Learning Reflections

Get a Free Summary Perspective

2012-02-02T14:04:00.002Z

Yesterday we put our first Summary Perspectives reports up onto our website. So, you can now download them for FREE! No cost.

But, why would you want an Elearnity Perspective anyway? What are they? Why have we published them?

Well, we know how time consuming and expensive vendor research can be - we do it all the time, reviewing solutions from the key players in the learning technology market to get an unbiased insight into the solutions they provide. Elearnity’s Vendor Perspectives are the only in-depth, independent analysis of learning technologies and innovation for organisations based in the UK and EMEA.
These reports are invaluable whether you are:

Assessing your options into new approaches
Re-evaluating an existing solution
Keeping track of new suppliers and product, or
Simply re-affirming choices you’ve already made

We independently find out everything you need to know.

So now when you’re evaluating learning technology solutions, you’ve got a short-cut to expert insights, analysis and inside information that will help you make the right decisions.

If you would like to explore our Perspectives you can look at them at www.elearnity.com/perspectives.html.

Vendor Perspectives 2012

2012-01-23T20:05:00.001Z

We're pleased to announce that Elearnity is publishingits first series of Vendor Perspectives. These new reports provide the onlyin-depth, independent analysis of learning technology vendors with aUK/European focus.

We've been analysing and advising on learning technologysolutions on the front line for over 15 years, helping organisations such asBoots UK, Lloyds Banking Group and Vodafone choose the right vendor partnersand achieve real results. Recognising the diverse and often complex nature of thelearningtechnology market, the team has created Elearnity’s Vendor Perspectives to helporganisations take a short-cut to understanding the realities of different vendor solutions.

Learning Technology is a specialist market,with a wide range of vendors offering competing solutions. Telling thedifference between vendors is difficult. Whether you’re brand new to themarket, or already have experience, it is still difficult to get an independentexpert view of which vendors you should consider, and how good they really are atdelivering in a complex environment. We’ve been helping corporate clients dothis for years, but wanted to make this knowledge more accessible to a wideraudience and help organisations to find the best solutions faster.

So what is Vendor Perspectives?

Vendor Perspectives review solutions from key players inthe learning technology market to provide an unbiased insight into thesolutions they provide. The reports capture the experiences of Elearnity’scorporate research network, as well as analysis from our independent vendorbriefings. This is shared using ‘5-star’ ratingsand analyst commentary of 30+ different factors covering: Market Presence andScalability, Ease of Delivery, Enterprise Flexibility, Solution Capability,Corporate and User Experience, and Cost.

Uniquely, the Vendor Perspectives are created with a UK/European notUS focus. Most research that is available is dominatedby input from the United States. Within the UK and Europe, this informationoften has limited relevance and value; it is often quite superficial, and doesn’tfocus on the specific challenges faced by multi-national companies, or thelocal capabilities of the vendors in Europe. That’s exactly what Elearnity’sVendor Perspectives do.

To quote one of our corporate clients, Gary Bellamy, Head of LearningTechnologies at Lloyds Banking Group, ”I have worked withElearnity for a number of years because we simply couldn’t find the samein-depth knowledge of the learning technologies market anywhere else. The teamhas much real-world experience of seeing how solutions work in action which Ihave found invaluable when separating fact from fiction in the market. Anyoneinvolved in implementing learning or technology solutions should use the VendorPerspectives to get an independent and instant insight into the solutions thatexist in the market today.”

We’re hoping that downloading the reports will save organisationsthe time and expense of carrying out research themselves, and assist in thedecision making process by providing real-world insights and a level of detailyou won’t find anywhere else (even if we do say so ourselves!).

The first set of reports will cover core areas, with more tofollow:

Learning Management Systems (LMS)
E-learning authoring systems
Bespoke e-learning contentOurSummary Perspectives will be available from 1^st February. So watch this space for updates and be thefirst to have a look at the very latest learning technology analysis andinsight.

Also see our website for more information.

Mobile Learning - All Talk?

2011-12-14T11:20:00.007Z

What is the reality of mobile learning in corporate learning organisations?

At the start of 2011, it was widely thought that this would be the year when mobile learning, or m-learning, would reach a tipping point and become part of mainstream learning solutions.

So, surrounded by all the hype, what actually is the reality at the end of the year?

What is its role in the learning mix?

What are the key opportunities and challenges in the adoption of mobile learning technologies?

In this Insights Report we explore the realities of mobile learning in EMEA corporates; the trends, challenges and opportunities.

To download and read our free report, simply follow the link below.

http://www.elearnity.com/EKCLoad.htm?load=ByKey/DWIN8PJEHL

Providence looks to chalk up Blackboard for $1.64 Billion

2011-07-06T09:58:00.023+01:00

It is thought provoking that an e-learning company would be worth $1.64 Billion, in cash. But that's exactly what Providence Equity Partnership have valued Blackboard for, in their recent acquisition offer.

Blackboard have historically been the dominant player in the educational VLE market, although over the past year they have been losing a significant proportion of their market share to open source alternatives such as Moodle and Sakai.

So, what does this mean for EMEA based corporates?

Is this shift in ownership going to create some ripples, this side of the pond?

In the short term, not really. Blackboard isn't a name that has really been that visible in the EMEA enterprise sector. Their academic model, hasn't attracted much interest outside of the academic world in Europe.

But, looking further out, this could be a turning point for Blackboard, and could mean the start of a a sea change in the LMS market.

With the Learning Management System market-place moving increasingly towards a more holistic, talent and performance story, corporate talent networks, and collaborative work-based learning approaches; Blackboard's VLE functionality could become much more attractive, if Blackboard moves some of its focus from managing semester based education programmes to supporting the corporate learning context.

Augmented Reality and Learning

2011-05-26T17:14:00.010+01:00

Augmented Reality seems to have hit the headlines. And if you aren't sure what that is, the ever popular Rory Cellan-Jones, has just produced an article for the BBC website explaining everything.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-13558137

If you consider this technology through the eyes of Corporate Learning the potential impacts for Employee Performance Support (EPS) and Just In Time learning are massive; even truly mind boggling; especially in a technical environment and product rich environment where the learners could even be the customer.

But, who in the e-learning world is ready to address this opportunity?

With all the fixation on mobile content being about taking more traditionally focussed push and pull traditional materials to the learner, and collaboration this is obviously an opportunity for someone to exploit.

But, to some extent for developers of this Learning Content, it also means thinking about how you manage learning content very differently from how you do today. It will mean meta-tagging, data warehousing a rich set of assets... and I can't see most e-learning developers both internally for externally being nimble enough to be thinking less about layout on the screen and nice story based interactions and more about creating a rich, contextual learning ecosystem that is triggered at point of contact.

Augmented Reality could really revolutionise the way everyone one learns... and shift the reality of everyone in L&D... particularly those who have a product or physical context, but it means rethinking what the training departments is about and how it fundamentally operates...

Goodbye Articulate......

Hello... ????? well.. who knows...

Our Learning Technologies 2011 Videos

2011-02-28T17:48:00.009Z

It's just over a month ago that we presented at the Learning Technologies Conference 2011.

In many ways it seemed like a distant memory; well that was up until Stephen Clee drew our attention to the conference videos that are now available online, and all the memories came flooding back - supported by the relevant slide deck..

Naturally, to anyone other than a complete egotist, the prospect of watching yourself back on video is about as comfortable a feeling as a queuing up for a triple root canal at your dentist.

Thankfully for the spectator tho, the videos are perfectly painless and pleasantly informative.

The Elearnity Presentations are in the links I've attached below, but the entire conference line up is available for your delectation.

The Changing Learning Technologies Landscape - David Wilson

The Key Steps to Selecting Suppliers and Systems - David Perring

The full 2011 Conference Video Archive

It's not quite Oscar material, but it's entertaining all the same.

Enjoy.

David

The Fall and Rise of Academies

2011-02-18T10:38:00.017Z

Over the past year we have seen a rise in focus on Corporate Academies.

What is interesting is that this appears to be being generated from a couple of different sources.

On the one hand it appears to be fueled by corporates wanting to provide a platform for corporate social networking, and on the other hand, they seem to have grown from "Capability" based Organisational Development (OD) strategies, where an academy provides a focus for introducing organisational competencies.

The power and opportunity of Social Media and collaborative tools is self evident. You only have to look at Neilsenwire's article on web-brands for Jan 2011 to see the comparative importance of Facebook. When combined with the impetus behind Organisational Development (OD) in HR, it looks, at face value, to be an irresistible force.

But, the history of Corporate Academies has seldom been littered with success stories. Of the academies Elearnity researched 5 years ago, none are still operating today.

So, will the power of social media and OD make things different now?

Perhaps they will, but more importantly there are lessons to be learnt by looking back. Why did they fail in the past and what do you need to do differently if you are to make Corporate Academies succeed in the future?

Our latest Viewpoint Paper called "The Fall and Raise of Academies" will provide you with some insights into our view of the critical factors that are needed to help them bloom.

Naturally, the next chapter in how Academies are growing, evolving, whithering or flourishing is still being written, so if you'd like to share your story, please get in touch.

David

Getting a Clearer Vendor Perspective

2011-02-03T14:00:00.011Z

Learning Technology is fraught with competing functionality and product views. If you wandered around the Learning Technologies 2011 Exhibition last week comparing your options it can be bewildering.

That’s why, today see's the launch of Elearnity's Vendor Perspectives programme, the creation of reports designed to help you to clarify, accelerate and de-risk your decisions in the e-learning market place.

The reports will provide independent analysis of Learning Technology solutions not only in terms of their functionality, but also their market presence, the completeness and sophistication of their offering, their level of innovation, value for money, scalability and user experience.

Uniquely, they are all taken from an EMEA perspective and appreciate the diverse corporate needs that can create. They are based on over 12 years of insight into learning technologies and the real experiences of real customers.

But most importantly, because we don’t have a vested interest in your choices, you can trust our objectivity and independence. In the past we’ve provided that insight on a one to one basis with our customers. With the range of options getting ever more complex, it’s time to provide a wider access into our perspectives.

To find out more about our programme, please have a look at our press release using the link below.

http://www.elearnity.com/EKCLoad.htm?load=ByKey/DWIN8DQE7J

#LT11UK

Trends for 2011 - What are the emerging trends in Learning technology?

2011-01-25T12:06:00.011Z

The world of learning technology has changed a lot over the last 5 years. New approaches to learning, new technologies and new supply options are fundamentally changing the choices available to organisations. So what are the main options available to organisations today, and the key decisions or trade-offs as organisations determine their future strategy for learning technology? What are the key challenges and realities in adoption of these learning technologies? In particular, what are the key trends we see from our corporate research? This ViewPoint paper supports David's presentation at the Learning Technology 2011 Conference tomorrow and gives you a flavour of what he'll be covering. You can open the report using the following link.

http://www.elearnity.com/EKCLoad.htm?load=ByKey/DWIN8DEEZF

Elearnity ViewPoints: Functionality Isn't Everything:

2011-01-25T10:43:00.021Z

The start of the year is a time of reflection. It’s also a time to start something new.

At Elearnity, that's meant us thinking about how we share our insights into the Learning Technologies market and corporate best practice. As a result we've just created a new report format, called ViewPoints. A summary view of what we see as being core trends and supporting models that will help you be more successful.

The first ViewPoint we’ve made available is a piece titled... "Functionality Isn't Everything".

Why? Tomorrow sees the launch of the Learning Technologies Conference and Exhibition for 2011. No doubt many organisations will be using it as an opportunity to do some window shopping; checking out the products and solutions that will help them take advantage of the latest functionality.

In a very timely way, this paper highlights the importance of looking beyond the corporate functionality tick list; to consider some wider, often more important perspectives.

So, if you are in the space of reviewing your learning technology options in 2011, you may want to hold these lenses up to your prospective vendors, to get a clearer view of how right they really are for you.

They may well just help you find a lasting match.

You can find the report here in our Elearnity Knowledge Centre:

http://www.elearnity.com/EKCLoad.htm?load=ByKey/DWIN8DEF32

Enjoy!

David P

Debate on Informal Learning at the Oxford Union

2010-10-08T18:05:00.005+01:00

I posted the following comments to a blog by Barry Sampson. Thought it might be of interest here too.

Although I found the debate interesting as a main participant, I also found it disappointing because in reality we didn't really have a debate about the core motion. Last year I had to improvise as much more of the content had covered what I had planned to say. This year I had a totally clear run as those for the event (maybe with the slight exception of Nancy) were arguing for formal learning not against informal learning. I crudely defined informal learning as "learning informally within work or the social processes of work" and this seems to me to be valid, whether you are a knowledge worker, a transactional worker, a student or a researcher.

In prepping for the session, I realised how strongly I felt that the issue was L&D's labelling of something that was outside their scope of visiblity or control, and then claiming it doesn't happen, or in the words of the motion has no substance. This is clearly ridiculous.

That doesn't mean that I completely believe L&D couldn't have a role to play in helping enhancing informal learning. Most work processes and tools are not good containers for learning informally. It often happens despite them, and therefore there is an opportunity to improve informal learning by enhancing work processes and tools to more explicitly focus and magnify the learning outcomes. This is therefore embedding mechanisms to enhance learning within work.

The idea that informal learning can be an incremental layer of learning activity divorced from work seems to me to be contradictory, but this seems to be the strategy being adopted by many organisations, especially when experimenting with social tools. IMHO, the more "informal learning" is separated from work processes and the social processes of work, the weaker and more artificial it gets! That's why many of these solutions end up getting limited usage and becoming redundant, especially when they duplicate functional systems that already exist are delivering value for their members.

ps. Will also post this to our blog with a link back ...

pps. I have posted the link to my mindmapped prep notes here: http://tinyurl.com/34xrwa5, in case anyone is interested. Used this with iThoughtsHD on my iPad instead of the printed copy and it worked a dream!

The challenges of deploying an LCMS

2010-10-01T16:36:00.003+01:00

I recently received a note from an organisation in the US who is deploying an LCMS solution and struggling to get much enthusiasm in adopting it. Here are some of my comments in response ...

