Globalization and the opening of new markets have increased the competitive pressure on companies. To secure their existence on the market, companies have to produce products with increasing quality requirements more quickly. Also, the high number of product variants in particular poses a major challenge for assembly companies. In principle this requires a high degree of flexibility for companies. Flexibility can be achieved through the systematic qualification of employees. To achieve this, competences that are needed on the shop floor have to be taught. In assembly companies, training is usually based on practical exercises. However, these are often carried out by people who are unable to teach the expertise knowledge properly. In addition, training is often carried out on the shop floor under production pressure, which has negative effects. One possible alternative to make training effective using digital assistance systems, that adapt to the learning progress.

The aim of this paper is to prepare a possible guideline for measuring learning success in the assembly after the usage of assistance systems in the form of a study. Therefore the learning time was divided into three sections with different tasks for the learning progress. In order to record the learning success, the assembly time, as well as the workload of the probands in the study, was recorded. Also, influences on the learning success by the characteristics of the probands as well as the usability of the assistance system were recorded. To measure the workload, the NASA-Task Load Index was used. The measurement of the usability of the assistance system was based on the System Usability Scale.

Eighteen probands participated in the study. They had to assemble a gear unit with the help of the assistance systems and mounted it with an electric engine. The evaluations showed that the learning success was well represented by the time measurement. Also, some variations in the learning success could be determined by the comparison of the influencing factors by the probands. In the end, recommendations for the qualification of workers could be summarized.