Introduction
In addition to the modules on various business topics published on this site, a regular update on corporate e-learning issues will be posted monthly; review Purpose. Readers should be aware of and read the associated Health Warning before acting on this update. Your commentator is Bob Little, click for Biographical Details.
Lost Balance
Balance Learning, the generic e-learning production company set up by Chris Horseman after he’d sold his previous generic e-learning production company, Xebec, to McGraw-Hill, for several million pounds, has gone into receivership. After several years of high-profile marketing, exhibiting at such shows as Learning Technologies and regularly having prominent advertising positions in trade magazines such as Human Capital Management, a number of people – both suppliers and customers - have noticed that the Balance Learning phones have been ringing but no one has been answering them. Finally, Amanda Dawson, from Balance Learning’s PR company, Michael Dawson Associates, revealed the reason for her client’s disappearance from the e-learning scene.
Comment: Another doyen of the old e-learning world has bitten the dust. Since Chris has already gone once (as Xebec) and returned (as Balance Learning), he may yet make another re-appearance. For the moment, however, we might conclude that the market for generic e-learning is far from buoyant.
Managed learning market consolidation
In a bid to consolidate the ‘managed learning’ market in the UK – said by NelsonHall, the outsourcing analyst firm, to be worth some £110m a year - KnowledgePool has acquired its fellow vendor independent learning outsourcing specialist, the Business Training Partnership (BTP). In 2007, KnowledgePool reported a 90% growth in revenues, achieving a turnover of £14.2m. BTP had 2007 revenues of £8m, representing a 56% growth over the prior year. BTP co-founder and former sales director, Craig Hyslop, will join KnowledgePool but Kevin Senior, BTP’s other co-founder and former managing director, will be leaving by mutual consent. The BTP brand will be discontinued. KnowledgePool received additional funds for the acquisition from Root Capital, the private investment company which bought KnowledgePool in 2004.
Comment: However you look at it, this sort of ‘market consolidation’ implies that the market isn’t really growing. I wonder why? And, looking at some of the other stories in this current blog, do you think that there is a pattern emerging?
The story that never was
A Government agency – based in Buxton, Derbyshire, in case you want to know – is, by all accounts, making great strides using a learning content management system (LCMS). Incidentally, in case you wanted to know, the LCMS has been supplied by Europe’s only ‘native’ content management and learning technology provider. This is the sort of on-going success story that should gladden the hearts of everyone in the ‘learning technologies’ sector and encourage the hesitant to ‘get involved’ with e-learning and its various impedimenta. Yet this story can never be told. The agency’s communications manager explained that publishing any news relating to this story ‘puts us in a difficult position - a government organisation seemingly endorsing a product… we have tight restrictions placed upon us when we choose to purchase products... We are basically allowed to say that the product fulfils our requirement and not much else. Further elaboration on how and why we use products can be seen as endorsement which is strictly against government guidelines.’
Comment: So please remember, you didn’t read about this here – not because the story isn’t true but because the Government don’t want you to know that their agents (and, actually, the general public – but we can’t disclose how) are benefiting from LCMS and related e-learning technologies.
Webconferencing is the answer – probably to every question
A recent survey conducted by communications consultancy group ICUGlobal has revealed that, from a poll of 300 organisations, 70 per cent rated ‘reducing organisational carbon footprints’ as a key driver in their organisation’s decision to invest in webconferencing and collaboration. The survey revealed that while organisations are constantly reviewing corporate travel and other communication practices for cost management reasons, the green debate is adding considerable impetus to webconferencing demand as this allows staff to meet visually, online, without needing to leave their place of work. This would not only save costs but generate environmental benefits in line with corporate social responsibility (CSR) targets.
Comment: So that’s settled then. Now that webconferencing appears to be saving the planet, maybe we can all turn our attention to achieving world peace. How about: if we all used more webconferencing, we could talk to more people around the world more of the time? In that way, we could all settle our multi-cultural differences without ever needing to leave our homes and we really would achieve world peace – except for places where online communications did not exist. But, apart from Antarctica and odd bits of central Africa, which would then have to become the world’s battlegrounds, life would be idyllic!
Mentoring potentially turns violent
Hi-Impact Mentoring® is the latest craze to hit the talent management sector. Created from detailed training programmes for mentors, ‘mentees’ and managers, Hi-Impact Mentoring® is a software module - from Insala’s talent management Solution Suite - that delivers an entire mentoring process and methodology.
Comment: Hopefully, the mentoring solution offered via this software is less violent – both mentally and physically – than its title might suggest.
Victimised by voicemail
Apparently, a Northern Ireland woman has won an unfair dismissal case after being sacked by voicemail. Marilyn Giboney said she found out she had been dismissed after picking up a message on her mobile phone while in hospital. The charity Victim Support Northern Ireland was ordered to pay the branch manager almost £17,000 after a tribunal ruled that her sacking was unfair.
Comment: I suppose it’s one way to drum up custom for a charity which exists to support victims: create some yourself. Presumably, Ms Giboney has subsequently sought support from the charity that sacked her in this way because she is, now, a victim – albeit one of the charity’s own making.