E-Learning: Apples and Oranges
By Jay Cross
Currently, there’s a fundamental split between e-learning for HR and e-learning for individual business units.
E-learning for HR. Most corporate e-learning initiatives are developed within the HR function. These e-learning projects typically make HR processes more efficient: virtual meetings to cut travel costs, tracking systems to ensure that employees complete compliance training, and Webcasts that extend the reach and timeliness of corporate communications. The main goal of these efforts is to perform traditional training functions faster, better, and cheaper.
E-learning for business units. A different sort of e-learning develops within individual business units. In these instances, the goal is to meet or exceed business objectives. Another difference is that e-learning may occur anywhere along the value chain--internally or externally, staff or clients. For example, e-learning can be used to inform prospects of new offerings or teach customers how to use newly purchased products. In another example, e-learning can be used to jumpstart product launches, reducing the time that it takes to get new products into the marketplace.
Here's a basic breakdown of the differences between training for HR and training that's built for individual lines of business.
| |
E-learning for HR |
E-learning for business units |
| Driver |
Improve HR and training processes |
Improve business performance |
| Metrics |
• Savings in resources
• Certifications
• LMS output
• Learner satisfaction |
• Improved sales
• Faster service
• Reduced error rates |
| Benchmark |
Previous internal HR efforts |
Position vis-à-vis firms in the same industry |
| Learners |
Employees |
• Employees
• Partners
• Suppliers
• Customers |
| Focus |
Internal |
No boundaries |
| Limiting factors |
Budget is based on how much fat you take out of the system. |
Confidence in the ability of e-learning to deliver on its promise |
| Impact |
Bottom line |
Top line |
So what?
Rather than target specific types of prospects, most suppliers lump everything together, which leads to a muddled set of benefits, including
-
decreasing time and travel costs
-
increasing sales
-
transforming organization culture
-
developing faster, better ways to learn
-
improving customer service
-
delivering just enough, just-in-time learning.
Unfortunately, customers rarely are concerned with everything on the list. Atraining manager is concerned with curtailing travel costs and a sales manager wants to increase sales. But few situations are ever black and white. Case in point: HR often manages e-learning efforts within the business units. This blurring of boundaries raises the question, Does an organization need a single or several e-learning approaches?
Until quite recently, I was an ardent advocate of a single enterprise e-learning approach. I believed that it was more cost-effective for an organization to put all of its e-learning and knowledge management activities under one umbrella. In doing so, the company would gain consistency and economies of scale; provide a single, personalized portal for every employee; and avoid projects that asked developers to reinvent the e-wheel. Indeed, I thought that HR’s cost-cutting efforts were the first step in e-learning’s evolution, which would eventually grow into e-learning programs that solved individual business problems.
However, I’m starting to explore the idea of decentralized e-learning. More often, it seems to make sense to diversify risk by spreading e-learning dollars among competing players. The reasons are plenty. First, the e-learning supplier market is unsteady, with suppliers that seem to come and go. Second, while still not quite plug-and-play, content is becoming more portable with the advent of standards.
For example, a recent consulting project centered around helping a company conceptualize its approach to customer-focused e-learning. Because the company’s internal e-learning was running smoothly, we used it as a natural starting point for the discussion. Not long into the project, we realized that customers had entirely different needs than employees. Customers also differed in scale, motivation, cultural diversity, and tracking needs. Considering customer e-learning as an extension of HR-based e-learning was restraining our thinking, so we removed existing e-learning efforts from the table. Unhitched from the constraints of an in-house LMS and other baggage in HR’s approach, our ideas quickly multiplied. We even went one step further and banned the term e-learning from our conversation, which let us focus on results rather than activities.
Now what?
Perhaps corporations should consider how small an e-learning application can be and still get the job done rather than try to create monster centralized e-learning systems. In doing so, would companies lose economies of scale? Maybe. But consider this: As many as half of all grandiose, enterprise software initiatives fail to live up to expectations. Many simply fail. Enterprise-wide e-learning efforts can run the risk of obeying the Law of Raspberry Jam, coined by Gerald Weinberg, “The more you spread it, the thinner it gets.”