There is a real danger that increasing demands for mandatory learning are leaving internal training teams little time to focus on developing learning to improve business performance. Budgets are under increasing pressure with little left after mandatory training has been delivered. That was the message from a recent UK government roundtable event on learning. At the event, Kineo put forward a solution: use rapid e-learning to get more out of limited budgets.
Kineo’s Managing Partner Steve Rayson had the pleasure of attending the ’leading thinking in learning’ round table earlier this month hosted by the Department for Work and Pensions and organised by PA consulting.
The aim of the session was to:
ï Discuss current and emerging trends in the field of learning
ï Contrast different approaches to learning within organisations
ï Relate trends and approaches to learning challenges within large, complex organisations
Kineo was invited to join the debate along with other prominent e-learning advisors including Donald Clark, David Wilson and Donald H Taylor.
The session provided opportunities to reflect on the demands and challenges faced by internal learning and development teams. Three different government departments were present at the event.
One of the key points to emerge was that there has been an enormous growth in mandatory training including health and safety, diversity and compliance training. The nature of mandatory learning has meant most of the training budget was being consumed by mandatory requirements, which whilst valuable was leaving little scope for more business focused learning. One manager said that his entire training budget was effectively accounted for by mandatory learning.
What are the implications for training and in particular e-learning? In Kineo’s view, there is clearly a need for internal teams to find more cost-effective ways of delivering learning to free resources for other initiatives. Public sector training teams must look at rapid e-learning to generate better value for money.
Steve Rayson commented:
The challenge to deliver more for less has always been there for training teams. With budgets being cut, and so much of what’s left in the budget being allocated to mandatory training, the pressure has intensified.
The problem with using traditional e-learning to address mandatory or business performance issues is that is doesn’t deliver sufficient value for money. With outmoded development processes and high cost per hour, the experience of most buyers of e-learning that it costs too much and takes too long. By the time it’s delivered, the goals have changed, and internal teams are left with inflexible solutions developed in proprietary tools, usually with significant cost overruns. So it’s no wonder budgets are under pressure.
Our view is that internal teams can change this experience through rapid e-learning. Rapid approaches deliver better value by driving out cost and reducing time to delivery without any compromise in quality. This means more e-learning for less, freeing up capacity in limited budgets to do more and achieve better results.
We’ve achieved these aims at Cable and Wireless, BP, Google, Marks and Spencer and others, for both mandatory training and performance improvement. We believe the public sector can also benefit from this approach to relieve pressure on the public purse and generate better returns. We challenge the public sector to explore rapid e-learning for all our benefit.
Learn more about Kineo’s approach at www.kineo.co.uk.
Kineo will present and exhibit at Learning Technologies on January 30th and 31st at the Olympia in London. Learn more about Kineo’s rapid e-learning services at www.kineo.co.uk
Use rapid e-learning to get more from budgets, says Kineo
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