* Incl. Tips on how to formulate multiple-choice questions
In this manual, we provide you with a step-by-step guide to how the XLR Academy works, how it benefits your employees and your business, and the opportunities it provides.
NOTE: If you are in need of an assistance it can be realised under the hourly rates. To find out more please contact service@hseqdirect.com Index
GOAL
To decrease loss of training knowledge.
USAGE RESULT
Five self-made or premade monthly questions and solutions about HSEQ issues to incite ongoing engagement. Training knowledge is maintained at the highest level, raising HSEQ awareness at the workplace.
5 EASY STEPS for managing your XLR Academy!
Step 1 - Managing
Step 3 - Account
Step 4 - Categories
Step 5 - Managing questions & users
Tips on how to formulate multiple-choice questions
Quickstart for the Owner
MANAGING
1 3 5 4
2 5 EASY STEPS for managing your XLR Academy!
Log in to hseqdirect.com and go to MY ACCOUNT > MANAGE TOOLS > Manage your XLR Academy.
ACCOUNT
Clicking on the ‘ACCOUNT’ on the left side menu, you can check and edit your account information.
MANAGING QUESTIONS & USERS
One of your tasks as the Owner is to enter questions for your colleagues and to create user accounts for them.
CUSTOMIZATION
Create your own look & feel of your XLR Academy by selecting the color set, uploading your Company logo and much more!
CATEGORIES
After you have finished with customization click on ‘SAVE’.
It is very important to structure your XLR Academy with different categories (departments, sort of questions, etc.).
At the end of this manual you can find useful tips on how to formulate multiple-choice questions.
Now, start managing your XLR Academy and let your colleagues go for the PLATINUM level!
In case you need some extra help please use Manual for the Owner on following pages.
Introduction
Industry makes high demands. This is necessary in order to excel. So it is vital that all of your organization’s employees have totally comprehensive knowledge and expertise. By always keeping your knowledge up-to-date and by applying it appropriately, you can jointly achieve the best results.
KNOWLEDGE FADES
Employees take training courses and educational programmes to maintain and further develop their knowledge. But the knowledge they obtain here quickly fades from their memory. One to four years later, their knowledge is given a further boost during a refresher course or advanced training course. But how can employees maintain their knowledge at a sustainable level in the intervening period?
BY ACTIVELY PARTICIPATING IN EXCELLENCE LEARNING AND REGISTRATION (XLR) ACADEMY!
ACADEMY FOR COMMITMENT
The XLR Academy is an interactive system for retaining and optimizing knowledge and behaviour. The Academy is designed to make it easily operational within your organization. Very handy, as the XLR Academy is suitable for all organizations that want to work with the most highly trained and committed people, people who excel in terms of their expertise. If they are to perform at an optimum level, it is important for organizations that all employees know what the organization does, how it is structured, and what its objectives are. Everything that is important to your organization can be part of the XLR Academy. Participation in the Academy enhances your employee’s commitment.
HOW DOES IT WORK?
It is very likely that knowledge and expertise are high on your employees’ priority lists. You want to make sure that knowledge gained during training courses and educational programmes is continually used at the required level and that it is applied correctly. The XLR Academy supports your efforts in this regard. The Academy triggers interaction among your employees, while promoting involvement by asking questions. These are questions on a variety of subjects and situations that people encounter in the course of their day-to-day work.
The XLR Academy is informative and extremely user friendly. Every month, the Academy asks your employees five questions, plus two bonus questions, where necessary. You will see a rapid increase in interaction and commitment among your employees.
EXCELLENT RESULTS
The XLR Academy is, of course, available on any mobile device and computer. This allows your employees to tackle the Academy’s questions anytime and anywhere. After answering the questions, they immediately get to see the results. If they do well, their excellence ranking will increase. This result is recorded in the associated registration system. This also gives you direct insight into your employees’ excellence ranking. The XLR Academy motivates your employees to want to achieve the best results. After all, you only want to work with the very best people, don’t you?
TAILOR-MADE ACADEMY
You can customise the XLR Academy to comply fully with your wishes. Specific content and information can be easily coupled to the Academy. The system can also send emails completely automatically. These could involve reminders, or the announcement of a new round of questions, for example. You can add the logo of your organization, choose the name of your XLR Academy and even choose one of several color themes to match the look & feel of your organization.
Owner
Manage and edit
Welcome to your XLR Academy!
As an XLR Academy Owner, you are responsible for the Academy’s monthly questions. This means that you add and manage questions. One of the responsibilities is also entering and managing User accounts. To this end, you can log in with any mobile device or computer, at any time. In addition to entering, managing and editing questions, you also have an uncluttered dashboard that gives you a detailed view of the Academy’s activity.
