Reviews ASTD Members Only

Building E-Businesses
By Tom Abraham

It's often difficult for e-learning to have an impact--beeping email, ringing phones, and demanding people tend to overwhelm the humble training program. Products that push through the background noise and make a lasting impression employ a combination of usefulness, style, and substance.

Our expectations for training design have been formed by the flash and sparkle of TV and film: Make it fun; make it a game; show a video; pick up the pace! Although geared toward adult learners, training programs often have more in common with Sesame Street than Masterpiece Theater. However, there are still those learners who don't shy away from complexity. Their intellectual curiosity and genuine appetite for fresh insights make them less glitz-dependent.

Enter Harvard Business School Interactive's online learning resources. Given the shifting sands of the e-learning world, it's reassuring to find a provider whose history and affiliations stretch back to before last week. Indeed, few organizations have as strong a brand identity: recognized scholar with dense content that's geared toward more sophisticated learners.

The window to the HBSI courses is called the Launch Pad, which is essentially a homepage that gives access to the program catalog, course status, and history. It also contains links to other learning resources, including news items and a daily ideas@work audio broadcast.

Two features are worth singling out. ManageMentor--available for a separate fee--delivers insight and practical advice on nearly two dozen topics, such as innovation and change, e-commerce, globalization, and operations and technology. For each topic area, there's an overview, core concepts, steps, tips, tools, a self-test, and resource links. Working Knowledge is a regularly updated e-publication that explores 13 business topics and provides articles, links, book reviews, and so forth. On their own, these resources provide continuing access to thoughtful, relevant, and well-written information. But they're the icing, not the cake; the courses are even better.

At the time of review, the HBSI series offered several programs that were organized into two suites:

• Essential Skills for Managers: Financial Accounting, Finance for Managers, and Yes! The Online Negotiator
• Building E-Businesses: Crafting E-business Models, Creating E-business Value, and Developing E-business Capabilities.

For the purpose of this review, we focused on the e-business modules. All courses had the same basic visual design, framework, and features. In addition to the self-paced modules, a class version was available that replaced some screens replaced with facilitator-led discussions.

The core content of Crafting E-business Models covers a comprehensive look at 17 emerging models. Thorough descriptions illustrate what happens when complex content and Web learning collide: window weariness! To fully explore the 17 models, learners must navigate through nearly 30 screens or pop-up boxes. That's not an overwhelming number, but it does make you desire a more user-friendly structure.

Content for the second module, Creating E-business Value, is more manageable. The course looks at a three-phase e-business value framework: the business concept, capabilities and communities, and shareholder value. This program also explores vicious and virtuous business cycles.

Seven sections fill out the e-business courses, covering core content and executive insights, a real-world case study, opportunities to apply learning, and assessments. Each page or screen is visually interesting, and content is delivered through a combination of text pop-upw indows and audio or video. Learnerscan watch the talking-head video or replace the screen with a static picture of the speaker and text.

The programs are easy to navigate and keep track of learners' progress. True to expectations, the interactivity is adequate but hardly cutting-edge. Click-and-drag exercises, forms, and so forth keep these courses from being a passive experience, but learners must rely heavily on content relevance and their own inherent interest in the subject. However, the producer has made a real effort to ensure concepts translate to the real world. Two weeks after completing the course, learners might not be able to recite the 17 models from memory, but they probably will have applied the tools to their businesses. To reinforce real-world use, both programs are peppered with examples and case studies from both the bright lights and dim bulbs of the e-commerce world.

Building E-Businesses Ease of navigation *** Interactivity ** Holds user interest ***½ Production quality ***½ Value of content **** Instructional value **** Value for the money *** Overall rating ***½

A technical requirements screen helps ensure the learner has the right software programs and plug-ins. If you're considering these courses for company purchase, check with your IT department for plug-in restrictions.

Recommendation

Building E-Businesses is a highly useful learning tool at a reasonable price, not to mention the added appeal of the Harvard Business School name. Few institutions can equal HBS's reputation and credibility. Whether entirely justified, there's an assumed excellence that may have learners name dropping.

Published: May 2001