Economics: Cheaper always has a price

I was driving through our neighborhood recently  with my son on the way back from soccer practice.  It was one of the first really warm days of Spring, so many of the local shopkeepers were busy outside their stores cleaning windows, sweeping sidewalks and putting out colourful chalkboard signs that promised great deals and upcoming sales.  It was one of these signs that caught my son’s eye, outside the local Pet store.  The sign’s proclamation was simple, if not devastating.  Printed in a bold black font,

“Going out of Business Sale”

Reading the sign took only a second, but I knew the impact would last far longer.  Ask most parents in our neighbourhood (any neighbourhood I suppose) and they will say the same thing. The local pet store is more than just a place to buy food for their cherished family member…. it’s a mini zoo, where they can spend an hour on a Sunday afternoon… a place that in their children’s eyes, is filled with wondrous creatures great and small.

As a proud Canadian business owner myself, I am always saddened to see a local business fail, but this particular closing was especially troubling.

My son knows all too well, the sacrifices a family endures when they own their own business…. the weekends spent working…. the late nights… the endless “give me second” references, signalling that he should come back to talk to me later.  These are all too familiar, but made worthwhile when we succeed, which thankfully my company has been able to do.  But I do not think until that very moment, he had realized that sometimes a business can fail, even one as wonderful and joyous as our local pet store.

Naturally he asked ‘why’?

“Could be any number of reasons,” I said. “But, most likely, it’s because they couldn’t compete with the bigger pet stores”.

“What do you mean, they couldn’t compete; because they are small?” “Does that mean your company will go out of business too?”

“No, we’re just fine. What I mean by ‘compete’, is that some companies (large companies) can buy the things they sell to customers much cheaper than smaller stores can, because they paid less to get them. So their customers are happy, because they save money when they shop there.”

“Yes,” he said jumping in… “but the people working in the small companies aren’t happy, because now they don’t have a job.”

“Yah,” I sighed. “That’s economics; cheaper, always has a price.”

Naturally this conversation, got me thinking about my business. Pathways is a learning technology company. We are by all accounts successful. Growing, employing Canadians. But we don’t sell widgets. We sell services that become products. eLearning, gaming, animations, simulations etc. Our cheaper options would come in the form of people. We could outsource. Many in our industry do. It’s easy. In most cases, no one has to be the any the wiser. We could pass the savings on to our customers. Then everybody wins, right?

I know that ‘cheaper always has a price’. I know that local talent must be fostered and supported for our customers to really enjoy what we’re selling. I also know that you can outsource yourself right out of a job. It all comes around eventually.

Before writing this entry, I asked one of my colleagues what he believed our competitive advantage was. He paused for a moment and said, “We care. All of us. We all care. We may not always be perfect, but we care about what we do – because we see the direct impact of our work on our clients. If you don’t know your customers, how can you care about them?

He was right.

Small business owners know how much each and every client matters. They have to, because their livelihoods depend upon each and every one of them. People often talk about small business being the life-blood of our economy, but the real measure of those words comes when we make choices to buy our pet food somewhere cheaper.

Gamification Introduction

Several recent surveys conducted this past year estimate there are 1.2 billion people worldwide playing video games, spending up to 3 billion hours a week.  Of that number, the Sony Network boasts 110 million users for their PlayStation console while Microsoft numbers are at 50 million for their Xbox 360 and One platforms.  That leaves over a billion people playing video games on” non-console” formats, such as their personal computer or laptop, phone or other handheld devices.  Understanding that, is it any wonder that more and more instructional designers are using gamification” as part of their projects?

Gamification is defined as the “application of common elements of game playing as a means to encourage engagement with a product or service” *.  For example, awarding points, playing against or being in competition with other users, having a set rules of play to follow, etc.  So basically, using the elements over a billion people have become familiar with to help them learn.

In the upcoming weeks I am going to delve deeper into the phenomena that is gamification and discuss in more detail how instructional designers and programmers are partnering to create eLearning modules that are using gamification in many creative and exciting ways.

To learn more about gamification and other eLearning training solutions offered by Pathways please visit our website at http://www.Pathwaysinc.ca

What should you expect working with Pathways?

Extensive eLearning Experience

Highly engaging and interactive elearning takes skill and experience. It requires not only the ability to create these tools but the ability to create them in a way that ensures business outcomes are achieved. Our team of Instructional Designers and eLearning Developers work at bringing your training to life and have years of experience doing it. This is at the core of our business and we have 10 years of experience creating hundreds of modules on almost any topic you can think of.

