Improve How Employees Learn Company Software with a Quality Software Quick Reference Guide

What’s the fastest way to ensure employees have the necessary resources to use company software to do their job effectively?

Training, right?

Make sure they go through their 40-minute training, pass the test, read through the user guide, and then make sure they know all the documentation thoroughly. Isn’t that effective?

No, that’s a sure way to ensure they get very little out of training and then seem like they haven’t been trained at all.

Ineffective training is as good as no training at all.

If you want effective technical training, one of the tools you’ll likely use often is a software quick reference guide. That means employees can keep a short guide in their back pocket (not literally) and reference to help them get specific jobs done.

Software quick reference guides are one of the fastest ways we’ve found to ensure employees have what they need when using company software. They’re typically short, useful for specific tasks, and easy to decipher and use at a glance without having to think too hard.

Providing employees with quality software quick reference guides will improve how they learn company technology, specifically software systems such as CRM, HRIS, ERP etc., etc.

If employees have to use software for their job (who doesn’t), they need training or resources to learn it. Many types of training are available for company software, including many great digital training solutions. But this post focuses on one essential performance support type we love, called a quick reference guide.

Imagine a powerful tool that streamlines the learning process and acts as a trusted companion, ready to assist whenever they encounter a roadblock in mastering intricate software systems.

Creating an effective quick reference guide is an art form that requires precision, clarity, and a deep understanding of the process employees must use. This post will show you some broad ideas that can be used to craft a quality guide that educates and empowers your workforce to navigate the digital landscape confidently and effortlessly.

But why are software quick reference guides so important?

The Importance of a Software Quick Reference Guide

Training is excellent, but people rarely remember everything that happens in training. Job aids are excellent but can sometimes be overwhelming with too much information or context. A quick reference guide is a type of job aid, but it’s in an even simpler format.

An employee can pick up a software quick reference guide and immediately understand the software’s main features or how to do a very short task. They’re essential because they make doing the job with company software much more manageable.

What if you learned how to analyze data in a spreadsheet you’re sent every week? You learn the definitions of each column and how to organize it into a format needed for your specific role. You learned all of this and more in a course with other content and a good level of depth.

Unfortunately, nobody’s likely to remember it all; it simply provides a good overview that can be used again with a quick reference to the essential content. That’s where a software quick reference guide will help.

This guide could show the definitions of each column and what the buttons are that are needed for organizing the data. That quick reference guide is a simple way to ensure employees get the most important parts of the course and can reference it whenever needed on the job.

But what makes a quality quick reference guide? You’re in luck because I have some tips for that question!

Types of Software Quick Reference Guides

Quick reference guides come in many different forms. What form of software quick reference guide depends on the specific needs of employees and the nature of the software being used. Anything employees can quickly reference to help them use software is, in essence, a software quick reference guide.

These are some forms of quick reference guides (QRG) and what you might find them used for.

• Software overview: This is typically the main screen of a piece of software and all the essential options. It could also focus only on a specific toolbar.
• Keyboard shortcuts: These are excellent guides to help you get work done faster with the keyboard instead of constantly moving your hand to the mouse. We created a Windows shortcut QRG available on our portfolio, and Google has a good example of one for Chrome.
• Checklists: Whether a PDF checklist or an application that employees can use to ensure they perform every step of a job, QRGs are helpful, too. That way, employees don’t have to fear missing something or forgetting.
• FAQ: Yes, these are still a thing and often quite valuable. When there’s a list of truly frequently asked questions (not just whatever the experts thought of), they can be a valuable trove of info to reference quickly and in a pinch.
• Contextual Help: In some cases, contextual/in-app help is a form of software quick reference guide. They provide just in time information when employees need it.

A quick reference guide can come in many forms for learning company software. These are just a few ways to help employees use company software for tasks they might otherwise not remember.

There are some key elements to help you create a good software quick reference guide no matter what type you’re creating. Remember to keep it simple and not overdo it with text or content.

Critical Elements of a Quality Quick Reference Guide

A quality quick reference guide encompasses several vital elements that sometimes make it more valuable than a job aid and always more helpful than a user guide or other documentation. Focusing on each of the elements below will help guide creating a quality software quick reference guide.

Clear and Concise

The primary purpose of a quick reference guide is to provide employees with easily accessible information at their fingertips. It should be concise yet comprehensive enough to cover only essential aspects of using the software for an employee’s specific job.

