Rethinking eLearning and What Sales Teams Really Need

Let’s start with a question:

As a salesperson, Enablement leader, or Sales manager—has eLearning ever delivered the results you were hoping for?

Sure, it’s efficient. It scales well. It checks compliance boxes. But when it comes to actually helping your sales team build the critical skills they need to succeed—does it move the needle?

Let’s dig into why eLearning often falls short for sales teams, and what we should be doing instead.

The Upside: Why We Use eLearning

There’s a reason online learning is so popular. It’s:

• Cost-effective: Create once, deploy anywhere.
• Scalable: Easily reach a global team with consistent messaging.
• Flexible: Reps can learn at their own pace, on their own schedule.
• Measurable: Completion rates and quiz scores make compliance tracking easy.

These are all real advantages—if your goal is knowledge transfer.

But if your goal is to ramp reps quickly, build critical sales skills, and drive performance, that’s where eLearning starts to fail you.

The Downside: Why eLearning Doesn’t Build Sales Skills

Sales is a people-first discipline. The core skills—building relationships, reading buying signals, asking the right questions, and negotiating—are all behavioural. They require practice, nuance, feedback, and coaching. These are things you can’t learn by clicking through a module.

In fact, if you mapped out the top ten skills a salesperson needs to succeed, it would be obvious—eLearning alone won’t cut it. Skills like active listening, objection handling, reading non-verbal cues, or adapting to buyer behaviour can’t be mastered through videos and quizzes. They require practice, feedback, and real-world application.

Train Like an Athlete

Let’s explore the idea of developing salespeople the way we might develop an athlete.

Imagine trying to train Michael Jordan through eLearning. Give him an LMS, a well-designed learning pathway, some videos and quizzes. He’d be learning. He’d be busy. But would he get better?

Of course not. Great athletes don’t study their way to mastery—they train for it. They practise, receive coaching, get feedback, and repeat.

Just like athletes build muscle memory through repetition and coaching, salespeople build mental agility and behavioural muscle through practice and feedback. In high-pressure moments—whether it’s on the court or in a sales conversation—you react based on what you’ve internalized.

Did you know? In many languages, the word for employee development is “formation”—not “education”. That’s because we’re not just transferring knowledge; we’re shaping instincts, refining judgement, and training the brain to respond in real-time. And that doesn’t happen by watching videos—it happens by doing the work, again and again, with the guidance of someone who knows what good looks like.

You Hired Barbara for a Reason

Think about the people you hire into sales roles. Chances are, they’re outgoing, competitive, curious, persuasive—they bring energy and instinct. These folks are rarely passive learners.

From what I’ve seen, a lot of salespeople are classic Type 3 learners (according to 4MAT): they learn best by doing—solving real problems, collaborating with others, and getting stuck in. And what do they do with traditional eLearning? They skim. They skip. They click next as fast as possible to get to something they can interact with, like a quiz or challenge.

Can eLearning be made better for them? Yes—but even then, it’s still not the best modality. A better approach is to design workshops that simulate real-world conversations, deal strategy, objection handling—sessions where they can test their instincts and receive coaching in the moment.

So, Should We Do Away With eLearning?

Not at all.

A blended learning model can work brilliantly—when each modality is used for the right purpose. Use eLearning where it fits:

• Systems training (e.g. CRM workflows)
• Company policies and procedures
• Product refreshers or pre-work for a live session

But for building core sales competencies? That requires live practice, coaching, feedback, and repetition. Whether that’s in-person or virtual, the key is interaction and application.

What You Can Do Now

Start by auditing your current learning library. Ask yourself:

• What are the key skills our reps need to succeed?
• What modality are we using to build each of these skills?
• Are we over-relying on eLearning for behavioural skills?

Group your skills into categories—like product knowledge, tech systems, company culture, and core sales competencies. Then look at the training strategy behind each.

Pro tip: If your most critical sales skills are sitting inside self-paced modules, it’s time to rethink the design.

Shift toward more workshops, peer roleplays, coaching sessions, and structured on-the-job learning. Give reps a safe space to practise, fail, get feedback, and try again. That’s where real development happens.

Final Thoughts

eLearning has its place—but it’s not a silver bullet. And it’s certainly not a substitute for the kind of immersive, skill-based training that salespeople need.

If you're designing learning experiences for sales teams, be honest about what you're trying to build—and choose your modalities accordingly.

And if you're rethinking your sales training strategy? Let’s talk. Designing skill-first, behaviourally driven training programs is something I’m deeply passionate about—and I’d love to swap ideas.

Ready to build something better? Contact me at hello@mirandaferreira.ca. Or, connect to my calendar and book a meeting.