Delhaize has been playing a leading role in the food distribution sector for 154 years. Delhaize currently has more than 800 branches in Belgium and Luxembourg. This network consists of various supermarkets: Delhaize, AD Delhaize, Proxy Delhaize and Shop&Go. Some 12,000 employees work in the stores, ensuring that customers can count on an extensive range of over 23,000 high-quality products. In addition to the retail network, Logistics & Transport and Support Service are the other two business units.
Delhaize firmly believes that an ongoing focus on training and development provides motivated and competent employees who can do their work efficiently and safely. ‘However, our three business units require a wide variety of training for employees, which brings challenges,’ says Katia De Coster, Talent and Organisation Manager at Delhaize.
In addition, as was the case in many organisations, the pandemic caused a true digital revolution in the training landscape at Delhaize. Out of necessity, training courses that normally took place live in a classroom were digitised. In our search for a tool, we quickly settled for FLOWSPARKS. We had already experimented with the tool within Delhaize a year earlier. During our search for a solution to prepare and provide e-Learning modules, simplicity of use and decent reporting were at the top of our priority list,’ explains Katia De Coster.
Delhaize has been working with FLOWSPARKS for this digital solution since 2018. ‘The easy-to-use templates and the fact that we can also integrate other SCORM software are major advantages of FLOWSPARKS,’ says Vincent Goddeeris, Delhaize’s Digital Project Manager. ‘All our training courses must be available in Dutch and French, and some in English as well. FLOWSPARKS makes it easy to add additional languages.’
The fact that the 12,000 employees who need training do not all have their own email addresses is a problem of the past. ‘Together with FLOWSPARKS, we found a solution for this by creating an event page. This page is known to all employees within Delhaize stores as ONLIONS. Employees can log in to this portal using their personnel number,’ Vincent Goddeeris says. ‘They can access the e-Learning modules via this portal. And because each staff number is unique, we can easily import reports into our own LMS Success Factors.
Delhaize uses FLOWSPARKSnot only to prepare e-Learning modules, but also as a communication platform. For example, we can also distribute the precautionary measures regarding the coronavirus pandemic via FLOWSPARKS.
The easy-to-use templates and the fact that we can also integrate other SCORM software are major advantages of FLOWSPARKS. All our training courses must be available in three languages, FLOWSPARKS makes it easy to add additional languages.
In the meantime, together with the Talent & Operations team, Vincent Goddeeris looked after the digitisation of quite a few training courses. Each request to prepare an e-Learning course is first thoroughly analysed. Based on the results of this analysis, a decision is made as to which form, digital or blended, would be the best option.
Delhaize built two Virtual Classrooms. FLOWSPARKS was used here to partially train the trainers in the use of the Virtual Classrooms. We also currently use FLOWSPARKS to add participants to a session in the Virtual Classrooms via a link. ‘That is very handy,’ Vincent Goddeeris testifies, ‘because not only do we know exactly who is participating in the Virtual Classroom sessions, we also save time because we can offer some basic information about the session in a Virtual Classroom beforehand.’
There are currently some 20 digital training courses available on the ONLIONS portal. Vincent Goddeeris and the Talent & Operations team set up some original interactive modules by making creative use of the templates in FLOWSPARKS. For example, participants can use the product training courses to explore a Delhaize supermarket via a virtual tour. In this way, participants ‘walk’ through the shopping aisles and learn about the various departments and products. By clicking on products, relevant information will appear in the form of text, an image, a video or a quiz question. This module is not only fun, but also didactically strong because the participants get to see a highly realistic version of the store.
Vincent Goddeeris sees the future of training and education in a form of blended learning, combining the best aspects of e-Learning, virtual lessons and classroom lessons. And as for Delhaize, FLOWSPARKS will play an essential role in this. Not only because it is so user-friendly and offers so many possibilities, but also because of the service provided by the FLOWSPARKS team. ‘If we have any questions, we always get an answer very quickly, whether it is by email, telephone or a video call,’ Vincent Goddeeris says.
Delhaize was one of our guest speakers during our webinar Get in the FLOW. Katia en Vincent presents the challenge they had to overcome and which e-Learning they’ve created so far. They explain how they gained success within their company with the use of e-Learning. Get access to the webinar page and get plenty of inspiration to get started yourself.
