Throw Back Thursday: Leadership development and elearning

We receive so much valuable content from our customers, partners and internal subject-matter experts. On Thursdays, we thought it would be fun to do a “throw back” and bring back an older post that was valuable to our audience. Today’s throw back discusses leadership development and elearning.

Do you think your executives won’t use elearning? Think again.

By Kieran King

While the tsunami of information available on the internet may seem like a goldmine, it is costly to find the bit of information that you need when you need it.  In fact, in the paper, “How Executives Stay Informed: A Study of Resources Used and Time Spent Locating Critical Business Information” by Bersin & Associates revealed just how intense this problem is.

Approximately one-third of executives are spending more than four hours per week searching for answers, another third are spending two to four hours per week. 

Why is this a problem?  Because the productivity loss executives incur searching for credible information is astounding.  If an executive’s salary is $153,000 per year, and if they are losing two hours a week on an information quest, that adds up to the equivalent of $7,600 in opportunity loss.  Chump change you say?  Extrapolate this out to just 200 executives it quickly eclipses $1.5 million. 

Where is the opportunity?  Address the executives’ time challenge with elearning. 

As I travel the world talking with large multinationals, a common remark that I hear is this one…“Our executives won’t use elearning.”

“Really?” is my routine retort, “Do your leaders ever use Google?” 

My question is always met with the same surprised response: “Well, of course.”   At this point I explain that if an executive is turning to a browser in search of information, then they are already well practiced elearners.  At its core, elearning is simply taking a digital route to answer a question or develop a skill.

The old-school prejudices that surround leadership development and technology-enabled learning simply ignore reality. 

So, your opportunity, and your obligation, is to give your executives the best source of authoritative, trusted information to optimize their productivity.  Doing so provides them with time back, reducing the highly expensive opportunity loss.

Have you seen what technology enabled learning looks like today?  This is not your father’s elearning.  At Skillsoft, cloud-based learning takes many forms.  Our video leadership solution catches on like wildfire.  Within it, highly credible business leaders, influential experts from prominent business schools, and leadership gurus provide actionable answers and insights within 2-10 minutes.  Who wouldn’t want Lynda Gratton, Ram Charan, and Patrick Lencioni at their fingertips and accessible 24 hours a day, 7 days a week from anywhere in the world?  Another solution is a portal rich with leader resources such as case studies, 20-minute audio summaries of influential business books designed for a smart phone or iPod, global satellite speaking events with instant Q&A, and highly challenging on-demand simulations.  And if you need courses, today’s course is a highly modularized experience, customizable to the organization, full of rich media and challenging assessments. 

The cloud-based leadership resources are also highly complementary within blended programs, reinforcing skill transfer and increasing the ROI of the class event.

It’s likely your leaders are out there searching the Internet right now.  Still think they won’t use elearning?   Think again.