3 Things Corporate Learning Leaders Need for Successful vILT

The global pandemic has changed the way the world does business and how we provide training.

With the world already back to its pre-lockdown days, the remote and hybrid learning environments are expected to remain as a result of their convenience, efficiency, and productivity.

Whether you’re in-office every day or two days out of the week, how does this shift affect how we provide learning to employees, new and seasoned?

Let’s examine the effects of online training and where instructor-led training (ILT) and, most importantly, virtual instructor-led training (VILT) make an impact in our new world of learning!

What is virtual instructor-led training (VILT)?

Virtual instructor-led training (VILT) is the version of facilitator-led learning conducted in real-time, via an online classroom.

VILT training maintains all aspects of face-to-face training in a traditional seminar or classroom setting, but instead uses the power of conferencing rooms and other learning software to provide the one-on-one experience.

Is Instructor-Led Training considered obsolete?

Surprisingly, ILT and vILT have never left or been considered dead.

Despite the popularity of eLearning and now AI in corporate training, instructor-led training both on site and virtual, are still the gold standard of learning new skills.

For corporate training, especially training that revolves around upskilling, in-person training will never be obsolete.

Despite the corporate and enterprise learning going fully digital with so many LMS and LXP platforms to choose from, both instructor-led training and virtual instructor-led training are here to stay.

In fact, Brandon Hall Group found that 96% of organizations still use in-person instruction, live online or in a classroom, to some degree. The report found that the areas that needed instructor guidance most were the learning of new technical skills and leadership development courses.

To add to the importance of ILT/VILT in the modern learning world even more, a 2021 report by The Ken Blanchard Companies found that 51% of organizations felt that their new digital offerings were somewhat or much less effective than their face-to-face offerings.

The top areas they felt their digital and virtual course designs could be improved were through “learner engagement, social interaction, and more learning touch points.”

Overall, 64% of organizations prefer to use ILT-based learning initiatives as opposed to pure online training because it’s more effective and engaging in improving learners’ understanding of the training material.

Plus, in today’s unique learning environment, the need for human interaction is even more important. With a widening skills gap pushing for faster skills comprehension on limited training budgets, L&D providers must strategize even more on how to deliver training ROI that translates to organizational success.

Dive Deeper: Online vs In-Person Training: Which is Better for Corporate Learning?

The Future of Virtual Instructor-led Training

Despite a boom of online training, in-person instruction remains a primary learning strategy especially for skills development and leadership training.

Though according to recent survey results, some say ILT is the gold standard and preferred delivery method, 57% of L&D professionals believe ILT has a role, but it’s part of a blended learning experience.

As Ken Blanchard puts it, “It’s no longer an ‘either/or’ proposition, but rather a ‘both/and’ proposition” since both classroom and digital training can be utilized to create a smarter, more skilled, and diversified workforce.

There is also a big shift to blended learning, delivering a mix of both ILT and vILT to accommodate in-person and remote workers.

According to the Brandon Hall Group study on The Hybrid Learning Revolution, 94% of companies surveyed plan to use a blended or hybrid learning model to train both groups simultaneously as they move into learning delivery modes that are cost-efficient, convenient, and still effective for skills development.

Learn More: Instructor-led Training – The Top Benefits for Learners, Trainers, and Organizations

Improving Virtual Instructor-led Training Starts with Strategy

The training industry is already laser-focused on connected, virtual classrooms, collaborative experiences, and personalized, blended curricula that benefit our learners and their experiences.

It’s great that training managers and learning directors can provide fun, interactive learning experiences, but we also need to think about the team responsible for providing training: the training admin team.

Many companies and organizations, from internal training and development to third-party training providers, overlook the administrative duties that go into training operations.

The vast amount of back-office / operational time and resources needed to plan, schedule, manage, and report on instructor-led and virtual instructor-led training.

The reality is that most of these processes are still managed manually in XLS spreadsheets and calendars. There’s much room for progress.

For example, according to a PwC survey, banks and financial institutions need operational savings of at least 15 to 20 percent to maintain viability.

Perhaps in no other industry is in need for more efficient training management more obvious. In fact, “64% of CEOs see neither innovation nor operational effectiveness as being dominant – they are looking to succeed at both!“

But ILT and vILT of the future are not bound to be inefficient and opaque.

We argue for an entirely new, impact-oriented approach to managing instructor-led and virtual instructor-led training.

One that reduces costs and administrative workload while increasing flexibility and visibility.

How to Effectively Manage Virtual Instructor-Led Training in 2026

We’ll be quick to the point on this one:

No, we do not recommend scheduling ILT on your LMS.

Even thought VILT is purely online and digital, it would be a beginner’s mistake to consider using an online training platform for that.