Step 1 - Managing
After completing purchase of your HSEQ Direct package go HSElife LARS (Learning and Registration System) at lars. hselifeunio.com to add users. Use HSElife LARS Manual for the Owner for an easy step-by-step users registration.
When you have completed adding users into LARS and assigning them to your purchased package, go to hseqdirect.com and log in with your login credentials (email + password). Once logged in, go to MY ACCOUNT > MY SUBSCRIPTION and click on Link users to user packages in LARS. After you have completed linking users to the active package, go to MY ACCOUNT > MANAGE TOOLS. Scroll down and click on MANAGE YOUR XLR ACADEMY. This link will take you to the CUSTOMIZATION. For information about specific fields of the Customization and their importance please go to the next page.
Step 2 - Customization 2
By completing first step you will be directed to the Owner’s panel, specifically Customization menu. here you can customize the look & feel of your XLR Academy. Let’s see what options are at your disposal.
1. By clicking on the button ‘Select logo’ you can browse and select the logo of your organization. Please make sure to use specified size. After selecting the logo you can resize/crop it to fit assigned proportions.
2. ‘Languages’ is required section. Here you can specify in which languages you will make your XLR Academy available for your colleagues. Multiple selection is possible.
3. ‘Color theme’ selection allows you to choose one of the 4 provided color sets for your XLR Academy.
4. This selection will activate ‘Pause period’ during summer holidays, in which availability of your colleagues is less than usual.
After you are finished with customization please don’t forget tot click on the button ‘SAVE’ to confirm your changes.
Step 3 - Account 3
Another category of importance is ‘ACCOUNT’. Here you can edit the information about your Academy, which you previously entered during the Setup Wizard. Please note that you can’t change the ‘Subdomain’ field.
1. Here you can eventually change the name of the company
2. Your colleagues will start with the Academy from the level you decide. Please use the following range to decide what will be the starting point: 0-20 IRON, 20-40 BRONZE, 40-60 SILVER, 60-80 GOLD and finally 80-100 is PLATINUM level. Choose wisely as starting point can additionally motivate your colleagues (for example: you probably don’t want starting point to be highest available).
3. In these two fields you can change the name of the Owner.
4. In case that you need to change / update the email address of the Owner, you can do that here.
5. To change password use this field and remember to verify it by typing it again in the next field.
After you are finished with editing information please don’t forget tot click on the button ‘SAVE’ to confirm your changes.
Manual for the Owner
Before you start creating questions, it is absolutely necessary to create a list of extra categories. By doing so, you are able to define for example your organization’s departments, specific sort of questions you would like to create, etc. Creating the extra categories, besides default one, will also allow you to categorize the questions as well. For example, if you have several different departments in your organization, you can create a specific set of questions for each of them.
To create extra categories please select ‘EXTRA’ (1) on the left-side menu. Overview of already created categories can be displayed by clicking on ‘list of extra categories’ (2). To add a category please click on the submenu ‘add extra category’ (3). It will display the ‘Create category’ form. In the field called ‘Label’ (4) you can give a name to a category and under the field ‘Category’ (5) you can enter the name in all selected/available languages. After you are done with creating categories please click on button ‘Save’ (6) or if you want to add another category click on the button next to it.
Once you have finished creating all categories, you need to assign these categories to all users. Go to ‘USERS’ on the left menu and you will see the overview of all users. On the right side of the each user, click on the button ‘edit’ and then at the bottom of the user’s data you will see the section ‘Categories’ (1). Select all the categories which needs to be assigned to this particular user. After you have done that click on the button ‘Update’ at the bottom to finish assignment of the categories for this user. Go back to the User list and repeat this action until all entered users have the categories assigned.
Step 5 - Managing questions & users
Questions
The ‘Questions’ menu option is the one you will use the most. You can use it to create, edit, and manage questions. To see the overview of already existing questions please click on the ‘list of questions’ (1) on the left-side menu.
List of questions
This list contains all the questions that are in the system and that are used in the XLR Academy.
1. Here, you can specify how many questions you want displayed on each page. You can select 5, 10, 25, 50 or all questions per page.
2. The question which is entered in the XLR Academy system and available for editing/managing.
3. By clicking on this arrow, you determine the way in which the questions are displayed. For instance, you can start at the top of the list or at the bottom. It is sequenced alphabetically.
4. This field indicates if there is a picture associated with the question.
5. ‘Category’ section indicates to which category is the question related to.
6. Looking for a specific question? Then type a distinctive term in the search box. The moment you start typing, you will see that the system immediately starts searching. Thus you do not need to press ‘Enter’, all of the results related to your search term are immediately displayed in the main screen.
