Consultancy at Epic
Two decades of experience have gone into developing a unique consultancy service at Epic which:
- Maximises ROI in people development and knowledge
management initiatives
- Increases cost-effectiveness of people development
- Improves business performance of individuals
and organisations
Our approach focuses on seven key tactical workstreams. This
practical, implementation-led methodology will help you:
Set your vision & goals
Learning is not an end in itself. Its purpose is to enable achievement
of business goals. To successfully implement blended learning, you
have to align learning with business goals.
The key questions that we will help you answer are:
- Why do you need to turn to e-learning and blended learning to
make learning more cost-effective?
- What are the drivers (business/performance improvement, cost
saving or increased flexibility and access to learners)?
- What is the vision for the future that will help align all
the future activities (you need an 'elevator pitch' or mission
statement)?
- How can you set measurable and achievable targets for your strategy?
- How can you identify sponsors for blended learning, and who
will develop/approve the strategy?
- How can you identify operational quick-wins to generate early
blended learning results?
Read
examples of Epic's work in strategy development
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Define your business case
You may have a broad idea of what you want to achieve, but it will
require funding and commitment before you can start on anything.
You will need to put together a business case to get the funding
you need for your blended learning strategy. You will also need
to put together individual business cases for many of the blended
learning programmes you hope to develop and implement.
We can help you:
- document your e-learning strategy
- align tangible and intangible benefits with the original targets
for your strategy
- develop and write business cases
- provide tools and develop capability in conducting ROI analyses
- integrate ROI analysis into the design process for blended
learning solutions
This agenda is likely to span the whole strategy development period
as you are unlikely to seek a single one-off investment. The need
for business cases will become a fact of life for all major training
requirements in the future.
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examples of Epic's work in business case building
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Create the best blend of training and support
How can you identify your existing programmes/sources of learning
and the future needs of the organisation? How can you assess where
these learning programmes are making a difference to the performance
of your people? How do you decide where increased use of all aspects
of e-learning could make a difference?
We can help you:
- define the optimal blends to best address the subject matter,
the target audience and the operational constraints and requirements
of the organisation (IT infrastructure, size of budgets, business
goals and direction etc.)
- work out the best way of resourcing learning content and delivery
- should it be in-house or external, off-the-shelf or bespoke?
- build a realistic model of blended learning to ensure you deliver
what you promise, given your current capabilities
- ensure that your training needs analysis is structured to take
optimal blend development into account
Read
examples of Epic's work in blended learning design
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Prepare your people
Perhaps you have a clear direction, funding and a clear idea of
what kind of learning is feasible now and in the future. In most
cases though, the barriers to successful implementation lie with
people and their natural resistance to change. So, you have to ensure
that your people are ready for e-learning. This can start well before
you launch any new programmes.
We can help you:
- assess the e-learning readiness of your learners, managers and
your HR community through focus groups, workshops and diagnostic
tools
- develop and implement change management programmes to move
your organisation towards a blended learning culture (potentially
focused around a key new initiative, e.g. leadership training)
- set up champion networks and awareness-raising campaigns
- market e-learning and blended learning within the organisation
- develop the capability of your learning developers and deliverers
in designing, developing and facilitating effective blended learning
programmes that meet the organisation's business goals
- develop the skills of your internal e-learning developers and
project managers
- create skilled teams of e-tutors and e-learning support staff
This is a key workstream that may extend well after all the others
have finished. Changing the current culture of learning may take
some time.
Read
examples of Epic's work in human infrastructure
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Prepare your technical infrastructure
Without an adequate IT infrastructure and ready access to new technology,
an e-learning strategy will inevitably flounder.
We can help you:
- assess the e-learning readiness of your IT infrastructure and
make recommendations for the future to support your blended programmes
- specify, develop or purchase managed learning environments
or learning management systems
- set guidelines for ensuring all content meets industry standards
(e.g. SCORM)
- select collaborative learning environments or virtual classroom
- support e-learners from a technical point of view
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examples of Epic's work in technical infrastructure
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Set your guidelines & procedures
To embed best practice and ensure that all the awareness-raising
work done earlier is sustained, you need to provide clear guidelines,
templates and procedures for each aspect of the design, development
and facilitation of blended learning.
We can help you:
- develop guidelines for learners, managers, learning facilitators
and support staff
- write procedures and templates for developers of e-learning
and blended solutions
- devise interactive design guidelines and templates for in-house
e-learning development teams
- run "train the trainer" programmes focused on blended learning
and e-learning
Read
examples of Epic's work in guidelines & prodedures
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Define how you implement & evaluate
Whatever your strategy, when you start to implement it, things
will seldom go to plan. You have to be able to evaluate as you go
along and modify your tactics and approach accordingly. The vision
may need revising, but it will tend to be your tactics that need
to be modified. Pilots can be an effective way of safely trying
things out. The key here is to "get it out there", gather meaningful
feedback, and modify your approach based on feedback.
We can help you:
- evaluate the effectiveness of initiatives or specific programmes
through ROI and appropriate metrics, that will show meaningful
returns to your steering group
- develop fast and effective feedback loops to gather feedback
data, and evaluate and modify any of your tactics or approaches
- develop a sustainable framework for evaluation and modification
of the strategy based on tactical feedback
Read
examples of Epic's work in implementation and evaluation
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