E-learning unleashes its real Power

Years back as a new entrant to the e-learning industry I found professionals going gungho about the benefits of e-learning. Today after all these years of learning on e-learning I realize that even at that time there were very few (in India) who could actually summarize the benefits of e-learning beyond the usual ‘global reach, lesser costs’ theory. Few could actually peer on futuristics.

E-learning today is working wonders. David Dewhurst, the Professor of e-learning at Edinburgh University has achieved a rare feat of actually saving thousands of animals from being slaughtered through his powerful computer simulations.

As always, I maintain that the key to a successful e-learning initiative is to understand change, understand that learning should be freed from the parochial clutches of professionals who do not want to look beyond Instructional Designing. Today, one has to think about the frontier. And to that end a professional experience in e-learning can replace the cognitive rigours of academics. Its the scholar who can unfolding knowledge from the darkest legions of the human mind.

Perhaps this will take a while to change, bogged as e-learning resources are with offshored work that goes little beyond working on Instructional Designing and development. Perhaps it will come at a later time when Indian e-learning professionals will realize that what they have missed in their long career in e-learning is the ability to think out of the box, of the far-fetched, innovative possibilities. Right now the issue is about survival, of feeding dependants, of two square meals a day.

Brands are not always the Best!

Just settled down with my work, I received yet another mail from the HR division of India's best known e-learning company based in Delhi. This was one of the several mails that I have received in the past. I was irritated. Inspite informing the company that I cannot join them, several times over, I was still receiving mails from this company. It was time I gave them a fitting reply, point-by-point. They deserved it.

THE EMAIL I WROTE

Dearest [],

Thanks for your offer. Unfortunately, as I have communicated to your earlier, I do not have any plans to join your company. To say the least my experience with your company has been extremely unpleasant. Your woeful remuneration, highly politicized work culture and poor recognition of performance makes it one of the worst places to work in the e-learning industry today. My allegations not baseless but are actual facts and is based on hard evidence. I have gathered these facts by talking to nothing less than 100 resources who have left your company in the recent past for reasons that I have mentioned above. The people who have left your organization also includes several senior resources (PMs and senior IDs) who have now joined companies like Genpact, Accenture and Satyam. Your attrition rates are amongst the highest in the industry. Just a few comparitive points where your company I feel scores low:

 
1. My present company gives me a flexi-timing that enables me to work more productively.

2. The work is project driven and no one is concerned how long I sat on my desk or wandered around (that makes me more responsible)

3. The annual increment is GUARANTEED between 25% to 100%. I am part of the strategic group in this company which means that I decide the communication strategy here and do not take the dictats of petty, incompetent managers.

4. I have a strict 5 days a week. And a 5 day strictly means 5 day.

5. A 5-star standard food (breakfast, lunch, dinner) that is supplied completely free.

7. I have free health insurance for me and my family.

Try rating your company on any of these points and see where it stands. For guys like me we are rarely fascinated by brands like yours. Your display of net profits and financial figures holds little value for me as I fail to see how it concerns me, whether you earn in millions or billions. For me, what matters the most are the finer organizational cultures.

I remember appearing for 5 rounds of interview in your company about 2 years back. And even while your incompetent HR executive kept saying all the while that the remuneration is not an issue, in the final round I was offered a 30k package per month -- a remuneration that was far less than what I was earning then. My writing this big mail has a specific purpose. I want to help you realize that all resources in Delhi cannot lured with false promises, tall claims or silly raazmataaz. There still are professionals like us who demand respect, who have a personal brand that is more credible, and who cannot beat around the bush sounding goody-goody words about brands like yours. Your International clients maybe awed with your brand but I am not.

Cheers!

Managing E-learning: Is this the trend?

Last week an acquaintance working in the e-learning industry sent me a joke (from this website) that, he opined, perfectly captured the essence of the project managers in the e-learning industry in India:

A man goes into a pet shop to buy a parrot. The shop owner points to three identical looking parrots on a perch and says, "the parrot on the left costs 500 dollars".

"Why does the parrot cost so much," asks the man.The shop owner says, "well, the parrot knows how to use a computer".

The man then asks about the next parrot to be told that this one costs 1,000 dollars because it can do everything the other parrot can do plus it knows how to use the UNIX operating system.

Naturally, the increasingly startled man asks about the third parrot to be told that it costs 2,000 dollars. Needless to say this begs the question, "What can it do?"

To which the shop owner replies, "to be honest I have never seen it do a thing, but the other two call him boss!"

Finally the Indian Government wakes upto E-learning

Better late than never. Finally the Indian Government has appreciated the potential of e-learning. The Department of Income Tax (DIT) has roped in NIIT for a innovative STE (Source-Train-Enable) programme where NIIT will select 5000 candidates for becoming ‘Certified Tax Return Preparers’. Over the past one decade even as India has emerged as a e-learning courseware development hub for global companies and governments, e-learning as a tool for training and education was ignored by the Indian government largely due to the apathy of its maladroit bureaucracy.

