4 More (Busted) Enterprise Learning Myths

I came across this list of training myths on Twitter today (courtesy of Jane Hart - @c4lpt) and I couldn't help tossing in my two cents. So here are four more enterprise learning myths that need to be busted (feel free to chime in with your own) :

1. Everybody in the ecosystem needs an LMS. Nope. I was recently at a conference where one of the world's largest consumer goods companies said (I paraphrase), "We don't need no stinkin' LMS". They launched e-learning, tracked compliance, got product information out to their ecosystem, and dealt with all sorts of training needs without an LMS and a server farm. Lots of companies I speak with are changing their thoughts about their need for an LMS. They all agreed both that they need technology-enabled learning (I work with a lot of tech companies, so there is a bit of a selection bias here), and that they all need scalable learning solutions. Yet learning technology, learning portals, and learning tools are no longer synonymous with "Learning Management System" (see my previous post- "A learning portal is not an LMS").
   
   
2. Rapid e-learning means it's easy and I don't need instructional design. Wrong - sort of. It's a matter of perspective. Rapid e-learning rapidly exposes two things to the learner:
   
   • Is this just a PowerPoint presentation converted to flash with a voice-over? or...
   • Is this course actually giving me knowledge I can use?
   My colleague and friend, Jon Lloyd, wrote this great piece about rapid e-learning that really breaks it down. I have led large organizations making global changes toward rapid e-learning, and I learned that
   
   1. I needed a template and standard that everyone my team was required to use
   2. I needed to have instructional design embedded in that template
   3. An absence of editorial review exposes itself pretty quickly
   Rapid e-learning, well planned, can be fast and responsive, but it's not easy, and you better have instructional design baked into everything you do from the moment you start even thinking about it.
   
   
3. VILT is less valuable than ILT. Kill me if I ever hear this gross generalization again. It's like saying "all trucks are less valuable than all cars". To do what? For what purpose? There are certainly times where getting into a classroom is the optimum experience. Yet in this rapidly changing, short attention span theater world, delivering timely information quickly to people is often far more valuable and actionable than the optimum learning experience. We work with a ton of SaaS companies, who deliver at least one major release of each of their products every quarter, and yet building a decent Instructor-Led Training (ILT) course take 3-6 months. Process that through on the space-time continuum: by the time you're done creating the ILT you're already out-of-date. ILT is awesome for processes, hands-on work, role-playing and group exercises, however Virtual ILT (VILT) is great for speed, imparting actionable information, being nimble in response to immediate need, and decreasing the time people spend away from what their real job is.
   
   
4. I need a reusable learning object strategy. Flip that one on its ear. What I need to have completely understood is my rate of content obsolescence. How fast does my content go out of date? I certainly need reusable templates, processes, approaches, graphics, animations, course models, and VILT and ILT delivery standards. I, however, have found in my almost fifteen years of leading both large enterprise training organizations and training lines of business that I rarely actually reuse content. Code? Sure. Structures and models? All the time. But in this environment of rapid change, I have chosen to forget about reusing content and focus instead on scale and simplicity everywhere else. Focusing on scale and simplicity is, in short, just more valuable: it's more important, more fiscally prudent, and, frankly, easier.
   

What other myths are out there? Our entire industry, and the entire approach to determining need and delivering knowledge to the enterprise, is completely transforming at this very moment. The new normal is that everything changes all the time. Bring it.

~ posted by Glenn Oclassen on 11 Aug 10
   tagged as: learning portal, Rapid eLearning, SaaS, SaaS Training, virtual training

 

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