aLearning Podcast Interview

Jeff Cobb at Mission to Learn was gracious enough to invite me to be a guest in his ongoing podcast series, and has now made the link to our conversation available via his blog.

It would be great to hear from you, so here are some of the questions Jeff asked me for your input and opinions!

What do you think makes a successful elearning program?

How do you see the relationship between social media/social  networking and elearning? How can they complement each other?

What do you think keeps some associations from succeeding in their elearning efforts? Why?

If you’ve incorporated elearning, what would you do differently now, if anything? What do you know now that you didn’t know then?

And here’s a new one: whether you have an elearning program or not, what resource do you wish you had that you haven’t been able to find, can’t afford, or otherwise isn’t available to you? Why? What would you do with it?

5-cent Coffee and Free Horseback Rides

You’re barely inside the South Dakota state line when you start to see them: Wall Drug signs. Many of them sport 5-cent coffee come-0ns. Great idea! Who doesn’t love a bargain? And there’s no other obligation. Drop your nickel in the slot, add sugar and/or powdered cream to your liking, and fill your cup.

We ran into 5-cent coffee at another restaurant and even asked what the catch was. No catch. We even got real cream at this place. We’d stopped in for lunch anyway, but somewhere in our heads was the notion that because we were saving a few bucks on the coffee, we could spend that in another way.

If you know anything about coffee in restaurants, you know that it’s — in a regular coffee season — a real money-maker. (If you doubt my word, calculate out how many cups you can brew from what you buy in the store, then charge yourself a two dollars a cup and see how much money you’d make on that bag or tin of grounds or beans).

So it’s an easy thing to do — 5-cents a cup — it goes along way to curry favor with the customers, and it really doesn’t cost the restaurant much money at all (assuming they can’t break even on the five-cents, what with the water, cream, sugar, washing, and serving that goes with it).

One of the campgrounds where we stayed advertised free horseback rides. I asked my husband if we stayed a week if that got us a free ride, or something like that. He smiled and said, “Get this. If we both pay for a horseback ride, we get a night’s stay free.”

On the surface, that sounds like a deal, right? But here’s how it would have worked in our case: $45 each = $90 for the rides. What were we paying for one night’s stay? About $15. Hmmmmm……

Moral of the story? If you’re going to provide an incentive, work out every angle. In the Web world, they call it a “use case scenario.” The designers imagine every possible user for the site, and work through ever possible thing they might want to do on the site, then design it to include those features.

What are the use case scenarios for your members? Will your incentives hold up to them? Will you have a five-cent cup of coffee, or a free horseback ride?

aLearning Trail Guide is NOW AVAILABLE!

And for not a huge investment, either…!

After months of writing and weeks of editing and printing, the book is now available in print and downloadable editions through Lulu.com.

Here’s the most important thing to know about this book: it’s about elearning in ASSOCIATIONS, not corporations. And it focuses on associations operating with a small staff — we don’t have a slew of internal graphics or Web people, so how do we handle the requirements of online learning? This book discusses ways to do just that.

And it’s affordable. Some people said, “You could charge a hundred bucks for that book, Ellen!” And sure enough, a book of this size – nearly 300 pages, chockfull of charts, activities, and other ways to get you to move from what you’re reading to what you need to get done — is probably worth more than the sticker price. But I know about budgets — tight ones and that — and wanted to price the book so it would be affordable for just about any association. Get a print copy for $35 plus postage and handling, or download it for just $25 (the green alternative, too).

Curious to see what’s covered? Here’s the Table of Contents as a preview:

INTRODUCTION:  WHY A STRATEGY? WHY A TRAIL GUIDE?                                       

PART ONE: TRAIL SIGNS, TRAIL GEAR, AND TOPOGRAPHY  

1.             Trail Signs:  E-Learning Basics and Choices                                                                

2.             Trail Gear:  Technology Basics                                                                                   

3.             The Topography of eLearning                                                                                      

PART TWO:  CHOOSING THE TRAIL                                                                                  

4.             Strategic Alignment, Mission, and Purpose                                                                  

5.             Needs Assessment                                                                                                    

6.             Environmental Scans                                                                                                  

7.             Narrowing the Choices                                                                                              

8.             Mapping Content to Delivery                                                                                      

9.             Deciding Which Direction to Go: Development Methods                                              

10.          Checking Your Compass on Learning 2.0                                                                    

11.          Who’s on the Team? And What Are They Supposed to Do, Anyway?                          

12.          Marketing                                                                                                                 

13.          Estimating the Budget                                                                                                

 PART THREE: HIKING THE TRAIL                                                                                      

14.          Writing the eLearning Strategy                                                                                   

15.          Getting Buy-In                                                                                                           

16.          View from the Summit: RFPs, Legalities, and Other Necessities                                   

17.          Evaluating the Program                                                                                              

 CONCLUSION: Just the Beginning                                                                                           

 APPENDICES

A.            Examples of Asynchronous Courses                                                                           

B.            Sample Budgets: APFI Case Study        

For more information, including how to order, click here.

If there’s something the book doesn’t cover in the detail you need — drop me a line or make a comment here in the blog, and I’ll gladly provide additional information.

