The E-Learning Revolution - technology transforming training

Training & Development, Dec, 2000 by Patricia A. Galagan

Jeff Schwartz also sees technology enabling new things, but says the more important point for the profession is that "what we're doing in the learning space mirrors what businesses are doing as they restructure around the Internet."

Adds Schwartz, "We're seeing a much more pronounced interest in learning from senior executives beyond the HR or training worlds. In boardrooms around the world, the same question is being asked: How can I reinvent my company around the Internet before some Internet company takes me out?" E-learning enters the picture when CEOs realize they must transform their companies in 12 to 18 months, not in the three to five years it typically takes with a classroom model of learning.

Few CEOs, or their training advisors, choose a cold-turkey move away from classroom training. Most efforts are a blend of c-learning and e-learning. Yet, Schwartz still sees many training execs looking for ways to complement large instructor-led approaches with technology instead of looking at how things could be done differently with e-learning. "We encourage our [trainer] clients to really focus on the technology part," says Schwartz.

Counting what matters

It has always been tough to isolate and measure the results of training. The decades-old Kirkpatrick evaluation model is still the blueprint for many trainers, even those who admit that its Level 4 (measuring the return-on-investment) is a nirvana seldom reached. The GartnerGroup has found that doing a Level 4 analysis costs at least twice as much as the training it measures. Will such classic measures as student reaction and even ROI be swept aside by the e-learning revolution?

KnowledgePlanet's Miller sees traditional measures of ROI changing "as we move toward knowledge-based businesses and a workforce that is measured by its ability to convert ideas into services, not products. But it's not happening yet." Pressure will come when companies have "mission-critical issues they really want driven by individuals, not by a corporate-mandated training program. Then you may see companies rewarding people for taking the initiative to acquire and use new skills and for aligning that effort with corporate goals."

Some of the most interesting developments in corporate learning are coming from new entrants to the training supplier market, especially those with lots of capital and corporate officers who come from fields other than training, such as games, systems development, and entrepreneuralism. As these new players rush to brand themselves and fight off competitors, they are attempting to invent better learning models, give learners more control, and integrate learning management into other business systems.

In the process, they're questioning many of training's oldest assumptions. Everything from what constitutes a basic unit of instruction to how to evaluate the success of learning programs is being reexamined in the light of what technology permits, and what matters to the business. That is bound to produce some innovations, and some discomfort, for training fundamentalists.