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Features

Published July 2008

The ROI of Reusable Content

  Mark Hellinger

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For today’s training organizations, learning content must be efficiently leveraged to serve multiple audiences, multiple contexts and multiple output formats in order to deliver training that meets each learner’s moment of need.  

In a recent blog posting, Chief Learning Officer magazine columnist Bob Mosher refers to the 20/30/50 model for delivering and teaching content. In this framework, the most effective and long lasting training results are derived from the following blended learning mix: 20 percent classroom training, 30 percent e-learning and 50 percent performance support.

The reality, however, is drastically different. On average, 60 percent of all training is still instructor-led; the vast majority of training investment is spent on converting this classroom training to e-learning; and, according to Bersin Research, only a small percentage of training organizations utilize on-demand performance support tools.

As an industry, we are far from delivering the ideal blended learning environment for learners. This is due to an overwhelming tendency to design and create content for a singular purpose. According to research compiled by Chapman Alliance and Brandon-Hall, the ratio of development hours to course hours is 34:1 for instructor-led training and 33:1 for converting PowerPoint from this instructor-led training to e-learning. This indicates that each time a new learning product is created, it’s basically done from scratch, even if the content is the same. This should give any CLO reason for pause.

As the shift from monolithic training courses to learning at the moment of need continues, training organizations must find a way to efficiently and cost-effectively meet the customization and performance support demands of learners. That means designing for reusability.  

Back to the Future
It’s well known that previous attempts at reusable learning content have come up short. As a result, many training organizations still remain skeptical about the reality of it. However, they do this at their own peril. Reusable learning objects are a sound and proven methodology. When they were introduced at Cisco in 1999, the key enabling technology – native XML content – simply lagged behind the concepts. However, almost 10 years later, the challenge of how to integrate proven XML publishing techniques with the SCORM standard has been solved.

Content reuse has been amazingly successful in other domains such as product documentation and publishing, and to not explore its potential for training organizations is rather short-sighted.

Reducing Cost, Speeding Development Aross Delivery Formats
Designing content for reuse allows content developers to author content once and package that content on-demand as printed classroom materials, Web courses, performance support or mobile applications. A few years ago, instructor-led training was the singular channel for learning. This resulted in a plethora of legacy content that today cannot be effectively reused for e-learning.

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