Managing the shift to virtual instructor-led training (VILT) will require three things from training admin teams:

1. First, it should be cost-effective, maximize revenue, and be able to respond to tighter training budgets.
2. Second, it needs to be collaborative to improve efficiency and data consolidation.
3. Third, it should be transparent and enable better training reporting and decision-making.

For this reason, we propose a completely new way to think about instructor-led training and virtual instructor-led training, resting on strategic planning, operational excellence, and technology to maximize impact and minimize costs:

1. Strategic decision-making for face-to-face and virtual classroom training

Unlike online training, instructor-led training is inherently less flexible and scalable as it entails scarce resources and limited capacity. Therefore, planning is crucial and represents the first step.

Planning your virtual classroom training

There are unique complexities for managing instructors, virtual rooms, materials, and new roles as everything continues to shift.

Some of these new complexities may include:

• Tracking and managing new roles for virtual sessions, such as producers or digital facilitators, in addition to the instructor.
• Managing vILT courses that extend over longer periods (i.e., a face-to-face class that used to be 3 full days, is now virtual, spanning over 6 half-day sessions).
• Offering a blended learning or hybrid model (classes that are developed as a blend of face-to-face, virtual, and eLearning).
• Interfacing with new virtual instructor-led training tools and technologies, such as Zoom and others, to automate the scheduling of virtual sessions.

Learn More: 10 Tips to Make Virtual Instructor-led Training a Success

Planning your global strategy

This entails forecasting enterprise-wide training needs for all populations, including external audiences such as your customers and partners, and non-desk workers who don’t have LMS portal access.

Then, create a comprehensive long-term training plan based on these forecasted volumes.

Lastly, you would transfer this forecast into your provisional budget, which will allow you to create a budget well aligned with your L&D strategy.

Prioritize training investments

For instructor-led training, this entails consolidating complete training costs.

This includes both variable costs such as catering and flights, and fixed costs, such as venues and instructor fees.

However, with virtual instructor-led training, training investments may look different.

For vILT, that may mean more instructor fees, more courses, and resources that require different investment scenarios.

A clear picture of costs will allow you to identify the highest return on investment. It will also help you select only the most strategic training sessions.

Lastly, simulating different budget scenarios will help you in making an optimal investment decision.

2. Excel at Training Operations & Training Management

After having decided on an optimal training plan and budget in line with your L&D strategy, the next step is mastering your training management processes.

Collectively know as training operations, this means that you and your team should perfecte managing vILT and ILT needs and resources to most efficiently and flexibly to reduce costs.

Focus on:

Streamlining of logistics and administration

Two distinct capabilities are needed to improve efficiency.

First, logistics capabilities such as instructor and resource curation, flexible course and resource scheduling, as well as occupancy rate monitoring and optimization.

You can do this, for example, through enterprise resource planning systems.

Secondly, an administrative capability that includes, for example, automated registrations and waitlists, electronic document management, and internal and external communication tools.

Optimize training budgets and reduce costs

Tracking and reducing training costs in real-time is probably one of the most difficult hurdles in instructor-led and virtual instructor-led training management.

It can entail anything from precise cost computations, including amortization of fixed assets, to invoice management and currency consolidation.

Tracking costs in real-time then feeds into higher-level monitoring of the remaining budget. This can be benchmarked against your initial plan. You should ideally do this with custom indicators reflecting your priorities.

3. Monitor Training Delivery and Provide Reporting

Frequent reporting around your instructor-led and virtual instructor-led training management is key to ensuring that your teams remain flexible in responding to falling performance, sudden changes in training volumes, rising costs, or other unexpected challenges.

This is a three-step process:

1. Access real-time shared data, key performance indicators (KPIs), and reports, enabled by the consolidation created through operational excellence.
2. Identify weaknesses and opportunities by benchmarking actual versus planned metrics.
3. Make clear-sighted decisions based on your initial strategy and track improvements.

Learn More: 10 Strategic Tips to Make Your Virtual Instructor-led Training a Success

Making VILT Work For Your Organization

For years, the learning industry has been focused on driving innovation in the learner experience. Innovations in the traditional classroom have been timid and mostly focused on learner experience.

This makes sense for online training and eLearning methods of delivery, which focus more on reducing costs while increasing scalability. The reported downsides, of course, are reduced learning engagement and skills comprehension.

However, the environment within the corporate learning ecosystem is changing, and ILT and vILT learning experiences are meeting today’s demands.

It’s time to take advantage of the rapid shift to virtual instructor-led training and re-evaluate how to reduce costs, improve training back-office efficiency, and continue bringing instructor-led training, both face-to-face and virtual, into the future.

Learn more about the corporate classroom post-pandemic and what’s next for instructor-led training by Senior Industry Analyst, Fiona Leteney, of Fosway Group.

Discover More: 8 Tips to Develop Better Instructor-led Training in 2026

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