"Very interesting to hear your comments and experiences with your LCMS roll-out. Obviously your experiences mirror some of those we saw in our research process. Since the research project, we have continued to track the progress of LCMS within our corporate clients, and provide some advisory work to some. Whilst every organisation has its own unique challenges and opportunities, many of the core issues are common to most of the organisations we've looked at:

Much of the benefit and business case for LCMS is an organisational benefit associated with managing and reusing content at a strategic level. From the developers and designers perspective, they often see the tools as limiting their creativity and options. For e-learning designers this can be a significant negative, making it hard to get them engaged and positive about the change. Some of the most effective (by scale, output and overall ROI) LCMS projects we've seen remove significant autonomy from the developer, building in highly segmented product roles and workflow to support an operating efficiency that would never be possible with hand-cranked tools and artisan designers. So a key barrier is convincing the individuals that actually the tools that embracing them and driving value from them is a positive thing, not a negative thing. Either that or change the designers ...

The other key challenge is one of L&D leadership. Whilst L&D likes to use the language of business, it is rarely a very "professional" business function. This manifests itself in many ways, including a general lack of clear business metrics relating to its key processes, outputs, quality, cost management, and business impact. (a bit sweeping but generally true unfortunately). The lack of these metrics, and the lack of business focus in the leadership of L&D, allows the artisan approach to training design and delivery to perpetuate and culturally this requires a huge shift in mindset and behaviour. The reason I mention this, is that there is often a lack of real action from L&D leadership to the need to reengineer content design and development, and the need for business-managed design processes. I assume that this need was an element (explicit or not) of your rationale for deploying an LCMS solution - in your case at a network level between your members. Whilst they may sign up to the theory of a professionally-managed content production process, in reality, they often do not follow this through with the real commitment required to force the changes at an operational level. Culturally L&D is not used to managing itself like this - it still likes "artisan" really.

Either of the above is quite challenging, both together can be fatal. Where we've seen greater success, it's typically taken a strong combination of:
* Absolutely clear leadership on what you are aiming to change with the LCMS and why this is non-negotiable - or a clear external threat that makes it blindingly obvious why the change is needed
* Clear operational metrics relating to the content design process that are visible at all levels in the learning organisation (ultimately this may be the key element as it is the one that proves the value of the change)
* A hearts, minds and fingers change process to turn key stakeholders into active advocates. This must include an influential subset of the design/development team.
* Reskilling of resources and replacement where not possible."

Not sure whether the above makes any sense, but hopefully it will align with some of your experiences. Very interested if you have related or contradictory stories to tell ...

A response to the supposed "Death of the LMS" question

2010-08-04T16:46:00.001+01:00

It seems very trendy to ask this question currently, but in my view the debate is not very objective. Market pundits often link the discussion of potential demise of LMS to the growth in interest in informal and social learning, defining the LMS as a tool that's relevant only to formal. Other big advocates of the "no LMS" world are often vendors whose vested interests lie in alternative solutions. Neither of these is to my mind a convincing argument.

So what's the reality? We do a lot of research in FTSE100 companies and similar organisations. The reality is that the major business drivers for an LMS within these companies are not just intact, they are increasing. Regulatory and compliance pressure has increased not decreased. Pressure on efficient operational processes has increased not decreased. The importance of talent and capability has increased not decreased. All of these drivers reinforce the need for coherent and automated management processes for learning, and therefore the need for an LMS.

The pressure in most corporates is actually to consolidate their LMSs, as most of them have multiple solutions in different units and geographies, and to better align the processes of the LMS to a 21st century learning model. That means more than just classroom training and click-and-turn e-learning content. The majority of our clients want to adopt informal learning, but this is an add-on, not a replacement for their formal learning. Of course some existing formal courses can get replaced by more efficient and effective informal approaches, but the majority cannot and will not.

The other argument that gets raised against the LMS is that of "tracking". The view seems to be that when a course was formal we wanted to track and report it, but if its informal we don't. If we don't want to track it, we don't need an LMS. Or at least that's the argument. Personally, I think this is rubbish. The entire Internet is tracked. Doesn't matter whether its a PDF, a youtube video, a page of html or an entry in a discussion forum, its always tracked.

The question is not one of tracking at all - its really about purpose of tracking. It is right to say that the purpose of tracking is different between an informal learning resource and a formal course. But it was different anyway between a classroom event and an e-learning module. With informal learning, the purpose of tracking is to ensure relevance, to rate its value, and to sometimes to pay for it if its someone else's IP. These patterns of relevance and value help connect informal and formal learning. After all, this a continuum or ecosystem of learning, not completely separate worlds. All of these approaches have a place together, and ultimately LMS's have to adapt to this new reality, just as they had to adapt to e-learning and virtual classrooms.

Organisations will still need their LMS and the LMS vendors aren't going away - in fact despite the mergers and acquisitions, there are still probably more LMS companies now that ever. The needs of an LMS are changing though to reflect the change nature of learning. Whilst certain vendors may want you to think otherwise, the reality is different.

2010-01-27T08:29:00.005Z

We've just announced some new research focusing on e-learning authoring strategies and tools, including the first of a series of three research papers. The first paper, titled E-learning Authoring: The Shifting Landscape analyses the the key forces driving changes to the way corporates are approaching the creation of bespoke e-learning, together with a high-level perspective of the new strategies for content authoring and new types of authoring tools. The next two papers, to be published in Q2 2010 will focus more specifically on a deeper analysis of the strategies and the tools.

http://tinyurl.com/ycjzk2p

Key learning trends 2010 - A quick response

2010-01-21T10:00:00.002Z

The following was my short response to a recent question on the the key trends in learning in 2010. Any thoughts?

- - -

Overall, Elearnity sees 2010 as a transformational year where lots of changes in 2009 become more formalised.

The biggest trend will be the reevaluation of the role and value of learning to the business. Training budgets were under a lot of pressure in 2009, with precedence given to mandatory learning that manages compliance risk but does not add real value or enhance performance. In 2010, companies will seek easier ways to automate their compliance agenda, and increasingly focus discretionary spend on enhancing the performance of the business, and building core capabilities.

Both agendas will see increased adoption of learning technology to better manage, focus, personalise and deliver key elements of the learning. Constraints on travel and subsistence budgets will continue to make virtual learning and e-learning attractive options. For many companies, these are now standard channels for learning, but many learners and trainers still lack the skills to use them effectively. More focus will need to be placed on the skills for effective virtual learning to support the growth in these channels.

SAP, Sharepoint or specialist LMS?

2009-12-03T14:14:00.004Z

The following is a response I recently posted to a question on the LSG discussion site concerning the use of SAP or Sharepoint as an LMS versus "well-known" LMS products (in the case of the question, he cited Moodle and Kallidus). Thought the response might be of interest to a broader community ...

The short answer is "depends on what you want to do with your LMS"! Or "horses for courses" as the saying goes.

In our experience, the selection of an ERP LMS solution (SAP, Oracle, PeopleSoft) tends to be driven by strategic IT issues rather than functional fit or the needs of learners or L&D. Whilst the SAP Enterprise Learning platform continues to improve in functionality, there is still a functional gap vs best of breed platforms. There is also a tendancy for ERP platforms to be positioned as "effectively free" as the organisation has already committed to the HR platform. This is highly misleading as there is typically an incremental license for the LMS (e.g. for SAP EL over and above SAP HR), and the implementation costs for the ERP LMS are typically larger than best of breed alternatives.

There is a lot of interest in portal-led learning solutions currently, and the integration of LMS functionality into Sharepoint is becoming a common question. Currently we would not consider either the SLK or Sharepoint LMS as an enterprise class option. That doesn't mean you shouldn't consider them, just that you need to be very clear they will meet your specific tactical requirements as they are unlikely to meet the common requirements of a corporate standard LMS platform. Our concern currently is that a corporates will get sucked into creating custom LMS solutions in Sharepoint; a strategy we certainly wouldn't recommend (with any portal platform).

Interestingly you then refer to well-known LMSs such as Moodle or Kallidus. Kallidus is clearly a corporate LMS that has historically been successful in mid-tier companies, and is increasingly winning business in larger enterprises as well.

Moodle is not however really an LMS. It is (in academic speak) a Virtual Learning Environment or Course Management System. We have recently completed specific research on the relevance of Moodle to the corporate market (results to hopefully be published in the new year). Whilst Moodle can provide an effective e-learning launch and track platform, it needs significant customisation or add-on functionality to fulfil the role of a corporate LMS. A number of companies (e.g. Aardpress, Kineo, Remote Learner etc.) have developed extensions to do this, but in our research through corporate Moodle adopters, we really struggled to find good examples of companies using Moodle as an enterprise LMS.

Hope this is helpful. Happy to discuss further offline if you want to email me (davidw@elearnity.com).

Regards, David.

The E-learning Debate - An Inside View

2009-10-03T12:21:00.005+01:00

On the 30th September 2009, David was a main speaker in the E-learning Debate at the Oxford Union, alongside Professor Diana Laurillard, Marc Rosenberg and others. The motion: “This house believes that the elearning of today is essential for the important skills of tomorrow”.

It's already clear from many conversations after the event, and in the days since, that this event
has really captured the imagination of many people in the UK e-learning industry. And the result on the day was very interesting: 90 for the motion, 144 against.

Here are David's thoughts on the debate itself and its implications.

SaaS Webinar - Link to Archive

2009-05-18T12:04:00.006+01:00

Here is a link to the archived webinar featuring David's discussion of the impact of SaaS on learning & talent systems research:

http://www.cornerstoneondemand.co.uk/landing/on24/files/lobby.html

(updated link)

SaaS Core Insights paper announcement

2009-05-14T14:18:00.001+01:00

Elearnity examines Software-as-a-Service impact on Learning & Talent Systems
Elearnity | Cirencester, UK

14-May-2009 » Training Press Releases » Elearnity, Europe's leading Corporate Learning Analyst, today announced its latest research on the impact of Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) on the Learning & Talent Systems market.

Software-as-a-Service (SaaS), the provision of software applications as an Internet service, has become a major force in the business applications market. This Elearnity Core Insights paper explores the growing impact of SaaS on applications for managing and delivering learning and talent processes within a corporate environment.

"Software-as-a-Service is a very relevant approach for Learning & Talent Systems and we are seeing rapid growth in its adoption in both the Enterprise and Mid-tier markets.", said David Wilson, Managing Director of Elearnity. "Our research highlights the benefits and barriers of SaaS for corporates, and explores these specifically in the context of Learning & Talent Systems."

The research paper looks at the evolution and specific drivers/barriers for SaaS Learning & Talent Systems. It also provides guidance and key questions for corporates to ask internally when considering SaaS Learning & Talent solutions, as well as a checklist of questions to ask to potential suppliers.

"The benefits of SaaS are particularly attractive in the current economic climate, but not all SaaS solutions are suitable for large complex organisations." said Wilson. "Overall, Elearnity expects SaaS to grow significantly as a proportion of the market, and pressure on vendors to offer more scalable Enterprise-class SaaS solutions."

The SaaS paper is available immediately for download from Elearnity's Knowledge Centre at www.elearnity.com along with other Elearnity research papers and presentations

Link: http://www.elearnity.com/EKCLoad.htm?load=ByKey/DWIN7RZCUJ

E-learning anarchy

2009-05-13T18:15:00.002+01:00

The following is a response to a question raised about how to deal with the problem of fragmented and uncontrolled procurement of e-learning within a distributed organisation. Thought it was worth adding here to ... DAVID

This has historically been a common problem, and often leads to the appointment of a central resource to support and coordinate e-learning related purchases, as well as to own the associated technical standards and sometimes the platform (e.g. LMS) they will be run on. In terms of resolving your issues - you probably need to think about it at three different levels.

1) Technical Standards - Nearly every major corporate we work with has had to put in place a technical standards document that is enforced via the procurement process. This includes: e-learning standards for compatibility with your LMS or deployment platform (AICC, SCORM 1.2, 2004 etc), technical standards for your IT environment - browser/script/java/plugin restrictions etc and network and other restictions (e.g. bandwidth), other integration requirements and so on. Will also probably include requirements for new suppliers in terms of provision of sample test content to prove LMS compatibility, as well as any associated release or delivery requirements for the content - i.e. the rules of engagement for the vendor.

2) E-learning Project Process - a standard process to be used by all parts of the organisation to facilitate e-learning projects. The aim of this is to better qualify projects and investments in e-learning, and to take them through some standard steps to help ensure the success of the projects. This could include which suppliers have already been vetted - some guidelines on procurement, guidelines on project planning and initiation etc, and (very importantly) guidelines on assurance, testing and deployment. This will help ensure projects are managed more effectively. Frequently the implementation of such a process will involve advisory support from a central e-learning advisor or team depending on the scale of the organisation. Whilst responsibility for e-learning may be devolved into the fragmented L&D operation - e-learning expertise is generally not unless an organisation becomes very e-centric and even then it still needs to rest with a few people (in reality).

3) Governance - as you have highlighted, a decentralised procurement of e-learning solutions leads to failed projects as the expertise is absent to make them successful, and basic issues of suitability, design, and deployability go out the window. Centralising all responsibility for e-learning can be a good strategy in the short term, but is frequently a bad answer long term as it fundamentally keeps it in the ivory tower. Delegating responsibility for e-learning without some form of governance and process leads to anarchy. As a minimum, you need to have some standards for projects and potential suppliers (see above), and also cross-visibility of existing solutions and suppliers across the business. Over time, this ideally would lead some form of governance network to maximise the value of what you already have and to stop reinventing the wheel 15 times in different parts of the business. Governance should also foster and facilitate innovation on a coordinated basis - innovation in terms of approach and of suppliers etc.

Software-as-a-Service (SaaS): the Impact on Learning & Talent Systems

2009-05-13T10:08:00.003+01:00

A Webinar featuring David Wilson, of Elearnity, will explore how investing in Software-as-a-Service (SaaS)-based talent management solutions is helping organisations increase productivity and ensure high performers are engaged, developed, connected and retained – while also lowering costs. The complimentary session, sponsored by Cornerstone OnDemand, is entitled “Software-as-a-Service (SaaS): the Impact on Learning & Talent Systems” and is scheduled for Thursday, 14th May from 3pm to 4pm GMT.

According to analyst firm Gartner, the global enterprise market for SaaS will rise by nearly 22 percent in 2009, as companies turn to Web-based applications as a way to reduce costs during the economic downturn. This includes increased adoption of on-demand human capital management applications by organisations seeking economical yet effective ways for managing and developing employees.

David Wilson, Elearnity’s founder and Managing Director, commented, “SaaS is having a significant impact on the learning and talent systems market, both for enterprise customers, as well as the mid-tier market. We also see it as being particularly attractive in the current economic climate.”

