CrossKnowledge’s award-winning training calendars anchor learning in day-to-day work

How can you successfully integrate digital learning content not only attractively, but also sustainably into employees’ day-to-day work?

CrossKnowledge has developed an innovative solution for this purpose with its tailor-made training calendars. Whether it’s the “Learnathon”, the Advent calendar or the Halloween calendar, CrossKnowledge relies on playful, interactive approaches to make learning a habit and motivate employees to engage with new content every day. The projects combine learning capsules with a variety of gamification elements, creating a learning environment adapted to modern needs and promoting both motivation and long-term learning success. For this, they were awarded the eLearning Journal 2025 prize in the eLearning Innovation category.

Improved learning habits thanks to microlearning and gamification

In a rapidly changing world of work, increasingly shaped by digital processes, companies are faced with the challenge of continually qualifying their employees and developing their skills. At the same time, many employees struggle to find the time to learn and prioritize their own development. CrossKnowledge has developed solutions that not only facilitate digital learning, but also anchor it in everyday work over the long term. It was against this backdrop that the idea of three training calendars was born – the seasonal Advent and Halloween calendars, as well as the “Learnathon”, which can be deployed at any time of the year: learning formats that combine short, easy-to-digest microlearning units with gamification elements, and enrich everyday working life in a playful way. In this way, learning becomes an integral part of everyday working life, helping employees to make continuous progress in their personal development.

Learning needs

In modern companies, training needs are varied and complex. CrossKnowledge has developed training calendars to create a learning environment that is rapidly operational, easy to access and at the same time motivating. The pre-established training calendars enable learning in short, flexible units, which can be easily integrated into daily work without requiring long absences from the workplace.

In addition to the flexibility and ease of understanding of the content, the sustainability of the learning experience is of prime importance. Unlike one-off training courses, the daily impulses of microlearning foster a learning habit that is deeply rooted in corporate culture. This continuous, active access to knowledge contrasts with the passive learning behavior often observed in traditional training formats.

Another focus of the training schedules is maintaining motivation to learn: integrated gamification elements, such as rewards and daily progress indicators, should help motivate learners to “stay in the game”. In addition, “Power Skills” such as intercultural competence, time management and critical thinking are taught to prepare employees for the demands of the modern working world, and to enhance their professional and personal skills. But the calendars also offer the possibility of integrating your own content behind the doors.

Project progress – Training schedules

The development of CrossKnowledge training calendars involved several phases. Firstly, the calendars were developed as a “plug & play” solution, to ensure structured implementation and precise adaptation to corporate needs in the next stage. This is possible for all three training calendars: the Advent calendar, the Halloween calendar & the Learnathon, which is independent of the season.

1. Planning and analysis: CrossKnowledge began by carrying out intensive customer analyses and surveys to identify the specific needs and themes desired by companies. This revealed that a small, regular learning unit, combined with seasonal themes and integrated storytelling, was particularly well suited to encouraging engagement and facilitating integration into everyday life.
2. Content development and design: CrossKnowledge’s digital learning experts created predefined designs with storytelling and learning content. Microlearning units were selected from the CrossKnowledge library and supplemented with interactive content, gamification elements and goodies. The flexible structure of the calendars makes them easy to adapt to specific corporate designs and company requirements.
3. Implementation and integration: during the implementation phase, pre-built schedules are rapidly integrated into corporate platforms. This phase enables adaptations to the corporate identity or contextual changes, such as specific content or learning themes, to be implemented.
4. Communication strategy: to encourage the development of a sustainable learning habit among employees, a complete 360° communication kit is supplied with each calendar. This includes e-mails, newsletters, banners, GIFs, virtual backgrounds and social network posts, tailored to the needs of each target group.

Evaluation and feedback: after a period of implementation, the use and success of learning is analyzed using clearly defined key performance indicators. Based on this feedback, customers can make further optimizations to ensure the long-term effectiveness of the program.

Project results
Training calendar – Learning habits for long-term success

Several customers have already opted for the concept, and are enthusiastic about the possibility of offering their employees regular, attractive learning units. This positive feedback underlines the potential of the CrossKnowledge solution to promote sustainable learning habits. Training calendars rely not only on easy-to-digest learning capsules, but also on integrated gamification elements and engaging storytelling approaches that motivate learners and inspire them to learn on a daily basis. The calendar solution regularly features short learning units and themes that provide variety and suspense. This not only helps to develop a learning culture, but also enhances retention and motivation. At the same time, innovative formats respond to two central challenges in the hectic day-to-day working environment: many employees hardly find the time to learn, and it is often difficult to prioritize learning activities and personal development.
With its short, regularly integrated learning units, CrossKnowledge offers a solution that anchors learning as an integral part of everyday working life, and thus achieves lasting results.

Learning as a sporting challenge: the 21-day Learnathon

As a non-seasonal learning format, the Learnathon calendar offers employees a 21-day learning adventure, structured like a narrative triathlon.
Each day, short learning capsules encourage the development of a continuous learning habit. Participants “train” in three disciplines – swimming, cycling and running – and work playfully through learning content on relevant soft skills such as time management, alertness and self-management. Each successfully completed unit enables them to progress in the disciplines and collect badges, before finally taking part in a prize draw.

The Advent Calendar is the first of two seasonal formats in the Training Calendar. In the 24 days leading up to Christmas, it offers daily learning content in the form of short, inspiring units. In addition to soft skills such as active listening, stress management and mindfulness, the calendar also contains seasonal content tailored to this festive time of year, such as sustainable gift ideas and holiday recipes.

Learning by scaring

The Halloween Countdown is the second seasonal format in the form of a 13-day learning series that accompanies employees through daily “spooky” microlearning units. Behind each door is a carefully tailored combination of soft skills such as creativity, networking and critical thinking, which are linked to the Halloween theme through storytelling. This is complemented by entertaining Halloween highlights such as virtual backgrounds for meetings, VR videos, original recipes and exciting fun facts, which create an additional, entertaining atmosphere. The spooky design and interactive presentation of content create an entertaining learning environment that motivates participants while developing important professional skills.

The three training calendars are designed for flexible, long-term use in corporate training. After their initial use, they can be “refilled” at any time with new content and adapted to other training needs or seasonal themes – be they new soft skills, sector-specific content or current trends. This reusability makes the calendar a long-term solution for companies wishing to provide current learning impulses continuously and regularly throughout the year, and promote sustainable learning habits.

Conclusion from eLearning Journal

Whether in the run-up to the holidays with the Advent calendar, during the Halloween countdown, or through a sporty/dynamic learning competition with the Learnathon, CrossKnowledge has understood that learning designed in a thematic and interactive way can be not only more effective, but also more engaging. Training calendars help companies to establish a sustainable learning culture that goes beyond traditional learning, actively supports employees in their daily work and thus also contributes to their personal continuing education.

For all these reasons, the jury awarded the eLearning AWARD 2025 to the project “Training Calendar – Learning Habits for Long-Term Success” in the “Special AWARD: eLearning Innovation” category, with particular emphasis on “Learning Nuggets”.

Congratulations to everyone involved in the project!