How to implement a GDPR training strategy for your employees

The General Data Protection Regulation, most commonly referred to as GDPR, is set to change the precedent for data storage and processing forever. This new data protection regulations has been put into place to protect sensitive and personal information for employees, clients and customers. This regulation is set to go live on the 25th May 2018, so in the final weeks, it’s important to make sure that you are tying up loose ends and are making a better impact on

As a business owner, it’s your responsibility to enforce these new regulations and to ensure that all data is being handled with sensitivity and that everything is in line with GDPR and cmtrading south Africa . These new regulations are going to affect every aspect of your professional life.

This is everything from storing your employees sensitive data, to processing client payment details. Everything all the way up to how to properly dispose of or store a business card needs to be explored and made fully transparent in order for GDPR to be followed in your company. Here are some simple training tips to consider on the lead up to GDPR.

Well informed employees:

A serious breach in data could be fatal for business after GDPR comes into effect. Penalties for failing to comply with these regulations could be up to 4% of global turnover or 20 million euros, whichever is higher and a failure to notify a breach could cost up to 2% of global revenue or 10 million euros.

Non-compliance is being taken very seriously, so it’s important to make sure that all of your employees are well-trained in the matter. Failing to partake in GDPR training could be fatal to your business. There are two important aspects to consider when training your employees on GDPR. First and foremost, they need to be aware of how to correctly store, process and handle data. Secondly, it’s important to also inform them as their rights under the new law.

As an employee, you reserve the right to know what data your employer is storing on you as well as how they plan to use it, any breaches in personal employee data could also lead to strict sanctions.

Engaging your employees:

Whatever GDPR makes up for in importance, it lacks in excitement, which puts an unfortunate spin on the matter of training the employees. So the question is, how can you make GDPR training engaging?

If the training isn’t engaging, then there is a high chance that your employees will not retain any information from the session. This again could be problematic down the line, as it’s crucial that your employees know the regulations, the processes and how this will affect their clients, the overall business and themselves as professionals.

Traditional training methods will do little to excite when it comes to GDPR, so you will need to think outside the box. There are countless sections and pages on the UK’s official GDPR website, which can be quite dry to read through, let alone training somebody else.

Instead, you will have to take a different approach in order for your employees to absorb the information. One of the most memorable and effective ways to conduct GDPR training is to use a gamification approach, based on the knowledge that is needed in order to follow the regulation. This is a method that has been tried and tested by many local businesses such 

Research has proven to us time and time again that turning something into a game can really help with information retention. Create a game that will engage your employees and create an awards based system – this will most certainly help to keep your employees engaged.