Learning and human resources (HR) leaders participating in Thursday’s Webinar will:

Discover why leading organisations are turning to SaaS to accelerate change and deliver more value for the business from their learning and talent systems
Explore specific HR business drivers – including cost/time savings, scalability and flexibility – that make SaaS a superior technology option
Learn the key questions to ask when considering potential SaaS-based learning and talent solutions

During the session, Wilson will preview analysis and recommendations from Elearnity’s latest research. Elearnity’s research and analysis focuses on the key innovations challenging corporate learning organisations, including e-learning and blended learning, learning management strategy and systems, the impact of learning and increasing value-add, and integrating learning with human capital and performance. Elearnity’s research process is designed to develop deeper insights into corporate realities and best practice, and an independent understanding of vendor capabilities and performance.

To register for the Webinar, visit: https://event.on24.com/eventRegistration/EventLobbyServlet?target=registration.jsp&eventid=127366&sessionid=1&key=CCF502FDC19380DB30AA8825ED3B21B8&sourcepage=register

Impact of SaaS on Learning & Talent Systems

2009-05-05T15:41:00.002+01:00

On 14th May, David will be previewing a new Elearnity research paper on the impact of Software-as-a-Service on Learning & Talent Systems at a Webinar hosted by Cornerstone OnDemand.

Click here for more information and to register for the event. The paper will be made available after the webinar.

Learning 2.0 - Video

2009-02-16T10:38:00.002Z

Here is an online version of the learning 2.0 video I showed at the Learning Technologies conference at the end of January.

Its originally based on the slides created by Daniel Siddle content but with some additions and then rendered via Animoto. I showed the better quality MPEG4 version at the conference - email me if you want a link to it.

DAVID

Learning Technologies on the Rise

2009-02-03T09:12:00.003Z

The Learning Technologies conference and exhibition still continues to be the best learning technology and e-learning event to attend in the UK. Hosted at Olympia in London last week, the conference was the largest yet, and the exhibition was sold out and seemed pretty consistently busy (at least whenever I was on the floor).

Here is a link to trainingzone's view of the conference, and Training Journal's view of the show overall.

LT is always a busy event for us and this year was no exception with a number of meetings and vendor briefing updates, plus the usual time hunting out new companies and products. Overall, I think it was a good show and it was heartening (especially for the vendors) to see the level of activity and interest despite the current economic doom and gloom!

My session in the conference on LMS 2.0 subtitled "Does the LMS have a place in a web 2.0 world?" seemed to be received positively, and I have already had a few requests for our animoto remix of Daniel Siddle's "Meet Charlotte". The slides have just been uploaded onto our knowledge centre.

PS. The LMS 2.0 topic is an area of ongoing research for us and happy to receive any thoughts or ideas, or links to relevant research or product information. Please email us at our incoming news feed news@elearnity.com.

Your Massive Visual Memory!

2008-09-29T10:43:00.007+01:00

Research recently published by Tim Brady and his colleagues, indicates that the storage capacity of your long term visual memory may be on an astonishingly higher scale than previously thought.

"One of the major lessons of memory research has been that human memory is fallible, imprecise, and subject to interference. Thus, although observers can remember thousands of images, it is widely assumed that these memories lack detail."

What is exciting about this research is that contrary to this assumption, they are able to show that long-term memory is capable of storing a massive number of objects including the details.

Their research indicates a "massive capacity-memory system, in terms of both the quantity and fidelity of the visual information that can be remembered," the researchers said.

Whilst, the full implications of their research has yet to filter into both the academic and corporate worlds, it is interesting to think about the importance of visuals in learning, and the power of an image to convey a thousand words. Visualisation, diagrammatics and information design have often been neglected in training circles, but perhaps this research will give it some much needed focus, because actually seeing the process (for example) may have a greater importance than we originally thought.

How do you outsource you elearning development?

2008-09-19T09:36:00.012+01:00

There seems to be an emerging trend over the past couple of years for corporates to buy in specific expertise rather than purchase an entire elearning project. In part this has appears to have been driven by the growth of generic publishing tools. But there also seems to be much more significant re-evaluation of where vendors add value, almost on a project by project basis.

This fragmentation which coincided with the growth of Rapid elearning also suggests some interesting new potential. Will we see the growth of syndicates of development specialists dealing directly with corporates rather than operating through a standard elearning vendor? These hubs of expertise already work on a contract basis for many of the established vendors... so why have the middle man?

Socially Transmitted Education?

2008-09-19T09:36:00.011+01:00

For those of you who haven't seen http://www.splashcast.net/ you may have been missing out on an interesting development in what they had considered calling Socially Transmitted Entertainment.

http://blog.splashcastmedia.com/2008/09/12/socially-transmitted-entertainment/

What is fascinating about this as you view the channels is how adaptable this medium would be for any organisation that was interested in Socially Transmitted Education.

Two thoughts occur to me.

If we think about LMS 2.0... is the viral sharing of learning content and embedding it in your "Corporate "FaceBook" an interesting way to develop an overt learning and knowledge sharing culture... You could see what your boss and his boss have been reading/learning and wants to share with you from your corporate education channels.

http://www.splashcast.net/web_watch/

But perhaps what is more exciting is the opportunity this has for reseller and value chain education programmes, where you want advocacy and community from people who don't work directly for you. The opportunity to provide training, updates, news, chats, and product competitions is immense...

Afterall - what you want is for people to share learning and this seems to be one way to reach and excite your audience... with a little creativity using http://www.animoto.com/ and some video expertise, even throw in some links to assessments, or Polls and.... you could have a lot of fun...

Konichiwa.

Are you a corporate Spielberg?

2008-09-10T15:42:00.006+01:00

Whilst many corporate networks groan and wither, and IT network managers visibly turn green at the very slightest mention of video, the winds of change are definitely blowing. In a paper released this autumn by Wistia, there are some interesting trends in the way video is growing in organisations, especially in the field of training and communications. One of the most telling statistics is that 52% of all video used within corporates is produced by internal teams... and that figure is likely to grow; this is especially true when you consider the ambient availability of video devices and the increased simplicity of editing tools.

This trend will obviously give many network managers sleepless nights, but for organisations that want to capture the passion of their people, share ideas, learn and communicate, this is going to become as much a part of the daily routine as conference calls.

And as we become immersed in the media age, developing the skills that enable you to be impactful in front of and behind the camera are going really important, because these skills will be critical to the influence you can exert within an organisation.

How long it takes for corporate networks to fulfil this aspiration it's difficult to say, but for those who are ready.... what are you waiting for? Solutions are evolving at quite a pace.

http://wistia.com/documents/video_training_report.pdf

Google Video for Business - Revolutionising E-learning!

2008-09-02T12:17:00.008+01:00

By announcing today that it is adding YouTube like video communications features through its business application suite, Google may well have instantly revolutionised what we think about collaboration and learning in organisations.

By making video-sharing among office workers as easy as trading e-mails or instant messages it may redefine our entire approach to internal communications and what it means to be a learning organisation.

In any democratic orientated organisation that relies on "The Power of We", this is certainly going to have a transformational, if not revolutionary effect in bring people and their knowledge closer together; and when combined with viewer ranking, comments, creativity and the search power within this Google App, it raises some very interesting questions about what LMS 2.0 may turn out to mean. And as content delivery formats converge the power of Google Video may be broader than they originally thought.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/150472/article.html

http://www.reuters.com/article/businessNews/idUSN0150543220080902?feedType=RSS&feedName=businessNews

http://www.informationweek.com/news/internet/google/showArticle.jhtml;jsessionid=DYK24T50FSRFUQSNDLPCKH0CJUNN2JVN?articleID=210201551&pgno=2&queryText=&isPrev=

Is Your Manager Your Biggest Obstacle to Learning?

2008-08-27T12:27:00.009+01:00

Potentially yes!

A manager's own preconceptions about the power of nature over nurture appears to dictate how much training their people get.

Some research by Peter Heslin and Don VandeWalle shows that managers with preconceived ideas about people's attributes tend to be less likely to ensure they receive the training they need. Whilst another study found that managers who think people's attributes are fixed gave their staff less coaching.

Whilst this may not come as a big surprise to most L&D Business partners, perhaps the positive side of the research will be. The evidence also indicates that managers with these entrenched views can be persuaded of the error of their ways, through evidence and by encouraging reflection about why developing capability is important.

Helsin and VandeWalle suggest that in order to enhance workforce productivity, cues to help managers to believe that people can change could be built into performance evaluation systems.

"These cues might include written, verbal and video-based reminders to managers...that all employee skills tend to be developed over time with practice and helpful feedback."

So what could this mean for corporates. Overall it's great news. To some extent this research suggests that a culture of learning in an organisation can be grown if it is fed proactively.

But it could also has some consequences on how we view type and trait based diagnostic tools.

If they aren't handled properly they could well lock down managers' expectations - "She's an INTJ", "he's Low Detail Conscious, "their profile shows an inability to handle rapid change". If those labels re-inforce a percieved "limit" to your performance through a type or trait, then that may reduce your opportunity to develop the skills that would enable you to develop and change.

Spotted at: http://bps-research-digest.blogspot.com/search?updated-max=2008-08-13T07%3A49%3A00Z

Heslin, P.A., VandeWalle, D. (2008). Managers' Implicit Assumptions About Personnel. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 17(3), 219-223. DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8721.2008.00578.x

SCORM 2004 or Let's See?

2008-08-07T10:27:00.008+01:00

With the 4th version of SCORM 2004 due out later in the year just under 5 years after it was orginally released there seems to be less than a stanpede to adopt it as the defacto tracking mechanism.

Many large corporates still use AICC and SCORM 1.2 as their default?

With the benefits of navigation and sequencing through better support for branching, pre-test based learning paths, problem solving, optional learning paths, for example... is courseware and the complexity of tracking not important? Or are most courses still using very simple design models?

If you've moved on to 2004 as a relatively early adopter - what happened? And how is it making a difference? Or if you're laggardly following the majority... what's holding you back?

Or, are you waiting to see what LETSI start to deliver as they plan SCORM 2.0?

It's time to share your thinking....

Afterall - It's SCORM 2004 or lets see (if you can forgive the pun).

PS

Remember you only have until 15th August 2008 to make your LETSI whitepaper submission.

http://www.letsi.org/letsi/display/nextscorm/Home

How do we take Serious Games seriously?

2008-07-29T09:40:00.004+01:00

There is something about the title Serious Games that always makes me feel uneasy. NOT because I have an issue with the intent behind them, but because they throw up too many layers of misinterpretation.

When I think about Serious Games I cannot suppress the peripheral thoughts of Super Mario, Sonic the Hedgehog and a mass shoot'em ups like Doom...

And this is precisely the sort of baggage that anyone not closely aligned to the Serious Game movement will also start to picture too. They will conjour up thoughts of immersive, thrill seeking, high-end graphics and "Hollywood" production values that are packaged for the High Street.

A laudable vision, but not necessarily that realistic to achieve for most organisations.

Without a shadow of a doubt CONTEXT is crucial to effective learning, and it doesn't require a Phd to appreciate that creating an accurate context for learning interventions that enables you to rehearse for "real life" will create a much more engaging and meangingful experince.

Without out a doubt learners want stimulating and enthralling learning experiences that are immersive and engaging. And those are goals we should all be striving to achieve.

I suppose my question to you is, would you talk to a senior business figure in your organisation and use the phrase - Serious Game? And my second question is would you expect to be taken seriously?

I think you might have struggled to get credibility and traction if you suggested that airline pilots were going to learn from a Serious Flying Game? Raised eyebrows and frowns but no nods....

So, does a rose by another other name smell so sweet...? Yes, but only if you let it near enough to smell it.... and the name in this case it may well be getting in the way.

LMS - In or Out? Are you re-considering your hosting arrangements?

2008-07-08T14:06:00.003+01:00

With the trend towards software as a service increasing its momentum, what is happening in the world of Learning Management Systems?

Corporate cost reduction pressures are increasing by the hour, the value chain and outsourcing is increasingly making learning solutions stretch beyond the immediate boundaries of internal corporate networks. Materials need to be available to partners and even customers. More often than not, they now need to be accessible 24/7 from a mobile, always ON and agile employee base.

So, are these pressures really translating themselves into fresh thinking in your e-learning team about your LMS? Or, have you already made the switch from internally to externally hosted to enable this to happen?

If you have, we'd love to hear your thoughts and reflections about making the transition and the challenges you’re continuing to face.

Managing Rapid - New Research Paper

2008-06-26T11:33:00.005+01:00

We've just posted the next paper in the Rapid e-learning research series. This document focuses on the different approaches and considerations to managing Rapid e-learning, including:

Rapid e-learning management styles and team organisation
The “rapid “project life cycle and its processes
Managing course redundancy
How “rapid” effects your relationship with suppliers
The critical success factors for working through a Rapid e-learning project

The Managing Rapid paper, alongside the previous Core Insights paper and Executive Viewpoint are available immediately for download from Elearnity’s Knowledge Centre.

Managing Rapid - Link: http://www.elearnity.com/EKCLoad.htm?load=ByKey/DWIN7FXL4R

Epic post on Elearnity Symposium

2008-06-23T18:49:00.003+01:00

Nick Timpson from Epic has posted a blog entry on the Epic blog about the Elearnity Symposium he attended in May, including comments on the roundtable sessions he attended.

We are planning to announce further information on the findings from the roundtables at the Symposium including summary mindmaps in the next week or so.

Rapid e-learning webinar

2008-06-18T13:28:00.002+01:00

Heads up on a webinar session David Perring will be running on rapid e-learning for Mohive:

Follow this link to register.

Event: Joint Webcast Mohive/ elearnity: Rapid E-learning: The Power of Rapid Thinking
Date and Time: Thursday, 3 July 2008 14:00
GMT Daylight Time (GMT +01:00, London) Change time zone
Duration: 1 hour

Description:
To help you understand and explore the key trends of the Rapid e-learning movement, Mohive has invited David Perring, Principal Analyst from Elearnity, to share their insights and analysis of what is, perhaps, the most significant development in e-learning of the last 10 years.
We will discuss:
- What is Rapid and its importance?
- How fast is Rapid?
- What are the key trends?
- How are corporate Managing Rapid e-learning
- What are the implications of applying Rapid approaches
Lars, CEO of Mohive invites you to join David & himself and participate in this special event.

Who wants to see an LMS anyway?