Presenting only essential information clearly and concisely allows employees to reference the guide quickly without getting overwhelmed with additional information.

Visual

People are visual; incorporating visual aids such as screenshots, diagrams, or infographics can significantly enhance understanding and retention. For software, that’s usually easy to do because a screenshot is helpful, along with overlays showing important information about the software.

It doesn’t even have to be a screenshot of the software; it could be a quick reference guide for the most helpful keyboard shortcuts. We put together a guide for workplace ergonomics with common Windows keyboard shortcuts to reduce using the mouse.

Visuals help break down complex concepts into digestible chunks and serve as visual cues for employees when they encounter similar scenarios while using the software. The more visual a quick reference guide is (with plenty of white space), the better it will be positioned as a useful resource.

Step-by-Step if Relevant

A quick reference guide won’t always have steps, but when it does, use it to your benefit. Often, it’s just a visual aid to help employees see the main features and functions they need for their job visually. When steps are relevant, a well-structured quick reference guide should visually provide each step of the process.

Some software quick reference guides will introduce users to the software functions, some may be a checklist, and others will have a few steps that can be reference quickly. Whatever you end up creating if someone can’t understand what it’s for in seconds then you probably lost them, it’s no longer quick.

Updated Regularly

This is true for all forms of training; keep it updated regularly to ensure it matches what an employee will see. There’s nothing worse than when an employee finds precisely what they need to help them do their job, and it ends up being outdated and irrelevant.

It’s essential to keep training up to date, including eLearning and quick reference guides. Never create and forget. Revisit content regularly to ensure it’s current and whatever’s being referenced is accurate.

Identify Employee’s Specific Needs

Creating a quick reference guide for learning company software shouldn’t be a task of the imagination. The only exception might be for one that introduces the main screen and toolbar of the software and what each important thing does. Some buttons will be self-explanatory, but some won’t. Make sure those are covered in a QRG.

For anything beyond the basics of the software, make sure you identify the actual needs of employees. It’s just as easy to bury them in too many resources as it is not to have enough. It’s a balancing act that takes getting to know people’s needs rather than trying to predict them.

Identify the specific needs and pain points of employees. Conducting surveys or interviews to gather feedback on what aspects of the software they find challenging or confusing helps address pain points more accurately. Sometimes, watching new users use the software is enough to give you some idea of the actual pain points.

If possible, we like observing user acceptance testing (UAT) to determine where people might be challenged. If a project manager or product owner has to explain something to a tester, then you know that’s a good candidate for a software quick reference guide.

Understanding the employee’s perspective will help you create the right guide and create it in the right way. Just as you shouldn’t skip the analysis and planning for your audience, you shouldn’t skip the evaluation. Every step of the ADDIE process is essential for creating quality software quick reference guides, too.

Measure the Impact and Effectiveness

This one might be a bit of a challenge for a quick reference guide, but it’s possible on a basic level. If employees search for the guide in a resource center, then it’s likely possible also to gather basic feedback. It could be as basic as a star rating, even though that’s not too helpful (what the heck does three stars mean!?)

If possible, you may have to do a few interviews with employees using the QRG. That way, you can understand where the pain points are, if they are ineffective, and how a guide can be improved. How employees learn software and use tools such as a QRG is always different for every project.

It’s essential to figure out the key performance indicator (KPI) from the beginning. That way, you can understand if any guides available are effective.

Wrap Up

A well-crafted software quick reference guide can significantly improve employees’ learning of company software. Implementing a quick reference guide that’s clear and concise, visual, and, when relevant, provides step-by-step instructions and updated content, which can help employees use company software more effectively.

When you have a thorough process for identifying employee needs and determining what the KPI of the QRG looks like, you’ll create more valuable resources for employees. A quality software quick reference guide will empower the workforce to master software systems with ease.

Don’t underestimate the power of a quality quick reference guide. Invest time and effort into creating one that aligns with your employee’s needs, and watch as they ramp up new software use quicker and use it to its fullest. That means more productivity with diminished frustration.

Remember, in today’s digital age, knowledge is power. Empower your employees with the best software quick reference guide possible. Performance support is one of the most powerful and affordable forms of corporate training, and the quick reference guide is integral to performance support.

Schedule a free consultation if you’d like to work with us on your next company technology implementation. We specialize in technical training that helps train non-technical employees on company technology to do their jobs better and more confidently.