2/2014 http://www.business-spotlight.de 75TRAINING MANAGEMENTUm auch bei einer schwachen Konjunktur konkurrenzfähig zu bleiben, legen Unternehmen Wert auf
die Fortbildung ihrer Mitarbeiter. Welche Lehrmethoden bringen die besten Ergebnisse? Ersetzt der
virtuelle den traditionellen Unterricht? VICKISUSSENShat darüber mit Experten gesprochen.Smarter learning
W
hile training-industry
expert Jeanne Meister is
talking on the phone,
she is walking around
her office and checking
her Nike+ FuelBand, a “smart de-
vice” worn on her wristthat tracks
how active she is. She believes we will
one day be using such wearable smart
devices to help us learn.
This may sound far-fetched, but
by 2017, there will be more mobile
devices on the planet than people,
according to market-research firm
eMarketer. “We will continue to see a
movement to mobilize learning across
all these devices and a future of inte-
grating learning into wearable smart
devices,” says Meister.
Technology is one key factor chang-
ing the way we learn. But it is not the
only one. Increased work mobility,
the entry into the workforceof the
“millennial generation” (those born
between 1979 and 1999) and the
drive by firms to get more value out
of training are also powerful forces.“This is an absolutely wonderful
time to be in training,” says Doug
Harward, the CEOand founderof
TrainingIndustry.com, which pub-
lishes training-industry news, research
and best practice.“The number one trend we see is
away from asking learners what they
want towards training that brings
measurable results for the business,”
Harward says. Training budgets fall
with economic downturns, but to re-
main competitiveand attract talent,
businesses need well-trained staff. So
firms want to see value for money.
“For this reason, executivesare work-
ing more closely with trainers than
ever before. Suddenly, we are pretty
darnimportant in the company.”Harward sees technologyas the
second-biggest force of change. “Vir-
tual learning is now mainstream. The
challengefor trainers, therefore, is to
accept this proliferationof online
knowledge and to understand their
role in this learning system.”
That role is to help firms filter the
huge amount of information on the
internet for relevance to their business
and put it into a learning context.
Harward estimates that employees
typically gain 90 per cent of their
knowledge online, but there is a risk
that they might be misinformed. “We
can’t stop staff from using the inter-
net, but we can point them in the
right direction,” he explains.
Technology is enabling this. Train-
ers can put a curationtool called a“widget” on to a website and pro-
gramme into it certain parameters of
information that they want pulled
from that site. For example, only
video, or only information that
matches certain search terms. They
then use their pedagogical skills to
arrange the content into an online
learning portal, where staff can do
online courses or take “bites” ofadvancedbest practice beste Methode(n)
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* This symbol marks standard US pronunciation.74-77 Management main 2_14 24.01.14 11:03 Seite 75