2008-06-13T09:38:00.002+01:00

If you put me on the rack and asked me whether most large corporates need a Learning Management System (LMS) then I’d have to say yes. If you are a large enterprise that needs to organise and track formal learning activity then it’s practically a given.

The problem for most LMSs in corporate environments is that actually they are usually at least three clicks away from when they are most needed by the user, and even then, a learner isn’t usually that interested in the fact they’ve accessed the LMS. It’s part of the journey, but not necessarily the chosen destination. What they are really after is the right learning, at the right time, with the right context with the right impact to make a difference. Most of the time they want to be looking at the learning content, in whatever form, that comes. Not the LMS.

Alternatively, if they are interested in development planning – they want to be analysing development paths, getting insight into their unique attributes, their potential and creating the roadmap that will deliver their aspirations. Again, they are interested in the destination not the mechanism.

And for corporate learning technology managers this is a problem, because without making the outcome the most visible part of the development journey, rather than the system that co-ordinates it, there will always be an extra barrier to LMSs delivering their maximum value.

One way around this is to use portals and deep linking to, in effect, make the LMS invisible. These are inherently more user focussed. The LMS is still there, but doing its job in the background, rather than obviously in the foreground.

Afterall, with the exception of the LMS vendor and the team who put it in, who really wants to see an LMS anyway....?

The 7 Top Tips for Implementing Learning Technology. The Vendors View!

2008-05-28T17:06:00.001+01:00

We recently brought some very well known and experienced learning technology suppliers together and asked them to list their top tips for implementing learning technologies.

This is what they came up with.

So, if you are contemplating a project this list might just be the difference between success and failure.

1) Internal Ownership
2) Clear Objectives
3) Clear Statement of Work
4) Small, Achievable, Bite Sized Steps
5) Constant Communication
6) Understanding of your own internal culture and what will work
7) Work together as a partnership

Their top 7 are enlightening not just because they will help you with your implementation. What is interesting about the list is it also plays a part in sustaining the ongoing success of learning technologies in organisations well beyond implementation.

As people, personality’s business direction and challenges inevitably start to change, then these seven tips actually become a continuous mantra to keep your solutions live and effective.

After all, what happens if your original stakeholder leaves? You can't ignore the situation; you need to align ownership to the business again so it delivers the ongoing business strategy. And often, that's not as easy as you'd want, especially if there is a fundamental change in learning philosophy or you lose a core business champion. That can be a death knell, especially if their replacement fundamentally don’t see appreciate its value.

It’s not just about the technology; it’s the e-learning structures too. Look at Rapid content... if you have a Subject Matter Expert who moves on, what will happen to their content if aren't replaced?

Each item in the list really does feed a whole thought cycle of planning and action well beyond the implementation. Without fresh objectives, and constant communication about how the technologies drive value for learners or stakeholders your solutions will eventually wilt. If you don't put energy into sustaining your solutions life, all the hard work of implementation will eventually unravel.

So, if you already have technologies in place, see if you can answer all those questions without, hesitation, deviation or repetition. Hopefully, it will only take you just a minute. If it doesn't, perhaps you should start drafting those answers now, or start planning how you’re going to get them answered. And don't just think about your back-bone solutions; think about the content solutions too!

Remember, implementing a solution is only part of the work... keeping it going, especially through turbulent situations requires even more passion, partnership and energy that putting it in the first place.

The Myth of Rapid Authoring Tools

2008-05-23T15:17:00.000+01:00

If you look at the debate around Rapid e-learning then a myth seems to be emerging it's all about rapid e-learning tools...

This is too narrow a view.

Now, I'm not against myths. They are very powerful stories that hold an inner truth; even if they don't always hold water when they're taken literally.

If you look at Rapid elearning objectively, there are two things that are fundamental to a rapid outcome - intent and processes . These are the two things that make rapid e-learning truly rapid.

Why intent...? Because if the project can stretch out for 10 weeks it probably will.

Why processes....? Because if you don't accelerate your process of scoping through to development and launch, then you still won't complete your project rapidly.

Sure the tools are geared up to work in a streamlined way and they are a pivotal part of the story, but if you think Rapid e-learning begins and ends in authoring tools, then you’re really not looking at the whole picture. It's not just about squeezing development.

So, where is the true power of Rapid e-learning?

If you look at Rapid e-learning as a philosophy and methodology as much as it is a tool set, then you are going to drive some really strong value. That's because the inner truth about rapid is it's relentless focus on the effectiveness and efficiency of every stage of production. And that has some very powerful overtones for all e-learning production - internal and external.

Goodbye scripting documents! ?!

But, the real story of Rapid e-learning is still being written. Leading corporates are using a wide range of ‘Rapid’ approaches and tools, but there has been no analysis of what really works best in different contexts.

There is a massive blind spot in the comparative effectiveness of materials, production models and implementation techniques. This means that most of them may not be realising their full potential.

Two of the most important questions have yet to be answered..

· How effective is Rapid e-learning?

· How sustainable is Rapid e-learning?

Whilst the market presence of Rapid e-learning continues to grow at an exceptional rate, the full ramifications of pursuing this strategy in the long term hasn't yet been resolved with some real research and tangible data.

Updated Elearnity website and knowledge centre

2008-05-23T02:15:00.004+01:00

Just a quick note to say we've just updated the Elearnity website design to (hopefully) improve its impact and usability. We've also slightly redesigned the navigation around the Elearnity Knowledge Centre, our research knowledge base to hopefully make it simpler and easier to navigate. Hope you like it ...

Rapid e-learning papers

2008-05-20T16:14:00.003+01:00

Elearnity has just announced some new research on Rapid e-learning, including a couple of white papers and a new research project. See this press release for some more information.

Tech play at HRD

2008-04-18T08:13:00.005+01:00

A small observation.

Went down to the CIPD's HRD show at ExCel centre this week. Was its usual eclective self - manor house training venues, lots of leadership and soft skill trainers, and the occassional bloke sprayed blue walking around promoting something.

But something did strike me this year as being different - the reemergence of technology at HRD. Learning Technology and e-learning has never been a significant part of this show. Whilst CIPD flirted a little with it in the early e-learning years, it soon got dropped as a significant focus and the number of vendors dwindled. This year it seemed to have a quite strong presence, distributed around the exhibition hall.

Although many of the big vendors were still not there, there were a number of the serious emergent LMS companies including Cornerstone from the US, NetDimensions from UK/HongKong, E2Train from the UK and IMC from Germany. StepStone was there from the Talent Management arena accompanied by a raft of online 360 providers and similar. And there were lots of e-learning vendors; CrossKnowledge from France, Epic, Line Communications, Intellego, Information Transfer, and so on.

Not sure if this is a trend, but certainly I was encouraged that despite seemingly the best efforts of CIPD and many traditional training people to underplay the trend, e-learning and learning technology is clearly now part of the mainstream of learning and development.

Back in play

2008-04-18T08:08:00.002+01:00

Apologies for the lack of blogging activity over the past few months. Life has been very busy and our focus on the blog has dropped off completely.

However, light is at the end of the tunnel and I hope to ensure this blog gets more activity going forward. There's a lot been happening. We've been working on some really interesting research which will start to be made available in the next month or so, and we also have more people and infrastructure to push the learning research forward.

Watch this space!

Regards, DAVID

Corporate Learning: Trends and Innovations

2007-10-08T16:06:00.000+01:00

George Siemens is putting together a free virtual conference on corporate learning called Corporate Learning: Trends and Innovations and has asked me to present.

Here is the emerging wiki for the conference with speaker information.

Here is Tony Karrers' blog entry on the conference.

Research Knowledge Centre - Suggested enhancements

2007-09-10T15:50:00.000+01:00

One of the reasons for the lack of front end activity was an investment in time at the back end on our IT infrastructure. The research knowledge centre is actually a Lotus Domino application, and we've recently upgraded our versions of Lotus Notes enabling us to do more creative stuff with the application and RSS feed.

Please email me if you have any suggestions on how to improve the EKC web interface or RSS feed.

Thanks, David

Research RSS feed - small fix

2007-09-10T15:45:00.000+01:00

Have fixed a small problem in the RSS feed for the research knowledge centre. Hopefully now the published dates fields should be coming through correctly. Thanks to Mark Aberdour from Epic who pointed this out.

p.s. All the entries are set automatically to 9am GMT just in case you were wondering.

Too quiet!

2007-09-10T15:43:00.000+01:00

Sorry the blogs been so quiet - no activity for 6 weeks. We've been very busy with some client advisory projects as well as doing some background research activities. Hope to start bringing these to the daylight soon ...

must try harder!

Jane Hart's Top Ten Tools

2007-07-27T11:10:00.000+01:00

Jane asked me to submit my top ten tools for her listing. Reading the others, I thought this was quite an interesting exercise and can give some helpful pointers for anyone on tools to make themselves more productive.

Here's my list:

Firefox: My window onto the web. Much preferred to IE and loads of open source innovation.
MindManager: Our most important business tool. I use it to mindmap pretty much everything - research, interviews, analysis. Anyone that's worked with Elearnity will recognise this!
Google: The definitive search tool for the web.
Bloglines: My other window onto the web, this time for tracking blogs and news mainly. Read a huge volume via this.
Yugma: Tried a lot of live collaboration tools and this is one of the simplest and best for small group collaboration. Works well and very flexible.
MyBlogLog/Google Analytics: Real time analytics on our blogs and research sites. Also couple this with Google Analytics.
Dreamweaver: Great basic tool for maintaining our web sites
Blogger: Basic blogging tool. Not fab but simple and does the job.
Linked In: Been using this for some time and network seems to be slowly expanding. Sure I can make more use of it and Facebook (if I only had the time)
Lotus Notes: Been using this as our core infrastructure for 11 years, and still struggling to find a platform that offers the same breadth of flexibility for collaborative applications including our research knowledge centre. Email sucks but less virus targetted than Outlook.

Jane's list is prettier though with the logos and links!

The role of technology in Informal Learning

2007-06-11T18:13:00.001+01:00

TrainingZone have just posted an article on the role of technology in informal learning which includes some input from me amongst others.

Is LMS a corporate competency?

2007-06-05T11:09:00.000+01:00

I've recently had a number of conversations with some corporate L&D leaders where we've been debating the ability of large organisations to effectively implement and manage enterprise LMSs. I say debate, but most of the time they have been lamenting their organisations inability to "do LMS things properly". That's not to say that they weren't serious about it - they were very earnest in their procurement processes with requirements documents and business cases coming out of their ears. In fact, to mix my metaphors, they were struggling to see the woods for the trees (or at least the printed ITT responses!).

This prompted me back to some research we did a couple of years ago, when we questioned the approaches and skills/expertise that many large organisations were applying to their enterprise LMS projects. (click here for the original article). In this we highlighted a number of common failings, many of which are still true today.

Large corporates, particularly in the UK and Europe, are generally too slow in embracing LMSs and too limited in their aspiration for them. For large organisations, LMSs are fundamental to enabling a viable and sustainable future for corporate learning.
Many corporate LMS implementations are too focused on reducing the admin burden and not sufficiently focused on enabling the business to meet its future challenges.
LMS decisions are often plagued by corporate politics, poor organisational alignment and a lack of strategic understanding and vision, resulting in long and expensive procurement processes with a limited chance of delivering real value.
Corporates struggle with a lack of skilled implementation resources and poor support , focusing too heavily on technology, and insufficiently on process and cultural change.

How many of them would you recognise from your organisation or customers today???

Searching for Meaning

2007-05-23T22:43:00.000+01:00

After reading Tony Kareer's recent post on "e-learning or learning? - more to it" and watching the recent David Weinberger video I remembered a recent conversation that David Wilson and I had regarding how we describe what we do to others.

We both agreed that using elearning to describe what we do (what ever that is? - As Wikipedia says "It is used interchangeably in so many contexts that it is critical to be clear what one means when one speaks of 'eLearning'.") does seem a somewhat limiting term as most people associate this with e-learning content and what we do does have a much wider context. However, when I explain to friends or people what we do is help large organisations utilise technology effectively to help their people learn (a bit of a mouthful!) I normally receive blank looks until I add that it involves elearning. This "tag" helps people gain an understanding at a very base level of what we do. A term I've favoured more recently has been "learning technology" (or educational technology) rather than elearning as this seems to suggest to me a much wider remit but even this seems to have a multitude of interpretations and there is even less awareness of the term.

One of the challenges of the area we work in is the diversity of activities this covers. One day you could be discussing blended learning and learning styles the next interoperability and rapid content development. David Weinberger may argue that I should not be concerned how we classify what we do as it should be down to others to "tag" our activities in whatever way suits them. Whilst I see the validity in this it still feels important to define your own role and help others get an appreciation of what you do.

Although some people have celebrated the dropping of the "e" from elearning to me this just seems to muddy the waters. Yes, most people agree the learning is the most important element, but this is such a broad "tag" that it does very little to define our roles. I think maybe time will tell on an universally accepted term but I'm still waiting .......

Modern means of learning dominate - I'm not convinced

2007-05-18T17:30:00.000+01:00

I was reading an article in People Management recently from a HR columnist entitled “Don’t rule out chalk and talk learning methods in favour of flexible approaches”. The article basically argued that due to the growth in remote home and mobile working, e-learning was now seen as the “modern means of learning” and we should not forget the importance of face to face learning. In the first few weeks outside of a corporate learning department the thing that strikes me is that this could not be more further from the truth.

The pace of change in society and in technology is incredibly rapid and with this the way how individuals learn is constantly evolving. E-learning though still seems to be a form of "black magic" for many learning professionals and they seem to view it with anything from mystical wonder to outright contempt. They seem too blinkered to recognise the benefits it offers in terms of flexibility and accessibility and the fact that for some learners they may even prefer it to face to face learning (Oh No!). Don’t get me wrong there are many organisations that are well down the road of utilising technology to help their people learn but these still seem to be in the minority.

It disappoints me to see so few learning professionals grasping the opportunities available to them, especially when you consider that learning is a process driven by the need to continually develop. When you look at last year’s National Training Award winners how many use technology? – I’d estimate it to be less than 20%. Face to face learning is incredibly important but to rely on it as the dominant choice in all circumstances is misguided, just as doing the same with e-learning is.

