tarynshae

What decisions do you expect organisations to address before they implement an eLearning program?

In the second block class we discussed some factors associated with the implementation of eLearning programs. Some of them included:

• Cost
• Technology infrastructure
• Learner and trainer readiness
• Support staff
• Venues or learning centres
• Buying or building courses
• Measuring outcomes and effectivess

Support

I believe one of the critical factors organisations must address prior to the implementation of an eLearning program is support. What level of support will they provide prior to and after the implementation of such a system? Will a support network be created? Will ‘topic champions’ exist within the business or within the organisations? When eLearning initiatives are introduced on a large scale, support is absolutely critical. Support networks can field queries and problems prior to and post implementation, and can out-source or redirect queries to appropriate people. Creating a support network that is communicated to employees will remind them that they are not alone and they do have people they can turn to for support. As is the nature of eLearning, technology issues and problems are sometimes unavoidable. The introduction of a new eLearning initiative may also be daunting for employees. It is for such reasons that support is a critical factor that must be addressed by organisations when thinking about eLearning programs.

Maintaing records

There is no use introducing a new eLearning program if training records cannot be tracked or saved. Tying into to concept of support, a system such as a LMS should be addressed prior to the creation of an eLearning program, a system that can support training records and accurately reflect what training each person has undertaken. Within many large organisations today online training is compulosory. It is for such reasons that it is necessary that any education or training courses be accurately tracked and available to all employees.

Technology infrastructure

Before introducing a new eLearning program, an adequate level of technological infrastructure must exist to support it. As a new eLearning initiative is a big enough change for most, the introduction of a new technology infrastructure just to support it may result in an unsuccessful and erroneous attempt at introducing too much information at once. The technology that will support an eLearning system must already be established, tried and tested so that its ability to support the new program is never in doubt.

Content

The content of all eLearning programs must be correct. While the implementation of new systems can be difficult, it is absolutely imperitve that all data and information that is going to be made available by the eLearning program be checked and any problems or mistakes be reported prior to implementation. There is nothing worse than a new system being launched that is riddled with erros and mistakes, and often once an eLearning program has been introduced it is very difficult to go back and change content. When being made available on a large scale it is critical that all data and information stored in an eLearning program be correct.

While many other issues must be addressed prior to implementation of an eLearning program, the above few are very important and critical to ongoing success within an organisation.

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 27th, 2007 at 10:15 pm and is filed under eLearning Experiences. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.