Using Animation In Corporate Training
If you haven’t, it’s much more optimized than you think and is used in a wide variety of training sessions: orientation training, safety training, technical training, etc. And yet, many still doubt how effective animated training videos are. They ask, “Is it a new trend that’s going to die out soon? Does it really work? Is it better than traditional training methods?”
How Effective Is Animation In Corporate Training, Really?
The strength of animation holds up when brought to the test of corporate training. It helps break down complex concepts into digestible content pieces and keeps learners engaged while making sure that the information is absorbed fully. Compared to videos with a “talking head,” which looks like a sci-fi villain, or plain slides with black text on a white background, animation can do wonders. And last but not least, don’t think animation is unfitting for a professional environment because it will certainly boost your audience’s learning and productivity.
Before going into more detail on animation’s benefits, we should clarify the conditions of a successful training session. The end goal is for employees to learn to train themselves and get actively involved in something new and more challenging. That leads to two key elements that a corporate training session needs: knowledge and motivation.
Animation Facilitates Adult Learning Theory
How adults—in this case, corporate employees—learn is far different from how young kids do. Adults are less likely to be affected by external motivation and are driven by internal motives like the need for new knowledge. They tend to ask, “What’s in it for me?” whenever they’re presented with a new lesson.
Simplifies Complex Information
Corporate training is known to involve difficult knowledge and a lot of statistics, making it as boring as can be. Animated training videos visualize complicated materials with a high level of accuracy, making them more digestible and less boring. This forgoes any concern that the content might be too heavy to take.
Take this video as an example. Such a scientific topic as geology may come across as daunting. And that would be the case if it were presented in plain text and numbers, but with animation, the natural process of rock formation comes alive and appears much more attractive. Not only does the animation simplify the complex knowledge, but it also adds vivid color and makes the image more appealing to the viewers.
Shows The Ease Of Applicability
What comes after understanding is naturally, application. Demonstrating how the audience can apply what they’ve just been taught is the challenging part. Animation perfectly encapsulates how knowledge can be used in reality. What cannot be described with words can be easily reenacted with animation.
Animations Can Help Boost Engagement And Motivation
Creates A New Learning Atmosphere
One big strength of animation is that it makes way for storytelling, a powerful tool for triggering emotions. Storytelling can make the content much more relatable and interesting to learn than a PowerPoint slideshow with dull bullet points. It’s simply a "dressing" to make the information more digestible, but you have to be careful. Understand your audience first and utilize what makes them tick. Success in this aspect will make employees much more willing to learn just because they’re interested in your training session.
Shortens Learning Time
Employees are busy and stressed enough without training sessions, so they probably don’t have much mental strength to spare for them. Animations succeed in doing them a favor by saving their time by making the content compact and easy to memorize. Shorter learning time conveniently fits our shorter attention span, meaning more engagement, and employees don’t have to constantly ask themselves, “How long is this going to take?”
Not only employees benefit from animation-based training but the company does as well. Less time spent on training means less money spent, and companies can use this money on more practical matters.
Choosing The Right Animation Type In Corporate Training
Animations are super diverse, but don’t worry, making choices won’t be too difficult. In essence, animation comes down to 3 types that are most commonly used: whiteboard animation, 2D/motion graphics, and 3D animation.
Whiteboard Animation
Whiteboard animation is the combination of hand-drawn elements on a white background and a timely voiceover. Some videos feature a hand quickly drawing on the whiteboard to add a sense of live action.
This style of animation is particularly popular and you can easily find examples of it after a few minutes of browsing YouTube. Audiences love to watch whiteboard videos because they are clean and academic looking, making it suitable for multiple purposes. It’s also the most digestible of all as it contains no distractions. Here is a typical example of a whiteboard MOA (Mechanism of Action) animation.
An MOA animation is one that typically explains the working of a drug or processes in your body that take place on a microscopic level. It perfectly wraps up the information into a bite-sized lesson, while also being budget-friendly and visually pleasing.
2D Animation/Motion Graphics
This is essentially a glow-up version of whiteboard animation. For this style, animators add in 2D characters or motion graphics to spice things up. It’s more colorful than whiteboard animation and usually presented as a story. Here is a typical demonstration of a 2D animation.
The animation is from a Permaculture Design online course that specializes in knowledge and practical solutions to develop sustainable ecosystems. If you watch it, you will notice a lot of motions and movements bringing the images to life, and this is a strong suit for 2D animation, something whiteboard animation cannot do.
3D Animation
This is a very popular choice in the medical field, but not favored by corporations because they are costly and unnecessary. 3D animation is usually used to depict extremely difficult concepts that are invisible to our naked eyes, thus the common use in medicine.
3D animation is extremely good for depicting real processes and phenomena, as well as storytelling. This will bring new life to corporate training, provided that you have resources to spare. That said, here’s a perfect example of 3D animation.
Conclusion
And that is all about animation-based corporate training. Considering the benefits it brings, there’s no reason why you shouldn’t deploy this magnificent piece of technology. And if you’re interested, start by choosing the right animation for your company. There is no particular rule identifying what types of animation you should use in corporate training. We hope our introduction to animation types can give you an overall look at the advantages each type brings and how to apply these benefits. Moreover, you can definitely combine several styles at the same time to make the most out of them.
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