Thomson Corp exits Learning Market

2007-05-15T11:16:00.000+01:00

Life is very busy at the Thomson Corporation these days. Not only have they just completed the sale of their NETg subsidiary to SkillSoft for $270 million, but they have also announced they are selling Higher Education assets of Thomson Learning to a couple of venture funds for $7.75 billion. This now leaves them better funded to pursue growth in "better aligned" to their core operating model. Currently that means acquiring Reuters.

All this is very interesting for Thomson, but shows another big player significantly exiting the learning market place. I remember maybe 10 years ago speculating with Peter Rothstein, then head of Lotus's LearningSpace business, that the big publishers/information companies had a significant potential to engage in and shape the emergent e-learning industry. The sentiment was proved to be right, but the reality wasn't. Certainly the publishers came to the market. But then they floundered, and largely they have gone south.

What does this say about the ability of large companies to make money from the learning industry? Not sure it is a positive message. If large owners of learning content assets such as the educational publishers struggle, then what hope is there for smaller providers? Personally, I think their strategies for developing the market were flawed and therefore likely to struggle, but its still an indictment of the learning market that they couldn't make enough money to stay around!

Welcome, Adrian Jones

2007-05-11T09:14:00.000+01:00

I'd just like to welcome Adrian Jones, who's just joined Elearnity as Principal Analyst, (see press release here), and will be leading our research and advisory activities for e-learning and related areas, and will also be contributing to this Blog.

Adrian has been one of the leading corporate advocates for e-learning in the UK during his last six years at B&Q, and has won many related awards for his e-learning work at B&Q. Under Adrian’s leadership, B&Q became one of the earliest adopters of enterprise e-learning, e-assessment and learning management systems and a leading corporate reference for e-learning. Here's what Barry Sampson, Adrian's colleague at B&Q had to say about him.

So welcome Adrian, and I look forward to your contributions to the Blog as well as to Elearnity's research and analysis!

Real metrics on Informal Learning

2007-04-25T09:30:00.000+01:00

I was talking with Jay Cross at HRD last week, and I was asking him about real research into the investment and efficacy of formal versus informal learning. I am particularly interested in pulling apart the 20% of 20% argument that Jay (and now a lot of followers) are advocating about formal learning. I.e. is 20% of corporate learning really formal? And is the impact of this only 20% effective?

Does anyone have specific research (i.e. not anecdotal) on this?

I am not trying to decry the value of informal learning story, but I would, like Jay, like to see some substance underpinning it that can be interpreted and impact corporate strategies. At the moment it is in danger of becoming the latest fad that gets lots of powerpoint airplay, and then disappears into obscurity with the arrival of the next one. I want to make sure we are still holding the baby, long after the bath water has long since disappeared!

Malcolm Gladwell at LMS 2007

2007-04-13T17:14:00.000+01:00

I'm currently at Elliot Masie's LMS 2007 event in Las Vegas. A typical Elliot event with lots of Elliot facilitated discussion with his Masie Fellows, and somtimes with the audience. Overall I'm not sure the format works for me. The interaction is good, but the discussions are often a bit superficial to carry the attention of the audience for prolongued periods.

Anyway, that's not the point of the post. Yesterday's keynote discussion was with Malcolm Gladwell which was (for me) quite thought provoking and interesting - both at a personal level, and also thinking about the implications for the learning market.

Here are my mindmap notes (there was no presentation slides).

Learning Content Management Research

2007-03-15T07:52:00.000Z

We've just announced the results of our recent research into Learning Content Management which you might find interesting.

We believe the research strong indicates that large organisations need coherent strategies for producing and managing learning content that are geared to the needs and structure of their business ... and that, currently, they generally don't have them.

A copy of the exec paper can be downloaded from here.

I'm interested in your comments ...

Kick out the Jams?

2007-03-14T19:04:00.000Z

There is a very interesting discussion about whether the BBC is stifling innovation on TechCrunch, and follows some typically bold comments from TechCrunch commentator Michael Arrington on "dissolving the BBC". Separately, but relevant to the discussion, the BBC has also decided to suspend BBC Jam, its online education service.

I think this is a very interesting and valid discussion. The trouble is it tends to descend into the pro/anti BBC factions, which potentially obscures the central point of the discussion - is the remit of the BBC in the digital age sufficiently clear or robust? Where should and shouldn't the BBC be allowed to invest in producing services, and how does that impact the independent market in those areas?

In the case of Jam, the BBC has a well established pedigree and role in the children's educational content market in the UK. But does that mean it should be providing it as a service at the UK tax payers' expense, I'm less convinced. I know the BBC claims to have a process (referred to by someone on the video) for vetting whether it should be engaging in different market spaces, but who is this accountable to? Seemingly not to independent regulation, or to the tax payer? Largely it seems to be accountable to itself, and that is what causes concern. In this sense, Jam is definitely the thin end of a rapidly growing wedge.

My personal view is that this is a complex not a simple issue. Services like Jam can add a lot of value in the market, often to parts of the market that have limited choice in reality. That can be a boon, but it also comes at a heavy price - collectively to those funding the BBC, but also in stifling innovation, often in markets where that innovation is desperately needed. I'm sure it impacts venture capital investment in competitive organisations, but it also helps to validate a market space that may spawn better solutions.

Let's keep the debate about the issue of remit and market impact, not about whether paid advertising is nice to watch ... I'm sure we all have a similar answer to that!

DAVID

Putting the Service in LMS

2007-03-14T10:32:00.000Z

What proportion of corporate LMS projects fail because of issues with the way they are implemented or run, rather than inadequacies in the underlying LMS application?

This is a key question we have been exploring for some time in our LMS research and it seems to me to really challenge some of the vendor market messaging, and the corporate mindset on LMS procurement. Our historic research tends to point to the view that many LMS projects fail (or at least fail to meet their original expectations) because of poor ... insert your choice of ... implementation, customisation, integration, support, operations, administration, etc. In other words, poor service.

Many of the "lessons learnt" from our roundtables relate more to the services around the LMS, than the LMS itself. These can include: poor architecture design and performance, problematic HR integration, excess customisation and failure to upgrade, no change management inside L&D, lack of long term direction, poor expectation management. These are all largely indicative of "service" failure rather than application failure.

Sure, application choice has an impact on how these services are performed, and how difficult it is to achieve the outcome. I'm not saying it isn't important, just that it is not the only thing that is important. Maybe choosing the best implementation partner is more important than choosing the best application? And surely even choosing the LMS is itself a service proposition (clarifying strategy, building the business case, understanding requirements, shortlisting potential products, planning, negotiating the contract etc.).

We have doing quite a lot of thinking about the service proposition of LMS, but I would be interested in your thoughts on the matter.

DAVID

Vendor Health Check

2007-03-13T09:18:00.000Z

We're seeing a lot of renewed vendor activity at the moment which seems to reflect quite overt optimism and aspiration for the market. (Something slightly lacking for a few years after the dot com bubble).

Some of the patterns we're seeing include:

Increasing focus by the US-based learning technology vendors on the European market with an increase in local investment in resources and marketing.
(There are also some similar signs from other international vendors e.g. from Asia-Pacific, and from continental European vendors in the UK market).
New market entrants, especially in the sub-enterprise space, often with niche tools leveraging Web 2.0 technology
Significant growth in managed learning services, ranging from SaaS/ASP technology platforms through to more comprehensive outsourcing

The e-learning content market is particularly interesting with consolidation amongst the generic and custom content vendors at the high-end, but increasing fragmentation at the bottom-end. I don't believe we yet seen any significant fall out from SkillSoft's acquisition of NETg yet, but the number of niche content vendors we are seeing activity from is increasing significantly.

Some vendor dynamics I'm watching closely are:-

In the technology market: LMS Consolidation/competition at the talent management level, increasing SaaS/ASP delivery in corporates, learning content management technologies and multi-modal content, marginalisation of specialist learning collaboration tools by Web 2.0 technologies, Open-Source platforms, etc.

In the content market: Specialisation and high net value content, content diversification away from e-courses, "rapid" vendors, reengineering supply chains and fragmented buying, changing economics of content production, content validity strategies, etc.

I'd be interested in your views of the above and the general state of the supply-side market ...

DAVID

Corporate Roundtables

2007-03-06T18:25:00.000Z

I'm currently planning out our corporate roundtable agenda for the year, and am interested in the topics people are thinking would be most interesting. (See the general description of how the roundtables work). Some specific topics which I'm playing with include:

The reality of "talent management"
Rapid e-learning - fact and fiction
Open source learning technology
Learning Outsourcing
SaaS - Why implement inside the firewall?

Please provide comments on the above and suggest other hot topics as appropriate.

We probably plan to run 3 or 4 roundtables this year - personal invite only. Any UK/European corporates who are interesting in attending should email me.

thanks, DAVID

MyBlogLog

2007-03-06T18:19:00.000Z

I've been playing around with MyBlogLog in the background as a potential tool to add a bit more identity to who's been accessing the blog. Let me know what you think.

DAVID

Moodle for Corporate Learning?

2007-02-27T17:03:00.000Z

A few weeks ago I put a question out to the Moodle community regarding the appropriateness and usage of Moodle in the corporate learning environment. I have to say, so far I have underwhelmed by the level of response and interest, with only a few prviate responses so far.

Elearnity is very interested in the potential for open source learning solutions in a corporate context, but frankly, we currently are skeptical at the degree of corporate fit and focus they have today. We know of some organisations who have been doing some successful work with Moodle in particular in the corporate arena, but would be keen to here from many more.

I am also happy to provide a summary of our research view to people making a good contribution to me/us. Happy to start a discussion here, or for more sensitive inputs please email me directly.

DAVID

The future of LMS

2007-01-29T19:10:00.000Z

Tony Karrer has put a post about the future directions of LMS.

It's funny because we've been working on some thinking similar to this internally within Elearnity. Some recent corporate discussions together with some of our futures research has also pointed us towards rethinking the model underlying the LMS, but to be honest, not necessarily many of the drivers for wanting an LMS.

Its interesing about you and Lee likening it to Google Analytics. Our current thinking is that the LMS will become like Google - a diversified mix of services and interfaces - anarchic but inherently with underlying structure and connectively. Systems that can optimise our experience of it are critical, but so are systems that can optimise how the connections work behind the scene. This is potentially what the LMS will become.

... an interesting discussion ...

DAVID

Collaborative learning?

2007-01-29T17:20:00.000Z

Donald Clark has turned his attentions to collaborative learning.

Here are my thoughts ...
Collaborative learning is slow learning??? Donald - to be honest, I think that's rubbish as a generalisation, although I do agree that poor collaborative learning can be slow and ineffective - just as poor individual learning can be. Unfortunately there's probably far too much of both.

The issue, as with all learning, is to understand the dynamics of what will make collaborative learning more effective rather than to trash it completely. An awful lot of effective learning and education is heavily reliant on a collaborative learning as a fundamental part of the learning process - with or without the 'e' bit.

Gill Salmon has written extensively about her experiences in the academic space, and our experiences back that up. Were Epic's projects with Arena all failures?

Collaboration may be natural but it is also difficult - even face to face it is difficult. People learn to be good collaborators - unfortunately often compensating for poor early experiences in our education systems. My belief is that the nascent e-learning market was hijacked by the e-course companies - both generic and custom (!?). Using technology to enable people to people interaction for learning is as important as using technology for access to static and dynamic information and knowledge.

Much of the new parts of the Internet you advocate are reliant on people-centric approaches rather than content centric. Let's look for more of this, not less.

;) David

What is e-learning?

2007-01-29T16:23:00.000Z

Clive Shepherd has posted a presentation on his site attempting to reposition e-learning away from just e-courses, to a more diversified view including collaboration, simulation, live e-learning and so on. A view I would strongly endorse.

Here's my comments on his post ...

Clive - I like the walkthrough, and predictably the de-emphasis on e-courses as the only form of e-learning. I've always felt that was wrong (see an old white paper from 2000).

But you still haven't actually defined what e-learning is ... just listed out a number of forms of it.

I also think the inclusion of informal learning as e-learning is mistaken. Why is informal learning e-learning any more than it is book learning or video learning or people-talking-together-learning??? I know it is trendy to bang the informal drum now, but artificially adding it to the e-list is not very illuminating or productive. Sure some aspects of e-learning are informal, but why is informal, e-learning?

The Future for E-Learning

2007-01-24T13:48:00.000Z

David Wilson is founder and Managing Director of Elearnity and one of the leading authorities on learning innovation and e-learning in Europe. He speaks to TrainingZONE about the present and the possibilities for e-learning.

Has e-learning come of age, or does it still have some way to go before it reaches its potential?
An interesting question Claire, in reality I think both are true. E-learning is definitely a mainstream capability in many of the leading corporate adopters, and there has been a well established and fairly robust supply-side market for e-learning for a number of years. So e-learning is now a fairly mature and is becoming increasingly pervasive in many market sectors and companies.

But that doesn’t mean it’s like that everywhere, or that e-learning is fixed in what it can do. We still encounter large organisations that have little use of e-learning, or are only piloting it. Whilst there is a perception that this is driven by learner acceptance, actually we see it as more of an L&D cultural issue first, and then a combination of infrastructure and learner acceptance second.

While e-learning might be a mature capability it’s still evolving rapidly. It’s diversifying away from the structured e-course model that came from computer/web-based training, towards a more holistic view of technology-enabled learning with many approaches and solutions.

Where does e-learning truly excel and where do you feel it has its limitations?
If by e-learning you mean e-courses, I would say they have a role in supporting basic knowledge or skills development in almost in any area. The key thing they deliver is a consistent learning approach on a scalable distributed basis. That’s a huge advantage for a large organisation or for training large numbers of people. This especially works well for the “acquisition” part of the learning process, and for some subjects, also for “practicing” it too. This is especially true for anything involving an IT system, or that can be modelled into an online role-play or simulation.

Other aspects of e-learning, such as e-assessment, can be used very broadly for all forms of learning, both for formal testing and assessment, and also for personal diagnosis to streamline the learning process. Both of these areas are very interesting now and very generally applicable in most mainstream learning programmes.

I haven’t just said use e-learning for compliance, which has been a massive driver for e-learning over the last few years. It’s not that I think e-learning isn’t any good for compliance, of course it is. But e-learning has been unnecessarily pigeon-holed as a tool purely for compliance and mandatory learning in many organisations. Clearly there are big benefits for compliance; both in terms of consistency and scalability, but also because of the automatic tracking and reporting benefits as well. But e-learning can and should be being applied more generally, both as a standalone solution and integrated into blended programmes, and also for assessment, performance support, specialist advanced learning and so on.

