Online training grows in dominance
No more pencils, books or dirty looks: Mounting evidence shows that online training is getting top grades from employers.
A study by technology research firm IDC, for example, predicts that by 2003 the web will snare 80% - or $40 billion worth - of the employee eduction and development market.
Some of that growth will come through cooperative efforts such as LearnShare, a consortium of non-competing Fortune 500 companies including General Motors and Owens Corning. The group now provides Web-based career development and skills training to 2.5 million employees worldwide.
Nancy Swanson, managing director of HR development for consortium member Northwest Airlines, says she has come to rely on LearnShare not only for access to 500,000 employee training courses but for the program's "large community of professionals who are willing to shae their processes, successes, and lessons learned."
(To read more about LearnShare, see Karen Lee's article "Consortium helps companies pool buying power for training" in the April 15 issue of Employee Benefit News at http://www.benefitnews.com/subscriber/00_04_15/quality1.aspx.
For smaller markets, CyberU provides 17,000 online courses for employee skills training and development, including free interactive courses in English language. CyberU offers classes, certificate programs and degrees in arts, business, family, humanities, science and technology from leading educational institutions such as U.C. Berkeley.
Educational benefits are often cited as part of an effective recruiting and retention strategy. Perhaps that's why Kaplan Inc., publisher of study guides for standard academic tests, reports that many employers are giving online test prep courses through Kaptest.com to employees as holiday gifts this year.
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