Case Studies
Freedom Leisure
Video induction programme
With almost 100 leisure centres across the UK, Freedom Leisure is a national leisure facility operator. With a community ethos, the centres aim to provide a welcoming, dynamic and exciting place where people can improve their lives through leisure.
The centres offer facilities that cater to a number of sports and hobbies, ranging from gym and exercise classes to racquet sports, swimming and trampolining.
Freedom Leisure has a deeply embedded culture of learning, which is vital as there are long-standing career progression paths within the company. In fact, the MD began his career as a lifeguard and progressed through to more senior roles – highlighting the importance of initial training to future business direction.
During a strong period of growth for the company, it was decided that older systems of training needed to be updated to become smarter and more efficient. The induction process for new staff was highlighted as a particular concern, due to its key role in staff competency, and strong demand on the time of managers and site staff.
Challenge
What we were tasked with
- The leisure industry tends to have a high turnover of staff, often due to seasonal work or students working between semesters – therefore, having to repeat long induction training was needlessly draining time and resources.
- No previous bespoke elearning, meaning training required classroom-style sessions that didn’t reflect the dynamic company brand.
- Induction training was time-consuming, and often required up to 5 days of face-to-face training, taking time away from service delivery
- Some of the subject matter, such as health and safety, whilst important, could be tedious when stretched over long periods of time.
In order to meet these challenges, our team of talented specialists worked with key client contacts to help create an effective and engaging series of elearning modules. These video-based modules significantly reduced the time spent inducting new members of staff.
Delivery
Through our ethos of smarter learning, Insitu Digital:
- Created a series of videos that profiled staff journeys, discussed induction items and presented learning content in a more engaging way.
- Engaged with a wide range of staff to ensure the accuracy and efficacy of the learner experience.
- Using the feedback of the staff, we scripted video content into more relatable scenarios, meaning it felt more relevant to learners.
- Included staff members in rehearsals and learning design processes, fostering a sense of ownership in the content.
- Ensured that induction content was more consistent with company branding and values
- Broke down topics into smaller, more learner-friendly modules, creating short videos and interactive learning items.
As a result of our work, training sessions that were delivered to individuals, sporadically over days are now able to be delivered to a larger audience in a single afternoon or morning session. The implementation of our induction training across Freedom Leisure’s UK centres will mean the company saves thousands of training hours, meaning staff are more effective, informed and supported.