Working as Partners

When we come on board to help with your project, we essentially become part of your internal team. Although we may not be down the hall from you, it will feel that way. Our ability and desire to be a flexible and responsible vendor will be evident as we work together to get to the finish line. Regular reviews, status updates, conference calls and even in-person meetings (when possible) are to be expected.

Competitive Pricing

Pathways understands that everyone company has different size budgets and we will work with you to give you the best possible solution that works with yours. Our team will come up with creative solutions to bring your elearning to life and hit your business objectives.

 

 

3 Tips for Creating Effective eLearning

eLearning can be a very successful training medium if executed well. The rollout of eLearning programs can save organizations on training costs, with the added benefit of faster delivery and the reach of a wider scope of employees.  Creating eLearning that is both effective and engaging however, can sometimes be challenging.

Here are three tips that are useful when working on eLearning projects.

 Learning Objectives

Having a clear idea of what your learning objectives are helps to shape the content of your course.  When writing objectives, be specific and focus on connecting these goals with what you want learners to take away at the end of the learning. By making objectives clear and concise, I find that I am better able to focus in on creating targeted evaluation pieces.

 The importance of great images

Images can truly help bring life to learning. That being said, not all images are created equal. When selecting images, try to include those which help to connect content to the real world. Learners tend to grasp information more easily when presented with a quality visual.

Also be mindful of including the right image size and provide the correct placement to match the content being presented.  Choosing images that really connect to the subject matter can help make concepts more relatable to learners.

 Create engaging learning

Because eLearning cannot necessarily cater to learners in the same manner as classroom training would, it is important to incorporate activities that are engaging and can keep learners interested in the subject matter. Since adults learn by doing and are most engaged when all senses are utilized, creating activities that appeal to multiple senses can be highly effective.

An example that uses a learner’s visual, auditory and kinaesthetic senses for instance can be a game. If done well, games can serve to positively affect the learner’s ability to understand and retain complex material. The advantage of activities such as these is that the content can seem less daunting and more fun, as learners are rewarded for their participation.

 

This list is not everything that is needed but provides a few key guidelines to consider when conceptualizing and designing eLearning. To learn more about the work that we do at Pathways please visit our website athttp://www.pathwaystrainingandelearning.ca/.

eLearning Trends 2016 – Cloud-Based eLearning Solutions

There are quite a few concerns about surrounding cloud-based elearning solutions such as a lack of IT support resources, data security or unreliable access. While these are all valid, great strides have been made to resolve those issues and provide a solution that has a great many benefits.

Firstly, cloud solutions are easy to use and support. You don’t need to install software on each computer and you don’t need specialized IT staff to maintain the system; this is all done by your solution provider. Another benefit is probably the most important to most organizations – cost. You can customize your solution so that you don’t have to pay for features that you don’t need. Another advantage is the cloud can be accessed anywhere by different devices so geography doesn’t play in as a factor.

Lastly, for those who are losing sleep over data security, there are a variety of safety measures that can be used such as data encryption and SSL. You can also password protect your platform to allow certain individuals access to certain areas of the training.

Contact me at matttklinger@pathwaysinc.ca to learn more about how we can help you with your elearning needs.

2016 eLearning Trend to Watch – Big Data

You don’t need to be an IT expert to have heard the expression “big data”. This refers to large quantities of data that are gathered and analyzed to expose different patterns, tendencies, and associations. This can be a very useful tool when considering your elearning objectives and how big data stats can help fine tune your training based on concrete stats. Most elearning solutions require a custom approach so why not take advantage of big data analytics to help custom tailor your learning activities?

Making sure that your learning solutions have effective reporting tools and user feedback will only help as you move forward with whatever training projects you have. Let the big data you have access to help you focus on key areas of your elearning course design and research!

Why (and how) you should incorporate badging into your eLearning strategy

Remember the participation badge you got for showing up to your grade 9 track and field competition? This isn’t that.

I’m talking about acknowledging the mastery of knowledge and skill sets to encourage iterative and deep learning. Done properly, badging can recognize the internally motivated among us.

