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Tata Learning Forum unveils key trends

Learning NewsMPS Interactive Systems

Some 150 of Europe's top exponents of e-learning met in London this month to discuss the industry's key trends and issues. Organised by global e-learning pioneer TATA Interactive Systems (TIS), attendance at the conference - the Tata Learning Forum - was by invitation only.

At the conference, IBM's Piero Graneli, revealed that IBM's survey of CEOs in 2004 showed that they believe that the biggest challenge to top line growth in their businesses is 'people issues' - especially 'education'. From IBM's research, the emerging trends in learning include placing increasing emphasis on:

- Learner empowerment - learners are becoming responsible for their own learning rather than having learning 'done to them'.

- Collaborative learning - recognising that some 80 per cent of what humans learn is learnt by 'being and doing' on-the-job, through connecting with other people and the environment.

- 'Embedded learning' - a revised and updated version of 'electronic performance support systems' (EPSS).

- Learning being about 'reaching outside the organisation' to customers and suppliers - passing on an organisation's knowledge to these in order to build loyalty.

Sanjaya Sharma, CEO of TIS, outlined five major trends in the modern world of learning:

- The delivery of learning materials to mobile devices is increasing rapidly.

- Outsourcing both HR activities and the production of training/learning materials is also increasing rapidly.

- Increasingly, many training managers are being expected to rollout learning programmes globally - which indicates the growing globalisation of business.

- Those providing the input for learning programmes - the teachers - are, increasingly, being drawn from anywhere in the world, making their knowledge and expertise available to anyone, anywhere in the world, and thus making 'learning' a truly global activity.

- The growing realisation that 'learning' is merely a blanket term - like 'fruit' rather than 'banana', 'mango', 'apple' and so on. Consequently, those commissioning 'learning programmes' are becoming more discerning and, so, are now asking for 'simulation-based', 'story-based' or other, more specific forms of learning materials.

Other topics covered during the TLF conference included:

- 'Accessibility and e-learning', with contributions from British Airways' Alison Walker and David Prescod, of BECTA. Prescod commented that learning materials producers must translate generic standards to specific products - especially products related to IT skills. He said that the way to make these learning programmes accessible by disabled people is to shift the paradigm on which they are constructed from simulation to application training.

- 'The implementation and take-up of e-learning', with presentations by Vodafone's Gordon Bull; Angela Nicol, of Belgium-based SCA Packaging, and Rubin Siddique, of Lufthansa Flight Training, Germany.

- 'The integration of learning into the workflow process', from John Kusi-Mensah, head of knowledge management operations at Zurich Financial Services.

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