And please, if you see something in the book you disagree with, or have done things differently that worked better, please, please, send a comment and share your discoveries and successes! I might be a loud voice in the alearning world, but I know I’m not the only one that should be heard.

Looking forward to hearing Your Voice

Lessons from the Illinois River Barges

We spent the days leading up to Memorial Weekend along the Illinois River, hiking and biking, and — ever curious — learning all kinds of things beyond the essentials of living in a very small space.

For example… after watching the barges from the Starved Rock State Park bluffs, we ventured out to watch them close up, calling out questions to the workers on the barges — who traded info by asking us for our local restaurant recommendations (in the great tradition that is “knowledge sharing”). We knew how the locks worked that got the tugs and barges safely around the dam and from one level of river to the next.

What amazed us was how carefully fitted the barges and locks are: cabled together to float three abreast, the first tug we watched maneuver the lock pushed two rows of three each — six barges. Some were empty, the bargeman told us (okay, that’s probably not his official title). “It’s been slow,” he said.

Like clockwork, as soon as that load was through the lock, the next tug lined up. We watched, mesmerized. The patience and experience it took for the captain to steer his nine barges into place was inspiring to watch. And as we watched, we realized that the lock didn’t look big enough to hold nine barges and the tug.

 

So we watched the tug position the float of barges, then reverse out of the way of the gates. “How will they get the barge out of the lock without the tug to push it?” we asked a man whose job it was to rope the barges securely to the side of the lock. “Cable,” he called back, pointing to the side of the lock. “It’s along here.”

Sure enough, they secured a cable to the side of the barge, then used a sort of dockside winch to pull the cable — and the barge — through the gates when they opened. Now the tug would come through, reconnect with its float of barges, and go on down the river (or maybe up the lazy river).

It occurred to me that each barge captain had a decision to make regarding his cargo. The first captain opted for six barges — less cargo (and likely less money to haul it) meant his tug and barges made it through the lock at the same time. The second captain opted for nine barges — more cargo (and likely more money), but it also meant he had to navigate the lock twice — which took more time. Each captain had to decide which was the better financial decision: more cargo, more lost time… or less cargo, but a better pace?

Too often we think we know the best way to go with our online learning — something that seems to be the obvious choice might not be the best choice at all.

For example, are you thinking through all the best reasons to hire a Webinar production company, versus doing it yourself? Are you assuming that because products like Rapid Intake’s ProForm make it so easy to create a stand-alone course that it’s really the best answer for you?

Think about what’s most important (time or cargo load, if you’re a tug captain)… so you can use your resources as efficiently as possible, too. Remember: time is never a free resource. Just because your staff members aren’t paid the way consultants are paid doesn’t mean they work for free. Are you using their time to your best advantage? Their skills? If you’re not, then you’re wasting money. You’re wasting your members’ dues and your sponsors’ donations. worse than that, you’re wasting your staff members’ talents, which — eventually — can compel them to jump ship.

Just as the tug captains factor in the time it will take to get through the locks as they haul their cargo along the river, you need to consider time as a resource, too. Don’t wait. Start today. Time’s  a-wastin’!

Ch…ch…ch…changes!

I’m living that old adage — it’s not raining, it’s pouring!

First things first — many thanks to the folks at Digitec Interactive for letting me share a case study in their recent Webinar. If you missed it, and want a quick overview of how one small association decided where to start with online learning, what we did, and how it all turned out, you can see it via this link: http://www.knowledgedirectweb.com/webinar.cfm

And many, many thanks to those of you who tuned in and texted your questions! The chat dialoge was great and gave us all a chance to think about the various challenges involved in initiating an online learning curriculum.

Now to the rest of the story….

Just as I was putting the final touches on the aLearning: a Trail Guide to Association eLearning book, we sold our house. This is no small feat in the suburbs of Lansing, Michigan, where the economy is pretty sour and is projected to get even worse. Our house had been on the market for two years, and after dropping our price periodically over that timespan, we finally found the sweet spot and the right buyers appeared. I gave notice on my association position (for those of you looking for me there, my last day was May 8).

What’s next? My husband and I have been planning to full-time RV for several years, and suddenly we were in a position to do just that. The last few weeks have been a dizzying whirlwind of packing, selling, tossing, scanning, and shredding. Tomorrow we hand over the key to the house and put the other key in the ignition.

Why this lifestyle? Well…. we travel whenever we can, and it seems as though everywhere we go we want to “buy a little place for retirement.” Choosing one spot seemed impossible — so we decided to choose them all!

So my apologies for the delay with the book — (Josh, I did see your note about the RFP chapter) — know that it remains a priority with me, and that I hope to have it available for purchase in the next month or so.

Having said that, you can tell that association elearning is still running in my blood, probably thicker now than ever, because I’ll be able to spend more time focusing on it, in between the hiking, biking, fishing, shopping (but not buying anything — do you know how little you can store in a 400 square-foot fifth wheel?!?).

I’ll announce here when the book is available, with full details about how to purchase copies.

Till then — you can keep track of our travels at http://bobandellen.wordpress.com

Maybe we’ll see you on the road!