But I don’t want to dismiss my (and your potential) initial resistance to badging because I believe it helps us better focus on the success criteria for valuable badges. Badging meets resistance because those of us who got participation badges considered them utterly worthless and we did so precisely because they were issued to anyone who managed to just show up for the race. To participants who trained for the day and genuinely competed, the badge was insulting and demotivating. Done hastily or half-heartedly, badges can discourage learning. To be effective, badges must:

• Be issued selectively, probably on the basis of some pre-established criteria,
• Be issued by a credible person or institution and
• Be publishable (or displayable) in a place that is meaningful to the recipient.

Effective badging requires planning and preparation in both the design and build (development) phases of your eLearning project.

Designing badges

As any member of the scouting movement will tell you, participants are required to complete a tasks and then present evidence before being they are awarded merit badges. Badges in eLearning should mirror this structure. If you have established performance outcomes and rubrics (your learner success criteria), you’re on the road to badging.

However, if you only have a fuzzy idea of what the performance outcomes should be, then you need to invest more time in the planning and design phases of your project to establish these criteria before you are ready to leap into the world of badges. An eLearning vendor can help you identify performance outcomes and map them to a learning strategy so that your badges are relevant. Already have those success criteria defined? Beware of badging overkill. Don’t apply badging for mandatory content as it defeats the motivational purpose of badging and rapidly diminishes their stock.

For badges to be valuable to learners, they must have a compounding effect. A single badge tells something of a learner’s interests and skills, but an amalgam of badges tells a fuller, interwoven and altogether more interesting story about their interests and abilities. Its this prospect of telling the fuller story that motivates learners to seek out, accumulate and display badges for professional development. (More on displaying badges in the section below.) Done properly, badging should be integrated into your eLearning strategy.

Building badges

At their heart, badges are images with metadata; metadata are what distinguish a meaningless participation badge from a sought-after badge for professional development. Badge metadata contains information on the evidence of a learner’s concept mastery, the validity of the issuer, the duration of the badge’s validity and any other vital information the issuer wishes to communicate.

On the subject of the duration of a badge’s validity, setting time limits (or expiry dates) on badges makes perfect sense as most knowledge and skill sets require maintenance to remain current. Once expired, badges shouldn’t disappear. After all, the currency your skill and knowledge set is not the same as not having that skill or knowledge set. Your badge’s metadata will determine its credibility, so consider this issue with care.

Because badges need to be published in a place that is valuable to the learner, they must be platform agnostic. In other words, just as learners have the freedom to accumulate (or to elect to not accumulate) whatever badges they want in whichever order they choose, so too should they have the freedom to decide where and when to make those badges visible. If you’re delivering your learning via LMS, find out if your LMS supports badges and if they can be exported from your LMS to be published on other platforms such as LinkedIn.

Getting started

Properly planned for, designed and delivered, badging can support learning in the modern world by providing relevant, flexible, interesting and valuable methods of credentialing. So how do you get started? I firmly believe that experience is the key to relevant instructional design and development. You can’t design and build badges without first experimenting with them as a learner. Go out and earn some badges!

Virtual Reality and 3D Simulation for Training

Using 3D or virtual reality environments as part of your training methodology creates a whole new aspect of your training that will enhance your learner’s experience. This type of technology breathes life back into traditional online training and stimulates greater enthusiasm and interest in a course which translates into greater retention. Virtual reality scenarios can be used to test the knowledge gained from elearning in a life-like situation, allowing you to see what decisions the learner makes and how they react to the consequences. These simulations can replicate a variety of real-life occurrences such as human actions and behaviour. People usually learn best when they learn in real life and this is the next best thing to that, especially with high quality graphics and interactive scenarios.

By enabling learners to directly interact with their learning materials, virtual reality makes courses immersive and entertaining, thereby increasing engagement and motivation to learn, and also appeals to different types of learners in a way that standard eLearning does not

How to good instructions write

 

Steps Instructions 1 2 3 Bulletin Board Sticky Notes

This morning I was browsing my “Home” screen in LinkedIn, looking for motivation for a blog posting I needed to write that was long overdue. (I find that when stuck for a topic to discuss, seeing what those in my Network are commenting on can sometimes get the creative juices flowing) For about 10 minutes I browsed a few articles and postings, choosing to ignore the mathematical challenges as I already know from last week’s quiz I am a smarty pants, and as well bypassing the motivational poster postings as I have not forgotten it is important to be nice to customers.  And then…. A posting from a 2^nd connection in my network that enticed me by proclaiming I was one click away from previewing an interactive learning demo.  The posting included a few instructions which I reviewed and then, my curiosity perked, I selected the link that was labeled “demo” and that is where my interest ended.  Immediately I found out the demo would not work with certain types of browsers, and even the supported versions would need a special update.  Another link offered help, but that only directed the user to a generic Java page with no special instructions on how to resolve the issue.  I went back to the starting point to review the instructions again; certain I had missed something as the browser I was using is very common.  Nothing was missed.  Seeing enough, I closed the open screens as I had all the motivation I would need for this week.

