Written By Prashanthi Simon
The demand for e-learning is increasing with each passing day. This is because of the changing learning needs of the learners and how e-learning enhances their performance and improves productivity. Most organizations today are adapting to e-learning, considering its flexibility and consistency.
Workforce.com, reports that 73% of employee training in Fortune 500 companies is delivered through online training methods and according to eLearning.com, 77% of American companies are already using e-learning. This demonstrates that e-learning is widely accepted as a convenient and cost-effective method of learning by various organizations in order to train their employees.
Furthermore, e-learning specifically caters to training on a variety of subjects such as software training, product training, compliance training, and just-in-time support. It enables companies to provide trainings not only to its employees but also to the channel partners and customers. Consistency is another most essential element in e-learning. All individuals receive training of the same quality.
E-learning has become the most competent and self-driven method that helps achieve organizational objectives. Firms today are spending much on online training activities. The statistics given here helps us to understand the extent to which e-learning is being used. Global Industry Analysts, Inc., (GIA) states that corporate training is a $200 billion industry and the share of e-learning is $56.2 billion. This is expected to reach $107 billion by the end of 2015.
The latest trends in e-learning in the last few years have brought in revolutionary changes that address and resolve the training needs of different organizations and learners, bringing learning into their pocket, so to say. With the advent of tablets and smartphones, mobile learning has come to play a major role in the field of training. Responsive learning design is another new learning paradigm that facilitates the development of online courses, which are responsive on varying screen sizes and multiple devices. Rapid authoring tools have cut down on development time. Using these tools, it is now possible to develop courses in 40% lesser time than the actual development time. Gamification gives an interesting experience to learners to learn efficiently and it keeps the learners engaged throughout the course.
The trends in e-learning have a profound impact on the learners’ mind and help retain information better.
Let us now understand how e-learning benefits organizations
1. Mass Training: A large group of employees may be trained at a single time and online training may be rolled out in a short span of time.
2. Flexible: E-learning is very flexible when it comes to anytime, anywhere learning. It is self-paced and may be pursued by learners as per their choice. There are no concerns related to logistics when it comes to online training.
3. Training content is updatable: The training content may be updated and learners may refer to the course as and when required.
4. Self-assessment: E-learning helps the learner to evaluate self-performance and gives instant feedback. The learner may go through the course several times and repeat the assessments in case he fails the first time. This motivates learners to make immediate corrections and re-take the test.
5. Motivation: E-learning engages learners with different strategies like interactivities, storytelling, gamification, and so on. This helps the learners to be motivated toward completing the course.
6. Tracking: E-learning helps track the progress of learners with regard to the courses attended, time taken to complete the course, scores obtained, book marking that may be done using LMS.
7. Consistency: The learning standard is consistent for all learners.
8. Customized learning needs: E-learning addresses the most specific learning needs of the learner and makes the course more engaging.
9. Improves online skills: Online learning enables the learner to be more tech-savvy and knowledgeable.
10. Translations: With good translations, e-learning may be implemented globally across various cultures.
11. Precise content delivery: This is one of the most unique elements of e-learning. The content is precise to the specific point. This approach helps eliminate outdated content and include only essential content.
E-learning is a boon; it is customized learning that is designed to cater to your learning needs. It emphasizes on the developmental activities for the learners and results in a fun-filled learning experience.
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