7. You can edit any of these questions by clicking on the blue ‘Edit’ button next to the relevant question. Next to it is ‘Remove’ button which will remove the question completely out of the system.
8. You can browse to a specific page of questions by clicking on the numbers. Click on ‘Previous’ to browse to the previous page of questions or on ‘Next’ to display the next page.
Manual for the Owner
New question
You can create a new question by clicking on ‘add new question’ in the left-side menu.
1. Start entering the question. If you have difficulty in formulating a question, click here for tips on how to formulate a good multiple-choice question. If more languages are spoken in your organization, it is important that you formulate the question in selected languages.
2. After entering the question, you can enter the answer choices. It is important that you enter three answer choices. Here too, you must enter the text in all languages that you have selected as spoken languages from the ‘Customization’ menu. Do you find it difficult to formulate three answer choices? Here you can find tips on how to formulate a good multiplechoice question.
3. Indicate which of the three answer choices is the correct answer to the question entered. You can do so by ticking the checkbox for the correct answer. Suppose that answer 1 is the correct answer, then you should tick ‘Answer #1 is correct’.
4. Do you want to add/change the picture associated with this questions, then you can do that on the right side, under the field ‘Image’ (4). Click on the button ‘Select image’ to browse and select an image from your computer. Use button ‘remove’ to remove the image.
5. Finally, you must indicate the category to which this question relates. You can choose between already created categories. By indicating this, you are ensuring that only those employees who work in the selected department/section will be presented with this question.
6. Has everything been filled in? If so, then save your question by clicking on the blue ‘Save’ button. Do you want to immediately start creating a new question? If so, then click on the blue ‘Save and add another’ button.
You can easily edit any questions you have created by using ‘List of questions’.
Manual for the Owner
Editing existing questions
If you wish to edit a question, click on the blue ‘Edit’ button next to the relevant question in the list. The editing screen will then be displayed. You can modify the text of the question (1) and of the answers (2). You can also assign the ‘correct’ (3) attribute to another answer by ticking the checkbox for the correct answer. Do you want to add/change the picture associated with this questions, then you can do that on the right side, under the field ‘Image’ (4). Click on the button ‘Select image’ to browse and select an image from your computer. Use button ‘remove’ to remove the image. Finally, you can change the ‘Category’ (5) when a question relates to a different created category.
Finished editing the question? Then click on the blue ‘Save’ (6) button on the right-hand side. Click on the ‘Save and add another’ (6) button to save the edited question and immediately create a new question. What if you don’t want to save the changes you’ve made? Go back, or click on the menu option you want to open, and any changes made will not be saved.
Manual for the Owner
To let your colleagues participate in your XLR Academy you have to enter ‘User Accounts’ in the system. All the users that are assigned for your HSEQ Direct package via HSElife LARS (see page 3) are automatically added once you activate XLR Academy. For these users all you have to do is to assign a categories to them. Adding other users afterwards you have to do manually. There are two ways of doing this. First is by adding new users by clicking on left-side menu on ‘USERS’ and then on item ‘add new user’.
1. Enter here the user’s email adress. This email will be used to communicate with the user and will also serve as their login/ username.
2. Second entry field speak for itself... First name.
3. Next in the line is user’s Last name.
4. From the dropdown menu you can assign which of the selected languages is applicable for this user.
5. Under the ‘Categories’ you can find and select for which department/section this user is working. Please note that multiple selection is possible (very useful if one person is working or is connected with several departments/sections of your organisation.
6. Finally, if you are satisfied with this user entry, please click on button ‘Create’ to save this user credentials.
You can display the overview of created users by selecting ‘list of users’ on the left-side menu. To edit user’s information please click on the button ‘Edit’ (1) on the right side. Editable form will be displayed (same as ‘add new user’ form).
Manual for the Owner
Import users
Another way to create user accounts is to import them from the Excel sheet. For that purpose you can download and use Excel sheet template from the section ‘Import new users’ on the left-side menu. Click on the green icon (1) to download the template. Fill in Excel all columns (email, first name, last name, categories,...). Once you’ve done that, click on the button ‘choose file’ (2) to upload the file back to the system. It goes without saying that you have saved the changed Excel file on your computer! Once you have selected the edited file, please click on the button ‘Submit’ (3) to upload the information into the system.
If the upload of the file is finished, click on the ‘list of users’ from the left-side menu to verify imported accounts.
Export user status
To view the current status and information of all participants, click on the ‘export user status’ from the left-side menu. Export users page will display the link indicated with the name of your organisation and the date. Click on the filename (1) to download and open the document in Excel.
