Our Customer Success team hosted a Tips & Tricks webinar all about Training Plans in January 2023 to assist customer understanding of the new Training Plans feature launched in late 2022. View the recorded webinar and extra resources below. Questions posted by customers during the webinar have been answered at the bottom of this article.
(Recorded 1/25/2023. Runtime 57:48)
Questions and Answers from the Webinar
Making Plans Effective
Will users be re-assigned training they have already completed training on the current version of a document when I make a Training Plan effective?
No. If the user has already completed training on the current version of the document, launching a TP will not make them train again. Furthermore the existing assigned date status, and due date will not be affected. No impact to the user.
Do I need to manually un-assign trainees from documents before I make a Training Plan effective?
No. Existing training records will be marked as “Controlled by TP”. This also means you cannot unassign training directly from the document after a Training Plan is made effective.
Does the Trainees box on the properties tab go away with the new Training Plan feature?
No. There will most likely still be situations where a single user needs to be assigned as a trainee. Training Plans should automate the majority of training assignments, but the manual option will still be there for the small minority of situations.
Are users notified in any way that a new Training Plan is effective?
There is no visible change for end users when a Training Plan is made effective unless they were missed during the manual training assignment and they are legitimately assigned new training.
Employees & User Groups
Can a single user be excluded from a training assignment even if they are in an included user group?
No, there is no “excused” button. If they are in the user group, they should complete all required training. This will also eliminate the possibility of confusion by auditors when the Training Matrix is provided.
Should I create a Training Plan for a single employee?
Generally speaking, no. Users can still be manually added as trainees to a document, and that is how you should continue to make one-off training assignments. Also recall that a User Group would need to be created first. If you anticipate similar employees and documents being added to the organization in the future, then it would make sense to create this niche group for these users and set up the TP so it’s ready to go as your business grows.
Is there a way to see who has completed the training plan and/or which documents in the training plan they have completed?
All training completion data will still be accessible under the Training tab of Qualio. There are no changes to the Training Overview and personal training views. Training completion data by Training Plan is not available.
Document and Training Plan Workflow
Document Status: What status of documents can be assigned for training in the Training Plans?
Any document in any status can be added to a Training Plan. However, if a document is not approved yet but included on an effective Training Plan, only when the document is approved will the training assignments be issued to the users.
Will training [assessments] still be editable during document revisions?
Yes, no document editing functionality has changed with the addition of training plans. All training functionality (read and sign, assessments) remain the same.
If a document is retired, does it auto-drop off the Training Plan?
Yes! Retired documents will automatically be removed from any training plans that they’re listed on.
Do Training Plans need to be deleted and created every year or should they be updated to include more training to already existing ones?
Training plans can be added to as more documents are created in Qualio - there’s no need to recreate Training Plans that have already been built! New training plans can be created as more segments are needed in your organization as you grow.
Once Training Plans are set up and you need to add a new document to an existing plan, do you make this assignment via the document or through an update on the Training Plans?
You can make an updated version of the Training Plan. Crysta provided a demo of edit a training plan and making it effective once more to create a second version.
If a document is modified (ex: grammatical change) and does not require training but we want employees to have a record of that version of the document in their training plan, will the plan/employee training record still be updated with the new version of that document?
With administrative changes to documents, you’ll still have the ability to select that training is not required on that version. The training overview will reflect this selection and display that all users have trained on the most recent version that required training.
Is there any way to compare all documents in Qualio to the documents listed on a Training Plan? This is essential for me to see what documents need to be added to a Training Plan.
Not at this time. Current solution would be to export list of documents and utilize our example matrix to plan
Have you seen best practices to use Qualio Training Plans to manage all training required? For example: HR policies that are outside the QMS requirements.
This may be a good use case for an Employee File document type where you could hyperlink to external systems or attach any external certifications/training that have been completed. Training plans will not manage external training unless that external training is entered into Qualio as a document at this time.
Common Scenarios
Adding New Users / Phased Onboarding
How do new employees get added to a Training Plan?
Assuming you have previously created the Training Plan and made it effective, when an Admin is adding a new user to Qualio, they will simply add the new employee to the appropriate user groups. The Training Plan then automates the training assignments related to that Training Plan.Will the training assignments appear on an employee's dashboard organized by Training Plan? (ex: If 100 documents are assigned to a new employee and they should be completed in a certain order, how would they know which order to complete them?)
