Customer Case Study
ResMed Optimizes Onboarding with Data Using Allego
RESMED is leading the way in cloud-connected medical devices that transform care for people with sleep apnea, COPD and other chronic diseases. Their comprehensive out-of-hospital software platforms support the professionals and caregivers who help people stay healthy in the home or care setting of their choice.
Situation: Onboarding A Global Team In A Pandemic
Covid-19 has changed how organizations approach onboarding forever. For ResMed, a provider of cloud-connectable medical devices that treats sleep apnea and other respiratory conditions, the shift to a hybrid work model posed several new challenges. ResMed looked to Allego as the innovative solution that could help the company address the complexities of today’s onboarding processes to meet the needs of their sales force.
Emily Mason, Senior Learning Strategist at ResMed, embraced the opportunity to improve their existing onboarding program for their team of 150 sales reps spread across Canada and the United States. “We train respiratory therapists and people that are entirely new to sleep. So, it creates a little bit of a challenge for us. Covid has definitely made us challenge the status quo of why we do what we do, but I think really good things have come out of that and have changed for the better,” Mason said.
CHALLENGE: Creating a Hybrid Onboarding Program
ResMed first focused on the core element of any great training program: content. Having used SharePoint initially as their content repository, Mason and her team worked with their customer success partner at Allego to migrate many of their existing learning materials into the platform.
“I took a lot of stuff out of SharePoint and put it into Allego, which is great. That’s been very helpful to just pull all the content out of the closet and push it out there,” Mason said.
To enhance the delivery of this content for their internal new-hire training experience, ResMed’s team created a hybrid onboarding program using a combination of remote and virtual instructor-led training sessions in Allego. Sellers watch pre-recorded video presentations prior to attending a three-day highly immersive session with ResMed’s subject matter experts.
Mason and her team also set up role-specific and team channels to add an additional layer of personalization. “I love the agility of Allego for that purpose. When you do want to change something and reallocate it to a different channel, it’s super simple,” she said.
From there, ResMed transformed the initial coursework into a broader set of robust training programs Mason and her team could use for onboarding, as well as drip-training methodologies, product launches, and national sales meetings.
“A lot of the courses have been turned into training programs, which is an awesome opportunity because then you can release them on an automated timeframe,” Mason said. “If you’re stretched pretty thin and can’t launch courses for each person coming through, it’s really nice to start to set a cadence with the training program. We definitely have utilized it as an opportunity to put things together in a timely fashion that are relevant to the goal we’re trying to achieve.”
SOLUTION: Snoring Specialist Keeps Sellers from Snoozing During Training with Allego
Module training can be heavy and intensive, so it was important for Mason and her team to develop creative ways to keep ResMed’s sellers engaged throughout the onboarding process.
Toward that end, Mason created “Brain Breaks,” short videos designed to share company culture and help reps get to know one another. For example, Mason might insert a video comparing the coffee on the first floor of the office with the coffee on the second floor and ask new reps to test them and share which one they think is best.
“I ask them to [record a video telling] us three things we might not know about them. Then they can share that with the other cohorts who are going through the training with them,” said Mason. “You’re building a nice communal spirit. You really have that luxury, that social aspect, with Allego.”
ResMed’s reps appreciated the exercise, sharing positive feedback about how it gave them a better sense of who their counterparts were without being able to meet them in person.
Tracking New Hire Progress
To ensure new sellers were completing and progressing with their required onboarding activities, Mason and her team leveraged Allego to track individual and team results for video exercises and flash drills using customizable scorecards.
She could review individual and team performance in real time and automatically route those performance metrics to each training team and regional sales manager. Managers could then follow up with additional coaching and guidance for every video submitted.
“What’s great is that everyone’s getting visibility on this journey, which we hadn’t had before. We’re able to give really solid feedback,” said Mason.
Leaning on Peers, Marketing, and Internal Champions
Mason saw great success in recruiting regional sales directors and field sales training groups to act as champions to help scale their efforts.
She advises,“Teach them how to organize content, showcase content, et cetera, because then you can branch your brand out a little bit easier than having to do all the heavy lifting.”
To account for any disconnect between rep messaging in the field and the collateral ResMed’s marketing teams were creating, Mason ran competitions in which reps would submit their best approach on how to use a specific piece of collateral.
This not only gave ResMed’s enablement team additional ways to evaluate whether new reps were using the methodology, but also provided the marketing team with greater visibility into how they were looking, sounding, and feeling during messaging delivery.
Using the video submissions, they took the five top videos for others to observe and learn from. Reps could continuously improve by trying different approaches.
“You could watch five of your closest friends utilize the piece and how they did it and walk away a bit more confident. That personal experience is nice too, because they want to see how things look and feel for their use. Any way that you can get the reps to immerse themselves where they’re learning from their peers is always a win.”
RESULTS: Decreased Onboarding Time, Faster Results
Using Allego, ResMed condensed what was once a 90-day program requiring both in-person and virtual training into one week, helping the company not only save big on costs, but also save time.
With Allego, Mason can see how use of the platform directly impacts the time it takes for new hires to produce revenue. ”Your ramp-to-revenue opportunity can definitely be shortened with the use of Allego. And I definitely have seen that unfold,” she said. “I think people are a lot more ready for the world after going through training now with Allego versus before.”
Mason attributes much of their success with Allego to the platform’s ability to provide their team access to everything they need under one roof. “Reps can revisit the content at their convenience. And they can see and hear from subject matter experts, even though they may never have met them before, which is nice. They really feel this level of connection, and the depth in learning is obviously a lot more,” she said.
ResMed’s Recommendations for Enablement Success
Mason’s advice for approaching enablement initiatives within Allego: Dive in and start using it and optimize your strategy as you adapt over time.
“The best thing you can do is just start, immerse yourself, try it out, trial and error. You’ll be surprised once you identify a path like onboarding, for instance, and see how much easier things come and how much quicker it is.
“It’s a very agile platform and very forgiving, and [Allego has] wonderful customer success people that you can lean into, as well. I’ve leveraged them to drive the success that we’ve had,” she said.
Ready to see what Allego can do for your team?
Transform your organization with award-winning sales enablement technology built for today’s distributed teams.
Request a Demo