training pointless. So, the first thing is to assess your company's priorities.
Then, identify areas where your business is struggling and ascertain whether these areas can be improved through a more knowledgeable or skilled workforce. That second step is pivotal because there are many reasons why your business might be faltering, including technological constraints and external market forces.
2. Plan the modules and lessons
Once you've established that there is, indeed, an area where your employees would benefit from additional training, you can plan the training. This is where course outlines begin in earnest. It's easiest to plan things hierarchically, going from the broad strokes to the specifics or from the macro details to the more granular ones.
In practice, this means setting out the overall course objectives, the modules within the course and their corresponding goals before planning the lessons or units of study within each module. By adopting this top-down course creation method, you retain a more holistic view of the course and ensure that no section receives too much or too little attention. Once these lessons are formulated, insert them into an easy-to-navigate course schedule.
3. Set the learning objectives of each lesson
As you move down that planning hierarchy, the next step is to detail the learning outcomes for each lesson. It's essential to think of these lessons not in isolation but in their broader role in the course. Does Lesson Y seamlessly follow on from and build upon the information learned by employees in Lesson X? Similarly, does Lesson Y provide enough training so employees won't feel overwhelmed or confused when they engage in Lesson Z?
Yes, achieving the teaching outcomes of each lesson remains one of the priority requirements. Still, without an eye to how the course flows, you risk losing momentum throughout the lessons, and the course might not have the same impact if it all fits together as one continuous, cohesive training sequence.
4. Incorporate the supporting materials
Plato once said, "A professional development course is only as good as its supplementary materials". We know there's a whole lot of truth to that sentiment. Most professional training utilises additional resources, ensuring access to the requisite data, images, software, and study journals.
5. Pick apart your course to make it watertight
It's important to ask several questions when considering the supporting materials and other requirements, and this is an area where many otherwise well-crafted professional courses come unstuck. For example, suppose you're providing an online course to remote employees, and a specific computer operating system (OS) or tools are required. In that case, you may be left wondering what to do when several of your employees get in touch saying they don't have that OS.
The more of these kinds of questions you ask whilst designing the course, the fewer problems you're likely to encounter during the course itself.
6. Plan the assessment and evaluation of trainees
Most courses for employees will have some form of assessment or examinable component at their conclusion to ensure accountability. Assessments can be formal or something more relaxed, like a quiz, as long as you're finding a way to assess knowledge retention.
While plotting out the course's assessment stage, build in reviews for the course or training materials. With any luck, you'll have created a professional course that can be used in years to come or in different company departments. However, that doesn't mean you shouldn't still look for ways to improve it.
Note: The above information applies to both in-person and online courses. However, there might need to be more of an onus on ensuring access to the appropriate additional learning materials for online courses.
Mistakes to avoid in a course outline
While there are lots you should include in a course outline, there are also some things to steer clear of when you draft one. For instance, the temptation can be to put in everything, whereas really, you should try to keep it as lean as possible, adding in what might conceivably be needed by the trainees, but nothing more. The outline is the framework, the skeleton if you like, that you use as your guide, but it isn't the training itself.
Another common error is forgetting the feedback element at the end of the course. Often, trainers are so happy that they've completed the course without any hitches, and the results from trainees have been promising that they forget that there's still a learning opportunity even once the course is completed. Feedback is invaluable in the improvement of a course.
Skewed or imbalanced courses
Developing an unbalanced course is another mistake that's often made. We touched on earlier how a hierarchical, birds-eye approach toward course creation can help prevent an imbalance from arising in your course, but you still need to watch out for it.
Say, for example, that there are ten topics you need to cover during your 10-week program. If you dedicate the first nine weeks to the first of the ten topics and try to cram the nine other topics into the session in the final week, then it's unlikely that you'll deliver effective training.
Now, of course, this is something of an extreme example, but the point is a salient one; once you've created your course outline, give it a day or two if you're able and come back to it with a fresher perspective to make sure it's as balanced as it can be (whilst still dedicating the appropriate time to topics that do require more time to teach).
How to write an engaging syllabus
Writing an engaging syllabus is essential for decision-makers within companies, as managers and department heads lower down the chain can use this syllabus as a basis from which to make relevant courses within the workplace whilst also ensuring any materials taught are working towards the same company goals and objectives.
Components of a syllabus
The main components of a syllabus are as follows:
- Instructor information (i.e. contact details),
- Course policies,
- Grading criteria for any examinable component (if there is one),
- Course goals,
- The training methodologies recommended (there will often be multiple) and
- Course information.
It's worth getting right
One of the most transparent ways to show your employees you value them is by investing in them. In this way, it isn't just beneficial to design outlines (and design them well) in whatever particular area. It's beneficial because it improves employee satisfaction.
A happy workforce is a more settled and productive workforce, and training your employees will help significantly achieve that environment.
Benefits of employee training
If you've been reluctant in the past to commit your company on a trajectory toward employee training, then consider the following statistics, and you might change your mind:
- A study by LinkedIn found that 93% of employers are worried about employee retention.
- HubSpot also found that 69% of employees said they would work harder if they felt their efforts were better recognised. What might that recognition look like? You could do much worse than upskilling them with the opportunity to train.
- A report from the American Society for Training and Development (ASTD) found that firms that invested in comprehensive training had "a 218% higher income per employee than those with less comprehensive training".
- Global giant Gartner found that over 50% of company employees surveyed believed they needed better upskilling.
Co-design a course with Plus UTS
With the help of Plus UTS, companies can co-design their courses to help their employees understand innovative new skills; with the business landscape as competitive as it currently is, you need to eke out improvements wherever you're able and in-house courses (whether conducted in person or online) are the perfect way to do it. Get in touch; we'd love to hear from you.