What is it not good for? I think e-courses definitely have their limitations, partly because of the constraints for doing them properly, and sometimes due to subject matter. People often focus on subject matter limitations but I am less convinced. I think you can find high quality and effective e-learning on almost any subject you can think of. But delivering structured e-courses that require 30 minutes plus to complete obviously creates constraints. Elearnity’s research shows a shift towards performance support and referenceware materials for just-in-time needs, and collaborative learning tools for deeper learning needs. It’s about horses for courses, rather than a one-size-fits-all approach.

When it comes to rapid e-learning, often members ask which tool is best. In your opinion is there much difference between products, and what are the limitations of rapid e-learning?
In my opinion, there’s much too much attention at the moment on the tools part of the rapid e-learning question. There’s no doubt that rapid e-learning is a growing area in nearly all corporates, and much of the current debate is about tool selection. But Elearnity’s research doesn’t endorse this. Yes a bad tool will be a barrier, but a good tool is not a guarantee of success. The biggest issues are around process and expertise rather than tool. And by process I mean the whole process, not just the development task.

Rapid e-learning for most companies is part of what I described as the diversifying of e-learning. It is about collapsing the supply-chain for e-content and pushing it closer to the subject expert, either directly with them doing it, or with someone they can work with closely. To do that you need tools than can be used by non-e-learning specialists, and you need to create valid learning, and that is the challenge. Companies have comprehensively proved with PowerPoint that they can generate tons of presentation materials, but how much of it is high-quality learning? Rapid tools can aggravate that problem further – especially if the people producing it don’t have instructional expertise or understanding. They may know about the subject matter, but do they understanding “learning”?

Content is only useful if its accessible and usable, and if its valid. There are big challenges for organisations with many people creating content, but then trying to push it through a narrow pipe (called their e-learning team) to get it loaded onto the corporate LMS.

In short, rapid e-learning concepts are an important part of the diversification of e-learning, and have a real role to play in enabling local content creation. But they are part of a much larger story, and the short term exclusive focus on tools is misplaced.

There is a good deal of talk about how a VLE/intranet can facilitate informal learning. Do you feel that the potential of technology is being explored by organisations in this respect?
Informal learning emerged last year as a big topic amongst the market commentators, but I don’t think it has really impacted mainstream corporate thinking yet. Some of the leading corporates have been publicly talking about it, but most organisations are still focusing on their formal learning agenda. I don’t expect this to change much this year, but maybe it will become more of an explicit issue in 2008 and beyond.

I do think that technology has a role to play with informal learning, but we need to understand what we mean by informal first. This is where all the discussion of “80% of all learning is informal” starts getting a bit vague. For example, is coaching formal or informal? Is spending some time with a colleague to learn how to do something, formal or informal? Is accessing some performance support materials live in the work process, formal or informal? A lot of learning in companies is not managed or tracked by L&D but that doesn’t make it informal. It can very structured, and facilitated or delivered by professional training staff or coaches, but it isn’t described centrally as a formal programme or course.

Technology can clearly help facilitate informal processes of learning, both through search and through access to content and to people. Arguably the biggest learning tool on the planet is called the Internet, and one of its main LMSs is called Google, but that’s not how people think about it. Adoption of more informal thinking internally within companies, coupled with tools for live collaboration will be the start. But I also expect to see more pressure on integration of learning processes and content with work processes and content. At the moment they tend to be pretty distinct in most companies, but informal learning will blur the boundaries. At the back-end, this will also mean growth in content management and integrated search as well.

How have technologies such as podcasting, wikis etc added to the potential of e-learning?
As someone who spends most of their life learning online and informally, especially over the Internet, I find podcasts on their own to be too limiting. I have to listen to the thing to find out whether it’s worth listening too, which is nonsense. Having said that, I still feel it’s an important direction, especially for delivery to mobile and non-visual devices.

In some recent research we did only 13% of early adopter companies were using Wikis for learning on a regular basis. So they are not mainstream yet (for learning). But the concept of collaborative self-generation of learning content is a really powerful idea – especially when if you can everyone engaged as an active participant. Research shows that retention of learning is significantly enhanced if you become the teacher rather than just the learner.

This dynamic is under explored currently and I think it has potential to be very useful, particularly for developmental learning rather than basic knowledge acquisition. But as with any collaborative approach, there are the problems of non-contribution (lurking), editorial control, and so on. But these can be resolved. I expect we will see more use of Wiki-like approaches in the future, although probably with embedded learning structure in the Wiki templates to make it easier to manage and validate the learning process and outcomes.

And finally, how do you feel we will be learning in five years time?
Ah the million dollar question! Well I guess that partly depends a bit on how you are learning now!

If you are currently (individual or organisation) still pretty much focused on formal and traditional learning approaches, then I think the next five years will see slow but increasing change. Increasing pressure of business will force you to change your assumptions about how, where and when you learn. You will have to be learning online and probably by mobile devices just to keep up, and keep compliant.

You will be using e-assessment to focus your learning time as well as to certify you’ve completed it successfully. Much of your learning time will be tracked and reported (you’re in that kind of company), and tracking will help you access learning that is more relevant. Much of this is available today, but it will have become pervasive, at least within large organisations.

If you already learn online, and mainly informally or through your own research on the Internet or through your personal network, then I think things will change even more significantly.

Learning anywhere will become a key requirement, via any connected device. Much of your learning will be informally delivered, but through formal mechanisms to help you find it, access it, and deliver it using a variety of media types depending on your context. Much of this will be about access to people, not just access to content. All of it will need to be focused on your specific needs or context, and to be integrated with other learning mechanisms to add more depth or context when you need it. More learning will be collaborative rather than individual, both synchronous and asynchronous.

Companies will need to offer a holistic learning environment, skewed to delivering the above services rather than generic learning content. Formal learning programmes will still exist but be a lower proportion of recognised learning time. Programmes will be blended learning processes, utilising e-learning and face-to-face learning time to maximise value and impact, and to maximise flexibility.

There are other new areas of learning for which we expect to see increasing adoption. I have talked about wikis and collaborative tools already. We also expect to see increasing use of gaming and complex simulations, and use of intelligent learning agents to aggregate and to personalise learning for you. Will this happen in five years? Yes, at least in part, but many of the mainstream implications of it will be beyond that period.

In summary, much of the technology to do this is around today, but it’s not well-connected or pervasive. The challenge for many big organisations will be to be able to consume this fast enough to stay up with some of their more nimble competitors. This is especially difficult on a global stage, and when you have to migrate a corporate IT infrastructure. But there will be an increasing realisation that not learning like this is an indulgence that the majority cannot afford, either in cost, but most of all in terms of time.

David Wilson will speaking at the Learning Technologies Conference on 31 January.

The Big Question - Rapid or Quality

2007-01-11T14:46:00.000Z

Clive Sheppard has posted an interesting response to Learning Circuits Big Question for January. As I quite like the point he is making, I'm commenting to that rather than the original question per say. I like the sentiments but think he's (maybe deliberately to state his point) misinterpretting the question.

Rapid e-learning is a marketing label being put on the use of a new form of tools for use by non-elearning specialists for creation of e-learning content. This will tend to be done rapidly as its a more collapsed development model - especially if its the SME doing the development. Or that's the theory anyway - and quite a popular one at this point in time.

But I don't really buy that.

If tools are more rapid, then they should be being used by the professional developers anyway. That's unless they turn out not to be very good, flexible, reliable or expensive. The reality is that these tools often have limitations. The ones that don't are often complex to use and therefore are just a more modern authoring tool.

But the issue for rapid e-learning is not about the tools, it is about the process, and about the expertise of people in the process. A collapsed development model also means collapsing the expertise involved. With SME production that means minimal e-learning or even learning expertise (e.g. instructional design). It also often means limited technology understanding or knowledge of the tools and associated standards. "What do I have to do to get this to create SCORM 2005 conformant content that can be uploaded into the LMS?" is not necessarily a question we would expect a SME to ask.

In many ways, this the essence of the debate; rapid versus professional content production.

Our (Elearnity) view is that rapid is a necessary part of a diversification of e-learning away from a pure e-course model (which was always too limiting) towards a more holistic technology enabled learning model. We also believe that tools for supporting mass internal production need to be more connected or shared in order to be more scalable and manageable. Individual local content production replicates the bad experiences of unmanageable document-based content. Finally, for the "rapid" elements, the whole process must be rapid, not just the development process. Rapid content needs to be able to be quality assured and tested, uploaded deployed and accessable, and maintainable or removable all in a rapid timescale at low cost.

David

Virtual Classrooms - do we need specialist tools?

2007-01-11T11:32:00.000Z

Donald Clark has raised a point about Virtual Classrooms tools as part of a post he made on Vapid Development Tools. "And while we're at it, why bother with all of this fancy virtual classroom stuff when we have messenger, netmeeting and Skype. If you want collaboration, it's already there, usually on your toolbar!"

I agree with the sentiment, the case for VC as distinct tools is much more marginal than it use to be. That was always part of Microsoft's long game - to embed the capabilities for collaboration into their core infrastrastructure. Don't forget that Microsoft bought Placeware (one of those VC tools) to for a core component of its Live Meeting capabilities.

Innovation with messenger/sametime tools and voice over ip services like Skype have accelerated this further, but more importantly made these services highly available with a very low cost of entry, i.e. free or virtually free, especially for the individual user. But there is still a reality gap for those stuck in corporate IT infrastructures. For those of us outside them who are able to use any tool we think will add some value to how we work it is much easier. As a small business we frequently find our options for live collaboration and virtual meetings decrease with corporate clients! A virtual classroom that provides a single integrated capability can still have some value here, but less than it used to.

The other key factor with VC tools is the specialist functionality they have embedded to streamline use of the tool for supporting learning events. This used to (5 years ago) include whiteboard tools and app sharing but now this is common in the collaboration tools. But there's other functionality too. Standard web collaboration tools can be fine for virtual meetings, and webinar tools are fine for large 1 to many events, but running high-quality structured learning with a group of 10-20 people can require additional help to make it work effectively. A good example of this is virtual break-out rooms.

But this kind of functionality will also make its way into the basic web collaboration tools too - if it proves to be really useful. That's why I find the discussion of functionality has become second in this post rather than first. A few years ago it would have been the other round. Now the limitations of the popular web collaboration tools are much less and their reach is much greater. The challenge for the VC vendors is to continue to differentiate their products or to integrate them into other solutions that have sufficient commercial value to give the VC away within an integrated offer. Our guess is that this is where the LMS/e-learning suite vendors will be forced over time, even if (as in Saba's case) it currently represents a significant revenue stream currently.

David

5 things meme

2007-01-04T17:18:00.000Z

I'm not a lover of chain letters or similar but Don Taylor has just tagged me with a 5 things meme, after he himself was tagged by Clive Sheppard. So in the spirit of the new year and peer collaboration, here goes nothing ... five things you may not know about me:

1. It's now been over ten years since I escaped serious employment and founded Elearnity. My longest period of serial employment in one organisation, and means I'm probably borderline unemployable by anyone else!

2. At 6 foot 7" (or 2.01m in new money) I have significant challenges with door ways, cute cotswold cottages and beds with foot-boards. All of which result in recurring headaches and occassional lacks of consciousness. Or maybe that's the alcohol ...

3. I would describe my taste in music as eclectic. My wife describes it as awful. Afraid my early rock roots were well as truly polluted by a hairy-hatted cousin who introduced me to Gong, resulting in life-long interest in the off-the-wall view, as well as the music! Ou est mon camembert?

4. About ten years ago, I started playing golf, after seeing all these corporate sales guys spending half of their "work" time on the golf course. This turned out to be more challenging than I expected - both to get the time to play, and then to manage to hit the ball in the direction it was supposed to be going. I now play off 17 handicap on an irregular basis, but working in the L&D/HR field is seemingly not a rich vain for potential golf matches. All reasonable offers gratefully received.

5. And vaguely back to subject, I spend almost my entire working life learning, but haven't been on a formal training course in years. I guess being an analyst is almost the perfect role for an habitual learner as I spend most of my time trying to understand the story beneath the story, both corporate and vendor. The downside of this that sometimes Elearnity becomes too interested in the exceptions rather than the rules, the alternative rather than the mainstream. But heh, I guess we should reference point 3 above for the cause of that!

Not sure who to stitch if anyone on this, but for variation let's try:

Barry Sampson

Susan Smith Nash

Wolfie

Ron Edwards

John Curran

Have fun .... David

Happy New Year!

2007-01-03T17:17:00.000Z

Just wanted to wish everyone a happy new year and best wishes for a busy and prosperous 2007. Work life is looking good at the moment with some really interesting research and client advisory work on the table, which hopefully is reflecting a positive direction and commitment for innovation in corporate learning!

David

Human Capital Reporting - Don Taylor

2006-12-14T10:47:00.000Z

Don Taylor has posted an interesting discussion of the state of human capital reporting. A very interesting post/article and quite thought provoking, and some useful references too. I agree that the lack of real metrics is a big limitation in moving the perception of people value in business. Our research also shows that most organisations do not even understand their basic data very well, let alone be sophisticated enough to really understand added value in either performance or human capability.

But even if the lack of metrics is a problem (which it is), I do not believe it is the cause of the problem, just an effect. The real challenge is in getting business leaders to truly understand the relationship between human capital (if that is the term we want to use) and business performance - both current and future.

In the majority, business leaders are simple animals. Their behaviour (as opposed to rhetoric!) is largely linked to what will drive results. If they definitely know that investment in people improves bottom line results more than cutting costs or increasing marketing then they will do it more often. Unfortunately they don't really know that, although plenty of people may try to tell them. In this sense, the human capital debate is in more of the "faith" business (like marketing in some sense) than it would like to be.

Metrics and models help to develop the discussion and start to provide a robust basis for moving from faith to evidence. But this is a long road, and, at least in the short term, basic is better!

David

Subject Matter Experts as Trainers - Implications for Rapid E-learning

2006-12-14T10:16:00.000Z

Wendy Wickham has posted a comment on her blog about Subject Matter Experts as trainers. I think this is a very interesting point she is making about the mindset, focus, interest and commitment of subject matter experts in the learning process. I'm sure we can all think of SMEs that are very motivated to pass on their knowledge, and try hard to help their learners really understand their subject. But unfortunately this is still all too rare.

