BusinessToday talks to Mohd Nadzrin Wahab, founder of the Virtual LearnCaster Certification (VLC) which is taking the training community by storm, having tripled its reach since its launching in April 2020.
Within 2 months, the VLC had 120 participants join and after one year, 400 participants received certification as proficient virtual trainers to serve the growing needs of diverse learners nationwide who have since gotten online to continue their education in various subjects.
The VLC is an impactful local certification program which teaches and certifies people to not only conduct online training sessions for any subject, but also make them exciting and engaging based on the latest learning psychology principles while making the most of the virtual tools available in popular online meeting platforms such as Zoom and Google Meet. The latest batch of VLC graduates includes trainers from diverse areas and capabilities. To name a few, a fitness instructor, a facilitator who successfully engaged deaf students online and a coach who is able to conduct sessions from his dialysis chair at the hospital.
Nadzrin is not a newcomer to the virtual training sphere, having had 7 years of experience working in learning and development for global consulting firm Accenture, in which he used software like Centra and Adobe Connect to conduct trainings regionally and within the local offices. Little did he know that his Accenture training days would one day help him serve the Malaysian community of trainers in the Klang Valley and abroad during one of the most unexpected crises in the 21st century, the Covid pandemic.
“I have a 10 year plan for my career and business. VLC was my pandemic baby. It was not part of the plan. So, I expected it to run for a few cycles and that’s it. Now, it’s taken on a life of its own and I’m happy that it did. This baby is helping a lot more people than it was designed to. And that, makes me a proud father.”
In the last 15 months, the VLC has grown in leaps and bounds to address the immediate needs of trainers who were looking for ways to stay afloat by having to pivot their classes from physical to online sessions due to safety restrictions, as many teachers, corporate trainers and physical training instructors lost their place of work and had no way to continue working unless it was via providing online courses.
Unlike Nadzrin and many other corporate players who are well-versed in using virtual technology in their daily work, many others do not have the know-how or the confidence to adopt online training platforms to teach in their respective fields in addition to not having the credibility to do so. The majority of complaints that Nadzrin hears from clients are “It can’t be done online”; “The internet connection is bad”; “I don’t know how”; “It’s impossible”; “How am I going to keep track of people?”; “I don’t have the technology or the money to do it”; “So much will be lost in translation” to “How can online training be exciting?” And one by one, he addressed all these objections and more through the VLC.
From being a total unknown to having over 400 members from 21 countries globally to now having a vibrant professional learning community on Telegram of like-minded people is not the only proof that the VLC has helped so many in the training industry during these trying times.
Local consulting company, Aleevar Consulting, did a case study comparing Nadzrin’s company, EnSync Learning, to the likes of UNESCO, MDEC and Sunago for their digital transformation efforts in education by displaying the reach and impact of VLC on the local community.
Only after one month of running his first VLC certification, Nadzrin started empowering his first batch of successfully certified virtual learning graduates to start applying and practicing what they learnt in up-coming VLC courses simultaneously. Together with 17 graduates from the first batch, they created the Virtual Educator Global FB group, which is open to all, not just VLC graduates.
To date, Nadzrin says these graduates, also known as Certified VLC Facilitators, have run 30 cycles of the VLC Certification in Malaysia, Qatar and soon he hopes they will reach Cambodia, Indonesia and Brunei. The VLC Facilitators can run the programme in English, Bahasa Melayu, Mandarin (Sept 2021), Tamil and Arabic (coming soon).
Haslinda Zainal Abidin, a Human Resource practitioner who graduated last year as a Certified VLC Facilitator says,”It has helped me to engage participants better virtually. It has also widened my network within the L&D global community.”
So far, the VLC Facilitators have celebrated 5 virtual graduation ceremonies and invited respected figures in the virtual learning world to share their wisdom and success. Some VLC Facilitators have been invited to run in-house versions for government agencies, higher-learning institutions and corporate organisations.
Nadzrin looks back fondly at the team effort garnered together with the initial batch of 17 VLC Facilitators who helped manage the 2nd and 3rd programme cycles which totalled up to 80 people. This amazing group is made up of 15 VLC Facilitators from Malaysia and 2 from Qatar, who are licensed to run the VLC Certification on their own.
“It was those moments that really pushed us into the limelight, and I’m happy to guide and be part of this team.” he says.
Nadzrin and his VLC Family recently celebrated their first year anniversary in April 2021 and no doubt there will be more to come with the work of getting many more teachers, trainers and educators in Malaysia on board with not only virtual learning platforms but the confidence and creativity in applying them in the virtual education space. They are indeed in the field, working hard to build local talent within their scope of influence to support our nation in our current digital upskilling efforts in the training business to shift together with national Digital Transformation efforts. Contact Nadzrin at https://www.facebook.com/Mohd.Nadzrin.Wahab to learn more on how you can start exploring the virtual training space with your own brand of sessions.
