Resumen de ELearning in South East Asia
Praveen Sahijwani, Jacqueline Sivalingam, Alexandra Roza
In May and June 2005, the Cape Group conducted a comprehensive survey of the use of eLearning in South East Asian organizations. Countries covered in the survey included Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore and Philippines. The objective of the research was to uncover how organizations in South East Asia are using eLearning, to explore their reasons for choosing the eLearning path, key success factors and plans for the future. Questions asked to the organizations during the execution of the research included:
• motivations and expectations of learning programs • kinds of learning solutions implemented • content and outcomes of learning programs This research will provide eLearning practitioners with a comprehensive overview of the state of eLearning in South East Asian organizations today and how return on investment (ROI) is being measured and achieved. The results of this research will be compared to an earlier report published by Cape Group on the use of eLearning in Australia and New Zealand. To date, certain pertinent points have been identified from the research. One major takeaway point was that the eLearning solution is still in its infancy in South East Asia and that much still needs to be done in terms of people, process, content and technology. Majority of the respondents were multinationals whose eLearning solution is part of a regional or global strategy. As such, these organizations did not have much (and for some, any) contribution in the selection of the eLearning solution hence finding it difficult to enhance it to meet the requirement of the local organization’s business needs. Another significant finding was that most of these organizations are still struggling to fully utilize the eLearning solution and have no real measurement in place to track the expected benefits post implementation. The key challenges faced by South East Asian organizations in effectively using their eLearning solutions include User Adoption (Change Management) and Technology. User Adoption is a continued challenge for almost of the respondents due to reasons that varied across the organizations. The recurring reasons across the organizations were:
• Need for senior management support • Need for more engaging content Need for more localized content • Need for better learning management capabilities Key challenges surrounding technology cited by the respondents included:
• Lack of technology readily available to employees to access learning anywhere • Lack of consistently reliable access to the eLearning solution Lack of integration with other systems e.g. HR and/or Performance Management System Having implemented their eLearning solutions, the focus of all of the respondents is Special Issue of the International Journal of The Computer, the Internet and Management 29.2 now on solution capability enhancement, user adoption management and most importantly benefits measurement. All of the organizations interviewed were employing the standard techniques of gathering feedback and assessing learners to qualitatively measure the benefits of their eLearning solution. On the other hand as mentioned before in key challenges, majority of the managers interviewed confirmed that their organization was not quantitatively measuring the benefits of their eLearning solution due to lack of tools or understanding on how to do it.
