Improve Training, Cut Costs With E-Learning Programs.

Corporate e-learning is hot, red hot. International Data Corp. projects that the U.S. market will enjoy remarkable growth, rising from about $1 billion last year to more than $11 billion in 2003, a compound annual growth rate of nearly 80 percent Online corporate universities, which numbered

What's all the fuss about? Is there a wide-eyed fascination with this new technology? No. At the heart of corporate America's romance with e-learning is a very old passion: cost savings. Web-based instruction is saving companies some big bucks.

Research suggests annual savings of 40-60 percent among companies using anytime-anywhere online training instead of traditional classroom instruction. The savings are attributed primarily to greatly reduced travel and lodging expenses.

A recent study of domestic and foreign companies with e-learning programs by industry expert Brandon Hall concluded, Virtually all organizations far enough along to be measuring cost savings/avoidance and ROI report positive results."

IBM claimed $200 million in reported one-year savings from online learning. According to a Merrill Lynch study earlier this year, it cost Novell $1,800 for a four-day certification course three years ago that now costs just $700-900 over the Web, and this comparison does not include travel and lodging costs. A Cisco Systems instructor-led course costs $1,200-$1,800 compared to only $120 over the Web. Hewlett Packard saved $150,000 in outside testing costs alone through online learning. And the Merrill Lynch report states that the FBI's National Security Division saved $2 million when it developed an e-learning course to replace one full week of training at its famed academy in Quantico, Va.

Impressive savings, but do they come at the expense of the educational process? Do employees learn as much in cyberspace as they would seated in a classroom? Apparently, they do.

Studies show that retention of certain subject matter is as much as 250 percent greater with e-learning than with the classroom-based model," according to the Merrill Lynch report The improved retention is due to the just-in-time delivery of online training. Typically; e-learners study course material when they expect to use the new knowledge, whereas in classroom instruction, there's no telling when employees will actually put newly acquired skills to use. And as the saying goes, "if you don't use it, you'll lose it"

In addition to just-in-time delivery, there's the benefit of "just-for-me learning." Just-for-me learning refers to the ease with which online training can be customized to meet the training objectives of every employee throughout the company. Lacking the same degree of automation, classroom instruction is much more difficult and costly to customize.

Corporate e-learning confers other advantages, as well. Like 24x7 convenience. With Web-based training, employees can log on to their computers when it is convenient for them and their bosses; they can work training around their work and family schedules, and eliminate wasted time traveling to classrooms across the country.

Plus -- and this is one of e-learning's biggest advantages -- corporate training managers can use online learning software to help track and manage their training programs. Training typically falls under human resources, and as a cost center, its budget and benefits are scrutinized closely. The best solution captures, stores and retrieves meaningful data that measures the effectiveness, competency and impact of training. A comparable volume of data is simply unavailable from the records of classroom instruction.

But not all software is created equal, and companies should shop carefully.

The best solution allows a myriad of applications things like audio files, chat rooms and whiteboards to work together smoothly. It also delivers speed and reliability as tens, even hundreds, of employees participate in online classes.

The best platform has an "open architecture." An open architecture enables the solution to integrate with a company's other systems such as accounting, human resource and other back-office applications. And it can take weeks instead of hours to load or remove courses on software that does not have an open architecture; even then the software often will not function satisfactorily.

But effective, smooth-running corporate e-learning requires much more than good software. It requires good software as part of a comprehensive, end-to-end solution.

As companies take their first cybersteps or upgrade existing programs, they should look for an integrated solution provider that delivers:

Course, or instructional, design. The solution provider should help the company apply Web-based pedagogy to course material in order to leverage the advantages of Web technology, such as interactivity and group study. The provider should also help migrate the course content to the online learning software.

Enrollment tracking and reporting. Enrollment support should include handling inquiries online or by phone; tracking, reporting and generating rosters; and doing course registration, enrollment processing and billing both online and by phone.

Support services. The provider should teach the company's trainers how to use the software to its greatest advantage. It should invest time upfront to get everyone comfortable and enthusiastic because, quite simply, the solution's no good if it isn't being used.

Training updates, tutorials and forums - both online and off -- can be helpful, too.

Additional online resources. Lastly, an e-learning solution should offer employees additional online resources, such as a Web-based library. They need to be able to do research, and they should not be denied simply because the corporate university is not a traditional campus.

These are the chief considerations in selecting an end-to-end online learning solution. Together, they serve as a firm foundation for a cost-effective corporate program that empowers geographically dispersed employees to improve themselves and their performance, that attracts and retains the best and brightest workforce, and that supports competitively superior performance in our increasingly knowledge-based economy.

Heather O'Meara is President of JonesKnowledge.com Inc.