I think a key reason for this is that SMEs assume that learners are in their (i.e. the SMEs) context, not the other way around. Wendy's point 3. The learner typically has to make the leap of understanding to be able to relate what they are being told back to their own needs or problems. In reality this is very challenging, unless the subject is very easy, and of course if it is that easy, they could probably have worked it out for themselves anyway! Context is critical for learning.

One key area of interest for me currently which directly relates to this discussion is the growth in rapid e-learning activity and its potential challenges and limitations . (See the discussion linked to some trends for 2007.

Rapid e-learning has emerged as one of the key trends for e-learning, and in some ways, rightly so given the cost and time to produce custom e-learning content. A big part of this assumes that SMEs can also become e-learning authors, but as you have pointed out SMEs are generally not great trainers, let alone educators. They might be able to generate lots of powerpoint slides but that doesn't necessarily equate to good learning content. Now the problem will potentially be magnified as they start to produce lots of bad e-learning instead.

I say magnified because this problem already exists in current e-learning, and it also exists in SME driven training. But with rapid e-learning, we don't even have the SME face to face to give us a chance to ask questions or examine our context. Their potential to crank lots of bad learning reaches new levels.

Of course this is a risk, and more enlightened organisations are aware that they have to manage quality. But our research with large corporates shows that this is not an easy battle, often taking the form of damage limitation rather than added value!

David

KM and Learning

2006-12-13T16:05:00.000Z

Jay Cross has posted a relevant (but not necessarily new) question on his blog about the difference between Knowledge Management and Learning. Personally, I think this is a question that the learning technology industry has been debating for some time, and not terribly productively. KM and Learning are still largely separate functions in most corporates we work with. They have separate agendas, separate teams, separate budgets and separate systems. Why?

One of the reasons I think is historical. When KM first appeared it was high-jacked by the IT industry. I remember doing lots of work with Lotus and IBM in those days who were early adopters of the KM story, and have subsequently made large investments of their own resources, and of their customers in progressing the KM agenda. At the time learning was mainly about "training", and maybe it still is in many companies. I believe that, at the time, it was in the vested interest of the KM afficianados to distance themselves from training, and to create a parallel knowledge agenda, which has largely led us to where we are today.

Does this separation make sense? I would argue no, but only if we've well and truly got the message that learning isn't training. This is of course why Jay is currently asking his question. With his current focus on informal learning, the separation looks incredibly artificial. Once we focus on learning from medium other than formal learning materials, i.e. course books or their e-equivalent, the differences between KM and learning very blurred.

For us to view knowledge as something distinct from learning implies that knowledge has a purely transactional value, distinct from it being retained or used by the person accessing it. Yes there are other processes around knowledge, but similarily their are other processes around learning. I think it would be much more useful if these were part of the same not separate agendas.

This also therefore brings me to maybe the real reason why learning and KM are mainly separate - organisational vested interest. Ultimately, in most corporates, these two functions exist as distinct groups, often in different reporting lines within the organisation. Why? If what I've said is true and they should be a continuum of the same thing, surely they should be integrated. The reason why they haven't is maybe more down to organisational politics than it is to an understanding of the real differences or similarities.

David

Back again

2006-12-13T12:36:00.000Z

Sorry guys - been out for a while - back on stream now.

David

SaaS for Enterprise Learning?

2006-11-24T04:17:00.000Z

I have long though that there was a significant potential role for ASP or Software-as-a-Service learning solutions for large enterprise organisations, but I'm not sure whether the vendors really see this (beyond those that SaaS is their main offering anyway). Yes they get the fact that SaaS is a good approach to sub-Enterprise customers (mid-tier etc), and that it is a useful tactical tool for accelerating enterprise customers. But they don't seem to see it as the long term platform of choice for them, believing that privately hosted or behind the firewall are the likely options.

I'm not sure I agree. Tactical platforms have a habit of being more long term than originally envisaged - especially given the challenge with the strategic ducks lined up! I'm also unconvinced that the perceived cost of SaaS over the longer term is disadvantageous compared with fully-costed internal or externally hosted solutions. And you would seem to get much greater flexibility with SaaS, both in terms of commitment, and in terms of flexibility of service, compared with the detailed terms and conditions that a hosting service or internal IT department wants to impose.

I'm interested to know what you think ...

Corporate e-learning trends - headlines for Europe

2006-11-09T13:49:00.000Z

I know it seems a bit early to start the "what's the trends for 2007" stories, but someone just asked me for such a view based on our corporate research. Thought you might also be interested in the answer. As always, happy for feedback.

For 2007, we expect the key developments for corporates to be around a) reconstructing and expanding the e-learning supply chain, b) reengineering and integrating learning management processes, and c) a diversifcation of e-learning content including experimentation with alternative delivery approaches.

A big part of a) is adoption of rapid e-learning inside corporates, and we expect most organisations to acquire tools and grow activities (if they haven't done so already). But we expect corporates to also start to realise the limitations of the rapid model, not least, the challenges for managing quality, educational value, and technical assurance. Whilst we are advocates of rapid e-learning, we also believe it is significantly over-hyped currently, and more sophisticated approaches are required. In addition, we also expect to see more changes in the ways corporates use external custom e-learning developers with increasing pressures for lower-cost, more rapid external solutions as well, and for self-maintenance.

b) Many corporates are reevaluating their LMS strategy going forward, and now increasingly interested in integrated talent and performance management. Although consistent with the grand ERP/HRMS story, and often the overall direction for extending use of their ERP platform, the HR sub-functions are sceptical of the fit of these products to their specific functional needs. We expect to see tactical successes for the LMS vendors in the performance and talent space, although longer term we still expect to see pressure from IT for a single integrated HR/ERP solution.

c) Although Wikis and podcasting maybe very trendy currently, most corporates are not really using them. We expect to see more experimentation in 2007, and some very interesting project successes, but we do not expect this to become truly mainstream in corporate usage. We also expect to see a shift away from traditional large e-learning course-based content towards smaller, more granular just-in-time e-content and performance support. We also expect to see referenceware growing in popularity relative to traditional e-learning courses, and greater adoption of virtual meeting/classroom technologies, which have now matured and are more widely available.

Across all of the above we expect to see more externalising of the infrastructure to deliver it, i.e. further growth in ASP or Software as a Service delivered infrastructure and solutions.

Key corporate drivers: immediate solutions, lower cost, more flexibility, more connected/aligned, bypassing internal constraints

SkillSoft's acquisition of NETg

2006-11-03T16:34:00.000Z

I'm really surprised not to have seen more ripples from SkillSoft's acquisition of NETg from Thomson Corporation. Having acquired Smartforce previously, and now acquiring NETg, SkillSoft seems to be finally closing the cycle on the once lucrative e-learning content business. With its origins from a group of ex-NETgers, and living under a cloud of lawsuits in the early days, SkillSoft has gone from strength to strength, now consuming both of its major adverseries.

What are the implications of this move for corporate customers? Good question. Many corporates have a commitment to either the SkillSoft or the NETg e-content libraries, and I don't see that changing that rapidly because the supplier has changed. The fact that there's now only one big content gorilla might affect competition, but to be honest, I think that was already changing anyway as corporates reconfigure their requirements and commitments. (see this note on generic e-learning we published last year for a view on this).

What really interests me is whether this event will accelerate the shift away from large generic content libraries rather than the other way around. Although maybe slightly contradictory (just as one vendor emerges with a huge content library), I wonder whether the battleground has finally shifted to niche content battles rather than library wars, and whether, in the end, the content (at least the traditional click and turn e-courses of the past)is actually becoming a more marginal part of the customer value proposition anyway. Let's see!

David

A fragmented identity

2006-10-13T11:57:00.000+01:00

Clive Shepherd has put his book collection (or the bits he's prepared to admit to at least!) on a site called Shelfari.

Another interesting niche site, but there are hundreds of these kinds of sites out there these days, all providing a nice way of describing some aspect of your life/work/interests etc. This is an inevitable consequence of capitalist opportunism and entrepreurial behaviour, but do how do you deal with such a fragmented approach to managing our own identity? I heard some venture capitalist on Radio 5Live recently going on about another site for "helping managing your digital identity" - which of course she happened to be an investor in, but that turned out to be another "personal website" space. How do we manage these identities and niche content on a sustainable basis with so many fragmented niche offerings???

Blogs and Wikis for corporate learning?

2006-10-11T18:15:00.000+01:00

I have recently had a number of conversations with some different corporates about their interest in using Blogs or Wikis within their corporate learning programmes. Most of the individuals in these conversations are actively blogging themselves, but it made me wonder how many companies were actively using them already. Or are these just an interesting idea, or not even that.

Maybe you could let me know your view by responding to the web poll on the right of the page. Thanks in advance and PS the answers so far will be displayed once you've voted.

David

Personalisation - a slogan in search of a meaning?

2006-10-10T12:33:00.000+01:00

Seb Schmoller has just put an interesting post relating to personalisation in learning. In it, he cites some recent articles and a recent Guardian comment and expresses scepticism about the reality of personalisation in education.

We have looked a little at personalisation within our research the corporate learning and e-learning area, and its a topic that I feel needs much greater exploration. Firstly, I agree with your sentiments about its use as a slogan in search of a meaning. Like many of terms in the learning area, it has become used as a bandwagon without much reality of substance. A sense of a good idea, without much in the way of tangible execution.

But having said that, I also feel it very important, and in many encapsulates the shift in thinking from training to learning. If we are to make progress on the potential for personalisation, I think our research would support the view that we need to tackle it at two levels - and I feel some synergy here with your arguments and Kevin's comments. Personalisation impacts structure at the macro-level, and it impacts choices and options at the micro-level. Much of the debate about the meaning of personalisation at an institutional level is about my macro-level; the structure of services, how they relate to the learner, and the organisation providing them. Without a fundamental rethink or realignment of current structures (in both academic education and corporate training), it is difficult to see how personalisation has much real meaning or difference.

But if that is true, personalisation at the micro-level is still very important. The choices that individual learners are offered or make related to their specific learning process; the resources they choose to engage with, the way they use or interact with peers, even to a degree, the role they expect from the teacher, trainer or facilitator. These are all areas of much greater flexibility and potential for personalisation than we give them credit for - already.

We must be wary of rejecting the concept of personalisation, but we must also be realistic about understanding its challenges. My personal view is that learning becoming more personalised, is an inevitability.

David

GooTube to impact corporate learning?

2006-10-10T11:59:00.000+01:00

Google's acquisition of YouTube could result in some interesting side-effects in the learning world.

Despite its many problems, not least blatant infringement on copyright of many of the commercially produced video that has been clipped onto the site, YouTube seems to me to be a very powerful tool to support learning. It is a fantastic mechanism for rapid distribution of video-related content that could support learning programmes, or for just-in-time learning support.

But it is also the culture of video creation and sharing that has been encouraged by the users of YouTube and other similar services. With the rapid in growth in cheap video cameras and increasing availability of video capture from mobile phones, there is an enormous potential for creative learning processes and knowledge sharing using these tools.

I also think this represents the final confirmation that we have now passed the tipping point on video as a pervasive media in web information and learning content. Historically it has tended to be an important but niche component, but now with the diversity of tools to generate video, and pervasive tools like YouTube for its distribution, the video genie is well and truly out of the lamp!

David

The cost of innovation

2006-10-09T09:44:00.000+01:00

Seb Schmoller has posted an interesting comment on private provision of infrastructure for schools. His point at the end of the post about (what I would call) the cost of innovation in the ICT or learning infrastructure I think is very valid in a corporate environment too. Too often this is seen as a static IT cost rather than a dynamic environment which needs to be evolved and allow innovation. Recent interest in blogs and wikis as learning tools is a good example. Most of these projects have to be done outside the gaze of IT or formal budgets. The danger is that the budget for infrastructure, just like the training centres of old, is a reflection of learning past rather than learning future.

Nuvvo up for sale!

2006-10-04T18:55:00.000+01:00

Brent Scheckler noticed that Nuvvo, the innovative e-learning platform and marketplace from Canadian company Savvica is up for sale. Apparantly they've run out of money to push it forward and are looking to sell the business and technology. Here is the full announcement text, or a link to Nuvvo's blog.

Nuvvo’s sale may also reflect some realities of the e-learning market as well as some of the mistakes Savvica may have made in themselves.

To our eyes, Nuvvo made an interesting splash with an innovative service which was nicely packaged, but like many web start-ups, underestimated the time and cost to build a robust pipeline of business, and the costs to establish an e-brand. Whilst selling a paid service is always an issue with open source alternatives, I doubt it was as significant as being portrayed. After all, only a small proportion of the cost of e-learning relates to the platform, it just happens to be a visible amount.

The e-learning market has proved to be a graveyard for many organisations over the past few years, I am sure there will be more!

David

Learning Content Model

2006-10-03T19:20:00.000+01:00

Delivered a keynote presentation at a seminar in London today, focusing on the topic of Learning Content Management, and based on some analysis from a recent corporate research project. One slide which seemed to get a lot of interest from a number of people in the audience was a model we have been using recently to focus the discussion of what is the scope of learning content.

Click on the image to link to a larger version and a PDF of the slide.

The model maps two dimensions - the nature of the content, Generic to Specific, and the nature of the learning, Formal to Informal, including some example representations for the typical types of learning we see in companies: classroom training, generic and custom e-learning, performance support, coaching, etc.

I like the model because it a) seems to have a lot of resonance for training people in structuring the way they think about sources of learning content, and b) can be used to clearly focus the discussion of the scope and aspiration for learning content management. E.g. We have found that many organisation focus their attention in the top right (formal, specific) initially, and then want to expand it longer term both downwards into supporting informal learning approaches, and then right to left to expand the scope to include all learning content.

How would you draw your different learning activities on the model, and what would your potential focus be for learning content management; now and maybe in 3-5 years? I'd be interested in your views and feedback on the model.

The Learning Circuits Big Question

2006-10-03T07:26:00.000+01:00

Tony Karrer and Dave Lee have just started a new feature, The Big Question, on the Learning Circuits Blog. .

This months relates to whether all learning professionals should be blogging?

My view is mixed, i.e. yes and no. To start with the no first, blogging is a useful tool but it has its limits and it tends to be viewed by some (and the press currently) as a bit of panacea. To my mind, much that is blogged is repetitive and doesn't add a lot of value. There's almost a trend to have to be seen to be blogging for the sake of it rather than because you actually have anything new to say. The danger is that creating a culture where all learning professionals must blog would in fact magnify these problems.