Let's hope that the wisdom of the Indian government grows as they adopt more e-learning initiatives for others departments. With a academician Prime Minister at the helm, there could be no better time than this for India to streamline its education, training and information dissemination initiatives through e-learning.

Who said e-learning comes cheap?

Journalists and regular writers have the unusual habit of sounding what sounds sweet. For instance claims that e-learning is cheap has has rattled the pillars of learning for long. Everyone is gung ho on the "low cost" as they peruse through arbit reports and features on the subject. But that's just a common opinion -- the ground realities say that elearning is definately COSTLY.

Lets consider a scenario in India and calculate the cost factor.

First, the actual competent e-learning resources do not come cheap. This since learning is not about being able to write a script in flawless english and then prinking pictures here and there. True learning experts are people who have honed their skills after years of toil.

At the delivery end, any e-learning course has to run on a system such as an LMS that enables the administrators to track the learning progess. LMS prices are not cheap. Even an average LMS can be bought at nothing less than 40-50lakhs. Add to it the enhancements and maintenance involving a team of programmers.

Finally when the e-learning course is deployed that's not the end. Its just the beginning. Apart from a few subjects such as softskills, most courses would require updations and enhancements. This too requires a cost.

For the ones bugging the naive with all that "cost talk", I suggest that they look at elearning holistically -- the dynamism, the expertise required, the delivery mechanism, the constant maintenance and updations required and so on. Its not a magic pill that will erode all learning problems once and for all.

Terrorism E-learning courses now!

E-learning is a clear winner. E-learning has finally caught on with terrorism. Its news for the e-learning fraternity that Informa has joined forces with the Centre for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence (CSTPV) at the University of St Andrews to offer the first transnational e-learning course in the study of terrorism. The 16-week course enables participants to receive a solid grounding in the causes, consequences and responses to terrorism.
And now the flip side. Even while the terrorism courses are being created one wonders whether actual terrorists will get hold of these courses and redefine their modus operandi. The other concern is that terrorism as a subject is extremely dynamic and requires real-time capture of data without which the courses will become a mere "content junk" as they will not be enable learners to practice their learning in countering terrorist attacks or making any difference to this onerous issue that impacts the society at large.

However, the attempt to develop e-learning courses for terrorism is laudable. The first stride is important. The rest will follow.

Thomson sells NETg with a Thud!

Finally the giant e-learning division was sold off to its competitor. Thomson's prestigious e-learning division Thomson NETg was bought by SkillSoft plc, its e-learning rival, for a whooping $285 million. And as this huge money changes hands the fate of about 300 employees lurks in the dark.

While selling off Thomson NETg Richard Harrington, the Chief Executive Officer said that though Thomson Learning is an excellent business it "does not fit with our long-term strategic vision."

So while the deal closes by the first half of 2007, a more pressing concern confronts Indian companies, particularly the ones that were dependent on NETg for a good chunk of their business. What of the employees that were recruited by these Indian vendors who have spent a major part of their lives only working for developing only NETg courses?

With Skillsoft at the helm now, getting NETg projects for Indians companies will remain a challenge for the days to come. Its likely that Skillsoft will analyze Indian vendors now on more stringent parameters.

Unpredictability undoubtedly is the king in e-learning.

NASSCOM should rank E-learning Companies!!

Its time we struck a fine balance between authentic claims and misleading information. As the e-learning industry in India gets innundated in unsolicited claims by e-learning companies that they are "Best in India" and the "Largest", its become all the more essential to seperate the wheat from the chaff. The ramifications of such loud claims have been pretty expensive and tasking for clients. Though an exact figure is not available there are countless instances where global clients have learned their lessons the hard way -- that financial figures and gigantic sizes are not always an indication of the e-learning capabilities. Some organizations like the General Motors have already learnt from experience that offshoring e-learning development to India is not always about cost-cutting. There's more to it.

Its time NASSCOM comes forward and provides a robust mechanism to rate all e-learning companies in India. Not only will this help in generating more trust but will shove aside the incompetent players who have been bringing the industry to disrepute.

NIIT receives Dataquest Award 2006

Its time for NIITians to rejoice. NIIT has bagged the Award for being No. 1 IT Training Company in India from Dataquest. Dataquest cited that "NIIT...is now nearly 1.5 times bigger than the combined revenues of the next 4 players put together."

I think a broader and a better analysis by dataquest for the award would have been to analyze the leader in developing quality training courses -- perhaps an average of revenue, reach and impact. NIIT is 1.5 times bigger does not sound impressive. Size unfortunately fails to impress everyone. Its time we think beyond simple size and economics.