Manual for the Owner
We already explained how to create extra categories, which can be related to the structure of your organization or information that you would like to communicate with your colleagues. Now we will focus on another useful function of the XLR Academy - creating easily accessible information sources. You have all the liberty to enter information sources (intranet, internet,...) and they will be displayed in the XLR Academy user application, under FAQ section. Users can access them on every type of device (mobile or desktop).
To view the list of already created FAQ sources click on the ‘list of faq sources’ under the ‘EXTRA’ on the left-side menu. The name of the source (1) is listed. If you want to edit the information (name or url) of the source, please click on the ‘Edit’ button (2). To remove the FAQ source please click on the ‘Remove’ button (3). If you are using many sources, you can search for them in the ‘search’ field (4)
To create a new FAQ source, select the ‘add extra faq source’ from the left-side menu. Under ‘Label’ entry field (1) please enter the name of the FAQ source. ‘Url’ entry field (2) is meant for url adress of the source. After the entry is complete, save the source information by clicking on ‘Save’ button (3). If you are planning to add more sources, please click on the ‘Save and add another’ button (4) instead.
Manual for the Owner
Incomplete questionnaires
As the Administrator of your XLR Academy you have the option to have the overview of users who haven’t completed their monthly questionnaires. For your own convenience, you can also export the overview as a Excel sheet (1). By clicking on the ‘View’ button (2) you can see additional user information. If it turns out that user’s information is not correct (such as email adress) you can edit it directly from this pannel by clicking on ‘Edit’ button (3)
Manual for the Owner
Dashboard
Finally we come to the page called ‘DASHBOARD’. The dashboard is the landing page for the Owner section of the XLR Academy. It offers you a detailed view and an overview of every piece of information concerning the monthly questions that you have made available in the Academy.
1. This number shows how many questionnaires have already been answered. You can export this data by clicking on ‘Export data’.
2. At this section, details of the number of questions answered are displayed. These are standard questions plus the bonus questions. You can easily view the questions answered by clicking on ‘View all questions’.
3. Here, details of the number of active administrators are displayed. You can view details of all active administrators by clicking on ‘View all users’.
4. This is the average score obtained by the Academy’s users. You can export this data by clicking on ‘Export data’.
5. The system uses this bar to show how many unanswered questions are still available. Incredibly useful! It tells you exactly when you need to add new questions.
6. This chart shows you when users have answered questions. Thus, you can quickly see if users do so at the beginning of the month or if they wait for a while before doing so.
7. By clicking on this link, you will open the XLR Academy application and, since you are already logged-in, it will show you your application Dashboard, with your current ranking.
8. Use this link to log out of the system.
Tips on how to formulate multiple-choice questions
In practice, it is often difficult to formulate a good multiple-choice question. What requirements must good multiple-choice questions meet, and what aspects should you take into account? Some practical tips are given below.
Tip 1: Consider your choice of words
Mostly, often, sometimes, never ... are words that are not very clear. What one individual considers to be ‘a lot’ might be ‘a little’ for someone else. Make sure you are always clear, and use terms that everyone interprets in the same way. For instance, use ‘in 90% of cases’ instead of ‘often’.
Tip 2: Don’t lose sight of the objective
The XLR Academy’s objective is the maintenance and optimization of knowledge and behaviour. You must keep this objective in mind when formulating the question and the various answer choices. Do not make the answer choices unnecessarily difficult. Do not use sub-clauses where they are not needed, and avoid subjective questions.
Tip 3: Information is contained in the question
If, when formulating the answers, you notice that they all include the same item of information (to describe a given situation, for example), then it would be better to include this information in the question. The situation you describe is applicable to all answer choices. By including this in the question, you make the answers clearer.
Tip 4: Consider your use of language
When formulating questions, give due consideration to the target group that is going to answer those questions. Make sure that your use of language is in keeping with that group, i.e. neither too complicated nor too simple.
Tip 5: Positive formulation
Formulate the question positively. If, however, you do decide to formulate a question negatively, make sure that it is clearly recognizable as such: What colours are NOT in the Dutch flag?
Tip 6: Just one correct answer
It may sounds obvious but, in multiple-choice questions, only one of the answer choices must be correct. This also means that you must be careful with overlapping answers. If different answers overlap, it can create the impression that more than one answer is correct. That’s confusing.
Tip 7: Do not make it too obvious that specific answers are incorrect
If one of the answer choices is clearly incorrect, employees will find the question easier to answer. So try to avoid this.
Tip 8: Logical sequence
Arrange the answer choices in a logical sequence, for example, numerical, alphabetical, or from small to large.
Tip 9: Equal length answers
Make the alternate answer choices all about the same length, and make sure that – in terms of vocabulary and structure –they have the same composition as the correct answer.
