There’s a big problem in the online learning world. There’s content out there that’s of marginal quality at best, and corporate budget-meisters look askance at the prospect of more spending in the field with uncertain payoffs. Although higher quality is p
by Site Staff
March 1, 2006
There’s a big problem in the online learning world. There’s content out there that’s of marginal quality at best, and corporate budget-meisters look askance at the prospect of more spending in the field with uncertain payoffs.
Although higher quality is possible, it comes at a price. Outside content from commercial vendors can be customized, but the cost of obtaining a high-quality product might be out of reach. As a result, compromises are often made, offshore vendors are used and “good enough” becomes the standard. There is another way.
In the conventional view, the corporation wants compelling, high-quality content at a reasonable price, and the provider wants to make a reasonable return on its effort. Since these requirements seem 180 degrees apart, the quality of the content is often sacrificed to find middle ground. We are saddled with the paradox that in many cases, the higher the quality of design and content, the more useful it will be. But the more expensive it is, the less likely that we’ll risk our limited budget to achieve it. So we spend less, get less and online learning fails to achieve sustainability.
Turning the problem sideways allows us to find a win-win scenario. By effectively syndicating the developmental burden among several organizations, including some “virtual” clients, the cost can be reduced while maintaining high quality. Virtual syndication allows a provider and a client to engage in a partnership with the understanding that the provider will offset much of the cost by selling the same product to additional clients down the road, with or without customization. The client puts skin in the game by sharing the development cost and by making professional staff and potential users available during the development process. The vendor and the buyer thus become partners in the endeavor.
Last year Cisco’s marketing and HR organizations worked with Monitor Group to launch a collaborative process to design a next-generation online learning solution. The partnership revealed what is possible when both parties sit on the same side of the table. “We were able to discuss our value transaction not only in dollars and cents, but also adding the critical aspects of expertise and experience,” said Matt Tabor, senior learning and design manager for Cisco Systems Inc.
The project produced extraordinary results:
- An exchange of multiple value points providing design expertise from both organizations, content from Monitor and iterative usability testing during production at Cisco.
- A program that Cisco used internally to launch a global marketing change process that has received rave reviews from marketers.
This solution combined the best of both organizations to create a new standard in online learning: recursive simulations in place of linear branching cases; a product equally valuable in stand-alone, blended and collaborative modes; and the flexibility of personalized approaches to learning. The design integrates learning and brain theories using reflective, intuitive, passive and interactive pathways to the same content. The program has two major pillars. First is to learn the content, and second is to apply it, supported by tools, insights and tips and “at a glance” graphical metaphors.
“I think we wound up with a unique and compelling product because the whole team had the shared interest of creating a great learning experience, even though our reasons for doing so were quite different,” said Queene Mavor, a Cisco learning designer who collaborated on the project.
Although the business model Cisco created requires a realignment of traditional thinking, it is also an innovative and successful solution to an intractable problem. The concept of virtual syndication might be the catalyst to generate economic leverage to resolve the endemic conundrum of cost versus quality. Perhaps an important component of the long-awaited tipping point to sustainability is at hand: a new way of thinking about achieving a level of quality, a compelling product and measurable economic benefit that will move this field forward.
Jonathon Levy is senior learning strategist at Monitor Group and former vice president for online learning solutions at Harvard Business School Publishing. He can be reached at jlevy@clomedia.com.