Oh, what a year it’s been in the training industry! Learning and development professionals have spent the year transforming highly technical content into engaging learning experiences. Acknowledging the good, bad and ugly of employee training, organizations have raised the bar on workforce development and pushed training to new heights.

Mindfulness, microlearning and motivation have been key focus areas for learning leaders over the course of the year. Pressing play on gamification and other technological innovations has empowered employees to take learning into their hands. And as the training versus performance debate rages on, learning leaders have diligently worked to match the right solution to each unique issue.

These themes were among those reflected in the top articles published on TrainingIndustry.com and in Training Industry Magazine, with authors and business experts from around the world sharing thoughts and ideas with readers. Let’s take a moment to pause and reflect on those insights and inspirations by reviewing some of the most-read articles in 2016. These articles are listed in no particular order.

Here are the Top 10 articles of 2016 from TrainingIndustry.com:

• Managing Employees through Motivation
• 5 Character Traits of Effective Leaders and How to Recognize Them
• Gamification: The Training Trend for 2016
• 5 Best-in-Class Corporate Training Approaches that Meet Today’s New Business Norms
• The Key to Employee Engagement Isn’t What You Think
• 8 Tips for Creating Effective Microlearning Courses
• The Future of Corporate Training in a Changing World
• 10 Insights from Interviews with L&D Leaders
• The Good, Bad and Ugly of Employee Training
• 5 Top Leadership Skills to Cultivate for the Future

Here are the Top 10 articles of 2016 from Training Industry Magazine:

• How to Turn Highly Technical Content into an Engaging Learner Experience
• Universal Design for Learning: Out of the Classroom and into the Corporate World
• Using Technology to Amplify Leadership Development
• Mindfulness: A Critical Success Factor
• Dispelling the Five Myths of Microlearning
• Blowing Your Millennial Mindset
• Next Generation Classroom: Providing the Ultimate Learning Experience
• Training versus Performance: It Isn’t Always a Training Issue
• Why Yesterday’s Skills Aren’t Enough to Survive Today’s Digital Transformation
• Memory: The Critical Bottleneck to Learning

With readers showing a vested interested in planning and analyzing the future of the training industry, our annual key trends report continues to be a top article each year. For a look ahead, please view the Key Trends for 2017 article.

Training Industry will continue to publish relevant and timely articles on both TrainingIndustry.com and Training Industry Magazine, so stay tuned for ongoing resources from industry thought leaders. And as always, please feel free to reach out to our editorial team and share what’s most important to you.

For more great content, check out the top 10 articles of 2015 and 2014!

Michelle Eggleston is the editorial director at Training Industry, Inc.