Elevating Sustainability Awareness through Role-Based eLearning

Arcadis N.V. is the world’s leading company delivering sustainable design, engineering, and consultancy solutions for natural and built assets. It delivers intelligent products and solutions to the challenges of climate resilience, energy security, diversification, and livable cities. Arcadis employs 36,000 experts and is active in over 30 countries around the world.

Enabling Sustainability as a Core Competency

Arcadis sought to operationalize its sustainability vision by equipping employees at all levels with the knowledge and tools to integrate sustainable practices into their daily work. With approximately 36,000 employees worldwide, the company faced two key challenges:

• Diverse and global workforce with varying familiarity with sustainability concepts.
• Desire for a unified, high-quality learning experience that could raise the standard across Arcadis’s training programs.

To meet these challenges, Arcadis initiated the development of a multi-module sustainability training curriculum and identified the following as its primary learning objectives:

• Building foundational knowledge of sustainability principles relevant to the company’s mission.
• Empowering employees to understand and evaluate their impact on sustainability goals, and driving sustainable behavior by showcasing peer-led success stories.
• Supporting behavior change by connecting sustainability to specific roles and responsibilities.
• Encouraging engagement and retention through interactive, accessible learning across global teams.

ELB Learning® partnered with Arcadis to co-develop a high-impact, multi-module eLearning curriculum, tailored to Arcadis’ branding, technology infrastructure, and educational goals. The key features of this solution include:

Curriculum Structure & Development Approach

• Module-Based Learning: A phased rollout of 14 modules, starting with foundational topics like “Arcadis' Sustainability Strategy” and “Understanding Your Impact,” with later modules serving as role-based, optional enhancements.
• Interactive Media: Courses included animations, drag-and-drop interactivities, scenario-based questions, and assessments, striking a balance between static and dynamic content.
• Localization, Accessibility & Scalability: Modules were made available in seven languages and enhanced with accessibility features such as transcripts and screen reader-friendly design, ensuring inclusivity, global reach, and support for diverse learner needs.

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Content Composition

• A balanced mix of static screens, animated transitions, interactive tasks, and assessments is used to create an engaging learner experience.
• Integration of voice-over narration, progressive visual storytelling, and knowledge checks to reinforce key concepts.

High Engagement and Organizational Alignment

The partnership has yielded notable results:

• High Learner Satisfaction: Within two years of launching the first module, the curriculum achieved a Net Promoter Score (NPS) of over 70—a remarkable achievement for this specific type of training program.
• Behavioral Impact: The curriculum has already connected knowledge silos and helped standardize sustainability understanding across regions.
• Internal Recognition: The curriculum has raised the bar for training at Arcadis, showcasing what high-quality, globally relevant eLearning can achieve.
• Technical Scalability: ELB’s flexible development approach in early module creation helped overcome integration challenges and proposed alternatives to align globally across multiple stakeholders.

Through this sustainability training initiative, Arcadis was able to transform complex, strategic goals into measurable learning experiences that engage, educate, and empower its global workforce.