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"Internet-based
learning can help to capture and distribute valuable insights gained
by your employees...
What did you do on your last training course? No, you don't need
to try to remember, we all know the drill: Stay up far too late
and drink far too much in the bar, sit in an uncomfortable chair
listening to someone droning on about theoretical concepts far removed
from real life, then take an extended break to catch-up with e-mails
on the laptop.
Not for much longer, if Donald Clark has got
anything to do with it. That's not because he's a spoilsport, trying
to rob people of 'awaydays'. He just knows that conventional business
training doesn't work.
His card describes him as chief executive of Epic, Britain's biggest
e-learning company by some margin. But from the moment he sits down
it is obvious that he is not simply talking his book.
Psychologist, business analyst, entrepreneur. Guru, even. Use any
or all of these words if you like, but they do not tell the full
story. Born in West Lothian, Mr Clark grew up in Livingston, and,
while at Edinburgh University in the late 70s, he began 'playing
around with computers' as a hobby, before moving into video-based
training and later into computer-based training.
Interviewing him can only be described as a mind-altering conversation.
Take this example: 'For more than 2000 years teaching and training
have followed the same model - the sheep-dip approach based on chalk
and talk: you go to the lesson, or the lecture or the training session
and somebody transmits information.
'For all sorts of reasons that just doesn't work. For a start, most
of the information is never transferred to long-term memory, and
most students soon learn that they don't get their degree in lecture
theatres but in the library and in discussion.
'Now that model has been totally shattered by the Internet. What's
the Internet about? It's not just e-commerce. The Internet is the
world's biggest library - and it's there on your desk.
'That alone has the ability to transform education - my eight-year-old
has already discovered what that means - and it can also transform
business.' At a superficial level, this sounds like the kind of
soundbite that we got used to in the bad old days of the dotcom
boom - but as Donald Clark fleshes out his thoughts the difference
is soon apparent.
Issues such as the rise of the service economy, the growth of knowledge-based
work, increasing regulation and the growth of performance standards
in local and national government all give rise to new training needs.
And one of the drivers behind the growth of e-learning is that it
can be cheaper than traditional face-to-face methods, particularly
in large organisations. When times are hard, there's nothing wrong
with selling a technology and a service where cost reduction is
a key part of the business case.
But Mr Clark argues that cost reduction is simply a first-level
benefit, and companies have to look beyond that. The danger, he
says, is that in focusing on 'doing what we do already, but at a
lower cost', the other benefits - which could be grouped as 'doing
things we couldn't do before' - get overlooked.
When managers are forced to devote most of their energy to short-term
issues, if not actually fighting for survival, it is difficult to
think about issues such as growing intellectual capital: the skills,
knowledge and experience of its people.
The danger is obsolescence: just like plant and machinery, intellectual
capital loses value over time, as a result of technological, legislative
and social change, increasing complexity, the growth of information
and knowledge - to say nothing of staff turnover.
In Epic's vision, e-learning is much more than a mechanism for delivering
content. It is a way to promote collaborative learning and knowledge
sharing. In this context there are two different kinds of knowledge:
- Codified knowledge, for example the information
held in, or obtainable from, databases and documentation
- Experiential knowledge, such as techniques
and insight gained from personal experience
Distributing and managing the first kind of knowledge
can, or should, be straightforward. It involves familiar mechanisms
such as information standards, databases and data mining, networks
and intranets. E-learning can obviously help people to know where
and how to find it.
The second is rather different, not least because much of it is
inside people's heads. You have to capture and distribute it so
that it is not lost when those people are absent, leave the company
or are moved to other roles.
People in the knowledge management business have been thinking and
talking about this for years, but workable solutions are still thin
on the ground.
Epic proposes e-learning tools and techniques to develop what it
calls community-based knowledge management. These could include:
- An organisational vocabulary, so that
everyone talks the same language (at least on issues of product,
process or technology)
- Collaborative tools, such as e-mail lists,
online discussions and video conferencing
- Learning networks, which allow groups
to share ideas that can be made available to the rest of the organisation
Not everyone will buy into this kind of
knowledge management strategy, any more than everyone has committed
to e-learning. Not everyone will need to, but issues of training
and knowledge management have an important part to play in both
public and private sectors.
And while Mr Clark's office may be in Brighton, Scotland still has
an important place in his heart and head. He says that the increased
adoption of e-learning could boost the Scottish economy.
There's an obvious problem here. In the private sector, the Royal
Bank of Scotland is one of Epic's largest clients, and the list
includes a good chunk of the FTSE too. But cost and complexity mean
that it is beyond the reach of many of the smaller companies that
could benefit from it, as Mr Clark readily admits. 'If you employ
five to 30 people you are probably going home at night worrying
about how much cash is in the bank rather than thinking about intellectual
capital,' he says.
But there could be a way round that: the
Napsterisation of learning. Napster is an example of peer-to-peer
networking, in which individuals exchange information, rather than
pulling it off a central server.
The concept is being developed across the UK with local authorities,
which currently spend more than £600m on training every year. Much
of this is duplicated because there is no effective way of sharing
content and courses.
Epic
is working with 100 local authorities to run a trial collaborative
system. Each council will contribute part of the training jigsaw
and make it available to all the others. The project is still at
its early stages, but it is seen as a pilot that will provide answers
to key questions: Will everyone contribute? Will it fall victim
to the 'not-invented-here syndrome', with some authorities reluctant
to use others' content? How much management and tracking of users
is needed?
Mr Clark is already starting to think about how a similar model
could be developed for Scotland's business community. At this stage,
he says, it is only an idea - and, given Epic's track record over
the past ten years, it is one we are likely to hear more about."
The Napsterisation of learning (P2P) is
a white paper by Donald Clark. For a summary, click
here.
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