Fetishising Technology
One of the key mistakes organisations make in starting down the road to online learning and training is to overvalue the technology and undervalue the role of learning design, leading to the question: does the technology serve the learning or master it?
We may be winning the battle against the luddites, and slowly enticing the technology-timid to change with the times, but are we really doing this right?
It’s worth asking yourself a few questions, before getting out the purchase order:
Why do you need an all-singing all-dancing learning management system (LMS)? What are you going to do with all those features? How do they enable, enhance, support the learning?
What is it you actually want to achieve with your learning programme? What are the best approaches, methods, tools to meet those expectations? Is it possible that a smorgasmord of “old” or relatively bland technologies might do the job better?
Who is leading the project? Is it technology-led? Or is there a true collaboration between stakeholders?
Keep up on trends by all means, and try out the ones that seem to have promise, but remain flexible and adaptable and don’t have your head turned by every shiny new gadget that crosses your path.
And, above all, make sure you start the planning with expertise in learning design and strategy, before you purchase a big, expensive white elephant that looks pretty but doesn’t actually fit your needs.
September 27, 2011 @ 18:24
Taking a step backward from the technology – ultimately its about learning and the success of the learning – can the learning experience be delivered successfully online?, will the users engage, can they then go on and apply their learning.
And then how do you as the provider of the learning gauge its success both in user engagment and value to the user.
Technology is the delivery medium – the learning is the item that defines the success and the learning should stand on its own before the delivery medium is applied.