Writing clear instructions is not difficult.  In fact, in my opinion it is probably one of the easiest tasks an instructional designer or program manager can be asked to complete.   There is however one caveat that appears to get overlooked more often than not…and that is does the author of the instructions know how to do the task he or she is documenting?  In the example I mentioned above, my guess is the author never actually tried to view the demo through the website, and instead probably had the files saved on his computer and tested it there.  I am equally confident the “Help” link was put in as an afterthought, again with no further testing.  I could add a few more examples here but the point is this…when the author put pen to paper, he was flying blind…and it showed.

The learning demo example I discussed above is just one example.  I am sure just about everyone can think of at least 1-2 examples where they were left frustrated and angry as a result of not being able to follow provided instructions to a successful conclusion.  Worse, we feel dumb that we are not able to follow the steps that (we assume the author felt) were clearly laid out for us.  Electronics, furniture, software…even board games…all of these items often come packaged with instructions that for lack of a better word…. just suck.  For myself, I cannot help but get frustrated and upset since as I have already mentioned, writing a step by step guide is not that difficult, so when I see poor instructions I am left with the feeling that the author (or manufacture) thinks very little of the people buying their product, and probably also has long since come to the realization we will eventually figure out what to do.

So, with that said here then are what I would consider a few simple tips for writing instructions:

• Make sure you know what you are talking about.  If you cannot do the thing you are asking others to do, or worse have never tried, you are setting yourself up to fail.  Having a poor understating of the process will in all likelihood manifest in to instructions that lack detail in key areas and fail to highlight where special attention is needed.
• Start with the required tools. If the process you are detailing can only be completed using specific tools or other pre-requisites, mention these first.
• Highlight any pre-conditions. Does the process need to be completed at a certain time of the day, only through a specific website, on a flat service, etc.…
• Keep the instructions short. If an explanation is running too long, make it in to two or three different steps.
• Be clear and concise. Tell the user what they should see and what to do if something does not look right.
• Identify and detail the help process. Provide instructions on how to get help if required, ensuring the steps are up to date and accurate.
• Describe what success looks like. Regardless if you are telling someone how to build a futon or install new software, ending with a description of what the final result should be or identifying how to know a process was successful is always a good idea, even when the final result is obvious.

That’s it for now.  Almost time for me to get back on my home page and see what’s going on….I might even try one of those math riddles.

 

Learning Trends 2016

Advances in technology have over the past few years served to shape the way in which learning is created and delivered across various mediums. Particularly with the ease of access to smart phones, tablets and laptops, how information is disseminated to learners is constantly evolving.  Learners prefer information to be delivered in quality chunks that are easy to understand and that minimize the time spent. Learners by their preferences therefore influence the future of learning.

Here are some learning trends to look out for within the next few years.

Augmented Reality

• Augmented Reality applications are created by imposing digital information unto physical infrastructures
• Wearable learning is gaining popularity in the market (e.g. smart watches for fitness tracking and health monitoring, Google Glass)
• The Augmented Reality market is growing at a rate of 15% per year. By 2018 it is estimated to become a $1 billion dollar business. (Source: Markets and Markets March 2014 report- Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality market.)

LMS Hosting

• The LMS market is expected to grow to an $8 billion dollar industry by 2018 (Source: Markets and Markets)
• A recent survey found that 59.9% of organizations chose to house their LMS on a vendor site, while 33.5% chose to house it on-site, and 6.6% chose a third party.
• Vendor support is ranked highest among reasons for switching to a vendor site. (22.9%) (Source: Brandon Hall Group, LMS Trends 2015)

SHIFT to HTML5

• Device agnostic learning (responsive design) is becoming more popular. Learners want the flexibility to access content on various devices with more ease.
• As a result, Flash usage has decreased by 25% and there has been a shift to HTML 5.

These trends are highly driven by developments in new technologies created to improve the efficacy of how learning is delivered. As well, advancements within the field are quickly evolving the way in which learning is approached within various sectors.