But having said that, on the plus side, blogging is best when the blogger has a view and can express it. The lack of formality and the ease of cross-referencing other blog content or references means is great to accelerate discussion and promote broader thinking and understanding. Learning professionals should be able to engage and contribute in these discussions. They should be able to communicate, and they should be able to both have, and express a view. If not, how effective are they as learning professionals? So, on balance I think, getting more or all learning professionals to engage in the blogosphere would be positive. But maybe for some, their blogging will be public - i.e. on the Internet, for others it will be "private" , i.e. inside their own organisation. That might not have been meant by the original question, but I think internal blogging from learning professionals, and promoted by learning professionals inside the organisation would be a positive step in the fostering of the learning organisation.

Roles in Simulations - Clark Aldrich

2006-09-29T18:34:00.000+01:00

Clark Aldrich is suggesting some ideas on the Learning Circuits blog around vocabulary for roles in educational simulations. I think this an interesting direction in discussion simulations and business gaming as well. Not least the concept of people controlling the primary characters rather than the simulation, and the simulation controlling the environment and context, and maybe some of the bit-parts. This seems far more a) achievable given current technology, and b) actually more flexible. The investment to build complex and realistic simulations, is I still think, beyond the budget of the everyday.

Ethics and Mobile Learning - E-learning Queen

2006-09-29T18:28:00.000+01:00

Susan Smith Nash (the e-learning queen, no less) has posted an interesting piece about ethics and mobile learning. I think the whole discussion of ethics relating to e-learning content is underplayed anyway. How is this impacted by the extension to mobile? Probably, quite a lot, as the context for usage goes outside the typical business environment and into the everyday. I think Susan has prompted an interesting discussion.

Corporates re-think generic e-learning

2006-09-28T16:20:00.000+01:00

Just over a year ago, we put out a research note focusing on the ways we were starting to see corporates reevaluate their use of generic e-learning materials, especially when they had company-wide commitments to large catalogues of content from companies like NETg and SkillSoft.

Some key elements we identified at the time were:

• Greater focus on driving high recurrent usage around a narrow set of generic titles; often linked to specific major business projects or changes, which may be cycled over time
• Rapid growth in adoption of non-traditional forms of e-learning content, particularly on-line reference material, driven by significant increases in perceived relevance and value from an often e-learning sceptical audience
• More focus on industry-specific (vertical) or job-role-specific (horizontal) content, often from niche providers with a proven understanding and brand in their niche
• Increased desire for flexible adoption of e-learning content, embedded within mainstream learning programmes (the so-called trend to blend)

We also noted that organisations were often struggling to achieve expected adoption and usage in their learner population, often relating to:

• An often negative perception of e-learning for discretionary learning and development based on poor experiences linked to compliance and regulatory (must do) e-learning
• A lack of flexibility of historic e-learning products in addressing learner-specific needs and questions
• A cultural resistance and resulting limited engagement from the broader learning and development community

A year further on, and not a lot seems to have changed. We still organisations asking the same questions. The longer term implications could be quite significant, especially for the generic content vendors. This is already a highly-competitive market and pressure from corporates for more targeted contracts or pay per use could have major implications for vendor revenues. And at a time when they are already struggling to keep their existing portfolio up to date, and up to the latest standards for e-learning design.

Apple targets PodCast Ready branding

2006-09-27T18:03:00.000+01:00

There's an interesting storm brewing in the technology press around Apple's recent targeting of PodCast Ready for their use of the "pod" word.

According to Engadget, Apple is not planning to try and shut down generic use of podcasting, but it looks as clear as mud to me!

David

The LMS M&A Drag Factor

2006-09-27T17:21:00.000+01:00

We all know there has been (and still is) a lot of mergers & acquisition activity in the LMS market, with plenty of consolidation going on. But although we've seen a lot of vendor consolidation, how much consolidation of products have we actually been.

Whilst some of the vendors have been very focused on trying to consolidate market share, they seem to be struggling to actually consolidate the customer bases underneath them. For example, Click2Learn and Docent merged to form SumTotal Systems. SumTotal then buys Pathlore, who itself had fairly recently bought DK Systems, and Pathlore still had quite a lot of old Registrar customers that still hadn't moved off that platform. Now SumTotal may have a large user base, but user base for what? Certainly not the current SumTotal platform - yet. And SumTotal is not unique by any stretch of imagination. We even see this is smaller regional providers that have been playing the M&A game. Most of the LMS vendors have at least some of this kind of historical consolidation challenge.

One key reason for this is because many of the major customers just upgrade to the latest release of their old product to maximise their support window. They then sit and wait to see how things evolve with the new company. So it takes a while, often more than two years plus to see how a given customer base will react to the acquisition of its vendor, sometimes longer. We're also seeing the same thing happening (but with even longer timescales) in the HR systems space following Oracle's acquisition of PeopleSoft. This isn't so much a function of size, but of perceived effort versus value to move sooner.

Elearnity has been tracking and analysing these vendors for many years. But one new strategic consideration that we're now factoring in is what I call the "LMS M&A Drag Factor". Its all full well and good having a large user base, but you have to be able to service it and move it forward. That's tough to do in the LMS world with multiple platforms and technology bases. The more diverse this is, the more effort needed to leverage it yourself, and the bigger your investment sometimes needed to create something more compelling to move everyone forward with you, rather than jumping ship with someone else. I think the LMS M&A Drag Factor will have quite an influence on individual companies performances in 2007/8.

David

A really worrying trend ....

2006-09-27T17:07:00.000+01:00

Barry Sampson has started an interesting thread picking up some of my discussion about changes to custom e-learning. In particular he is concerned (rightly so in my book) about the probability that rapid e-learning tools with massively magnify the amount of dodgy e-learning content swishing around in corporates.

I believe he is right, but the challenge is not to prevent the explosion in content, but to make sure it is fit for purpose as a learning resource. A lot of this will come down to making it easier to produce OK content than bad content, and the processes that support and surround the management of the content for distribution.

David

Small changes to blog page

2006-09-27T13:19:00.000+01:00

I've just made a couple of small changes to the page template to add a list of the latest entries in our Research Knowledge Base, and also a custom search tool for learning and e-learning related queries (using Rollyo).

Hope you find them useful. Happy to get any feedback if not.

David

Donald rants on Kirkpatrick

2006-09-25T10:34:00.000+01:00

Donald Clark has just posted another of his interesting rants on Kirkpatrick, titled amusingly Donald talks bollocks.

Here is my comment on it:

We said pretty much the same thing from some research and presentations a couple of years ago. The trouble is though that the KP levels and thinking has become lingua franca for the training community, and whilst individuals may question it, collectively they just accept it and continue to promote it.

I also believe this has been further magnified by the complicity of ASTD with Kirkpatrick and Philips in the US. Even ROI = level 5 now seems to be taken for granted even though ROI is just one format of presenting financial results. The biggest crime of many may be of perpetuating a model where the training industry thinks that "evaluation" is something that happens after the event rather than before and during. The effect of training's adherence to KP-thinking and systems for L1,2,3,4 evaluation is that it actually obscures rather than highlights the real issues of impact.

I would much rather trainers focus on understanding clearly what impact you are trying to achieve, whether it is a "learning" issue at all, and if so, in what way, how to design and construct solutions that make that impact, as well as delivering them to ensure they do make that impact. If you do this simply and clearly, understanding how to measure whether you are successful or not, becomes much more obvious.

David

P.S.One other quick though on L1. Why is the training industry the only one in the world that thinks it needs a detailed customer service questionnaire filled out by every customer on every transaction? I do see the need for business functions to understand their customer satisfaction, and encourage feedback, particularly on critical or challenging things. I do not understand why training thinks it is valuable to force it for every transaction. Ever hear of "sampling" guys!

Some articles and papers which you might find useful

2006-09-21T20:04:00.000+01:00

Here is a link to a collection of articles and summary papers from the Elearnity Knowledge Base which you might find useful.

The changing face of custom e-learning

2006-09-21T16:19:00.000+01:00

Last year we did some research looking at the changing nature of custom e-learning production within large corporates in the UK. A couple of key trends were clearly emerging that I think will have a profound impact on the e-learning market - especially given that custom e-learning content has been one of the more bouyant parts of the market.

Firstly, it seemed clear that pretty much all of the organisations we researched were increasing the amount of company-specific e-learning they were doing. But, they were also radically changing their patterns and amount they spend on it too. Most organisations had historically used specialist custom content vendors to develop their content, often having a short list of preferred suppliers. Whilst these arrangements were still in place, the budgets for projects were becoming significantly reduced. Whereas historically they might have spent £50-100K+ per project, now they are trying to get similar work done for £5-10K.

Secondly, as well as exploring offshore production to cut costs (usually with variable success), companies are also increasingly adopting rapid authoring tools - Lectora, Breeze, Articulate, Atlantic Link, etc. to enable self-authoring of content within L&D and line of business. This shifts the point of production completely, but creates a lot of other issues internally as well.

We expect both these trends to continue, and to interconnect. Corporates need to diversify their content production strategies to deal with the increased scale of need, and the associated focus on reducing cost and time for development and maintenance. For volume content, corporates will increasingly mandate the development tool in order be able to self-maintain the outcomes. They may pay one vendor to develop some customised templates that are proven to pre-integrate with their LMS (a topic for another day!), they might pay another company to provide instructional design input to projects, and yet another to quality assure any outputs.

Who will actual content development and production - good question? Some of it will be done internally, some will be done offshore, and some will be contracted out whole as a discrete (yesteryear-like) project with a reasonable budget allowing some creativity and investment in custom media. But the majority will be "fit for purpose", quick to produce, cheap and easy to maintain.

If the above really happens ,and I believe it is inevitable, it will have big implications for the skills and resources needed within L&D to manage it effectively. It will have even bigger implications for the large number of vendors that make a living by delivering whole projects. Nice big £100K+ projects will still be there, but they will become few and far between, the main focus is switching to the mass of "fit for purpose" content that corporates need everyday.

As the corporates also start cherry-picking single service components (template development, instructional design, media production, project management, quality assurance, content input, ...) rather than buying whole projects, I believe the writing will be on the wall for many vendors.

How will they survive this? Some will specialise and down-scale. Running a £0.5-2m custom e-learning company is a lot easier than running a £3-5m one. Others will offshore and automate tools to slash development costs further to compete. A few will aggregate and rise above it - move up the value chain and do a total BPO on learning development, but it will be only a few in each geography. The rest??? Start diversifying now!

Tony Karrer comments on DTI Blended post

2006-09-21T11:21:00.000+01:00

Tony Karrer, a US blogger with some interesting views has picked up my blog on the DTI research on blended learning. I would be really interested in what readers (US and otherwise) make of this issue.

The statement from the DTI research was unequivocal - blended was old news! Like you I think this is not a correct message, but I don't think it's just confusing blended as a label versus blended as a practice.

From our research, we still blended as the fundamental model for any structured capability development, as well as for high-impact project-based learning. Here is a link to some of the public domain research info we've put out on blended.

One additional point. One of the problems of blended was that it was a hype jargon, and became a bandwagon for lots of people to jump on, and subsequently off. This always happens of course, the equivalent for this year is probably "informal learning". Now, I don't mean these things are important or right, just that they encourage or allow many people (customers and suppliers) to: start using the term for a while, make some cosmetic changes, and then adopt the next bandwagon as it emerges. We see this all the time. Makes you look like your leading edge, but at the same time results in little different outcomes or any sustainable change in thinking and approach.

Its the latter that really interests me - for blended, for informal, or for any from any significant innovation!

Beyond E-learning - Barry's view

2006-09-20T18:43:00.000+01:00

Just read Barry Sampson's blog entry for the DTI session, and some of the comments. I think his view was similar to mine, but it will be interesting to see where the conversation goes ....

Is "Blended" really dead?

2006-09-20T10:43:00.000+01:00

One of the topics briefly touched on at the DTI Beyond eLearning session was the lack of any interest in the topic of Blended Learning in the US companies the group visited. According to Alec Keith, the US was not interested in discussing the topic, "Blended Learning is still in the literature, but not discussed seriously" was one specific comment. So is Blended Learning really dead?

From our research in corporates in the UK and Europe, we would say no, and for two reasons. Firstly, I think we're still partly in the hype curve of Blended Learning. Many UK/European corporates are still at the early stages of realising that the e-learning story is not going away and they have an increasing need for integrated learning approaches. Partly this is still driven by market hype, but it is also magnified by hard drivers of reducing cost and increasing the reach of learning programmes.

Much of this blending is not actually very blended. Lowest common denominator thinking drives decisions to chop down classroom time and substitute in e-learning content that is not really integrated with the classroom content. From a research project Elearnity did a year or so ago, most blended design seems to singularly focus on selecting media - in particular where should we use e-learning. I think far much too much attention has been payed to this.

This leads to the second and more profound reason why I think Blended Learning is not actually dead. Blended Learning should force us to focus on learning as a process rather than as a series of events. The value of blended learning should be in understanding and describing that process, and then understanding the interplay between and the added value through the components of the process, i.e. the whole design, not just the selection of specific media types. Process-based and integrated.

Whilst I may not personally like the term "blended learning" very much, I feel it is worthwhile if it forces us to design holistic learning processes rather than media-delivered events. But our research indicates that is not happening yet, and so, for good or bad, I will disagree with the US DTI research and keep advocating blended as one of our learning stories.

Once we have that as the norm, I would certainly be happy to consign it to the bin adn just call it learning!

E-learning vendors - market ripples

2006-09-20T10:23:00.000+01:00

The recent news of that AdVal had gone into administration was not a surprise, but it was a disappointment. Rumours had been circulating for most of the year that AdVal was struggling beyond the norm, but its' recent acquisition of the Maxim business has doubled the consequences of it.

Couple this with other acquisitions and uncertainties over the past year and it paints a mixed picture of change and uncertainty. WBT's recent acquisition by Horizon Technology is another local example. Some of the bigger US vendors have also suffering the same fate. And whilst the LMS market, for example, has seen significant vendor consolidation at the top end, we're yet to see significant platform consolidation follow on from it - i.e. the vendors still have a lot of legacy platform transitioning to deal with.

Whilst these vendor changes are part of a positive trend to a more mature market position, short term they are only magnifying corporate uncertainty. Or if they are not, this may largely through ignorance than insight!