No, the user’s dashboard will not reflect which Training Plan an assignment is related to. Keep in mind there may be overlap between Training Plans where a Document (or user group) is included in multiple Training Plans, but the user will only have one training record per document/training. Below are some suggestions on implementing phased training, like onboarding a new user.Do you have any suggestions for phased training (ex: onboarding new employees)? We have 60+ documents for some user groups and want to avoid assigning all of them on day 1.
Our first suggestion is to map it out like we’ve done in the spreadsheet below.
Start by first separating the Training Plans every employee (or the majority) must complete from the Training Plans specific to teams.
If a Training Plan has a lot of training assignments, break it down into multiple plans.
Then build an onboarding weekly game plan with a manageable amount of training assignments.
Once you are ready, create the necessary user groups. In the example below, we will be using 5 user groups (D1:H1) and had to break up the “All Employees” user group into two.
Then create your Training Plans based on your strategy spreadsheet).
When a new user is hired, only add them to “All Employees - Week 1” user group on their first week. The following week, add them to “All Employees - Week 2” user group. Then the following week, add them to their team specific user group.
As you proceed, do not remove them from user groups as this will cancel the training records assigned during those weeks if they did not complete within the time parameter. Furthermore, if any of the documents/trainings are up-versioned and need retraining, because the user is in the related user group of the training plan, the retraining is auto-assigned.
There were several questions during the webinar about the Training Completion Period and how this affects a Training Plan strategy like the one described above.
The Training Completion Period setting can be modified from the Org Settings and applies to all training.
If you would like to suggest a product enhancement to change this for Training Plans, please chat support to describe your organization’s specific needs.
Annual Training
Is there a way to assign annual due dates for re-training on procedures even if the employee completed training the previous year and there are no version changes.
Currently, Training Plans does not include the feature you described. If you would like to suggest a product enhancement to change this for Training Plans, please chat support to describe your organization’s specific needs.
As an alternative, a new Training Plan can be created each year (ex: 2023 Security Audit) with the same list of documents and user groups. When the plan is made effective, a new training record will be created for each user and training assignment.
Extended Leave
Crysta demonstrated a common situation that arises with Training Plans when an employee is put on extended leave. The following questions are follow-up questions from that demo.
If someone is added to an extended leave Training Plan/user group, when they come back will they only be issued training for document versions that they have not been previously trained on?
Any documents/trainings that are part of the training plan will be reassigned back to the employee who was on leave when they return and are added back to the appropriate user groups.Will the training due dates then reset once the user is reassigned to the active employees plan?
Ideally the employee should be up-to-date on training prior to beginning their leave. Training will be assigned to the employee when they return and the training period will be the global setting beginning on the date the user is added back to the user group assigned to the training plan.
Overlapping groups and training plans
If Jasmine is removed from the Suppliers user group, will she still be required to complete training for POL-37?
Because POL-37 belongs to both Training Plan A and B, removing the Suppliers group will still maintain the requirement via training plan A and the Laboratory group.Would an employee in both groups have to complete training twice?
No. If there is document overlap between multiple training plans, only one training is assigned to the user.
Training Matrix
Can the Training Matrix generated by Qualio be exported as an Excel file?
No. Currently it can only be exported as a PDF.
Can a Training Matrix be created for an individual employee?
No, that is not current functionality.
Does the Training Matrix break down to show who is in each user group in the export?
No, that is not current functionality.
Is there a way to filter out certain groups when creating a Training Matrix?
No, that is not current functionality.
These are all fantastic suggestions for improving the Training Matrix. We recommend you contact support to suggest a product enhancement and describe your organization’s specific needs.
Tags + Training Plans
Can documents be assigned by tags when setting up training plans? For example: I'd like the Project Managers user group assigned all documents with the tag 'Project Management'.
Currently tag selection is not possible in Training Plans.
We have been using tags on documents to link the document to a user group. It sounds like we no longer have to manage this either, correct?
Technically this is correct when it comes to training assignments. However, tags would still be beneficial if you'd like to filter a set of documents for a specific category to view or export. Depending on your organization's use case, it could still make sense to continue the process of tagging documents.