(Bangalore, Karnataka, India, March 10, 2015) Problem solving is at the heart of any business and EI Design (https://www.eidesign.net) is building the framework necessary to help solve problems for its customers. The company is extending its existing Solution Architecting expertise through a world class Competency Lab that will focus on creating a unique framework to enhance learnability of courses. Additionally, it will offer services to determine and maximise ROI on eLearning. "Our Solution Architecting is focused on defining a specific protocol to follow to help identify the problem clearly and then develop an efficient solution for our customers", explains Asha Pandey, CMD of EI Design. "The primary focus of the new Competency Lab will be on developing a learner-centred design process based on quantitative and qualitative research to address the basic challenge in ensuring effective learning, that is, moving learners from acquisition to application of learning", she adds. The company already has a team of people dedicated to innovation and exploration who focus on research tools, technologies and trends. EI Design’s approach to address learner challenges is as multi-faceted as its customer base, with strategies including gamification, simulation and storytelling to name a few. The team is highly skilled with a sound understanding of Instructional Design, Visual Design, interaction design, user experience, web technologies, video editing and 3D design. "We follow an Agile approach in our Solution Architecting initiative, from idea to concept development and design strategy to prototyping", says Asha. "The Competency Lab ensures this approach is mapped to global user experience practices to make learning effective and on par with the level of quality that is expected. More than anything, the Competency Lab is about anticipating the needs of the learners", she discloses. The biggest challenge faced by solution providers is to understand learner goals and their impact on the business and take proactive measures to apply the understanding in the programs they build. The existence of the Competency Lab is based on this basic premise of establishing a framework that bridges the gap between learner and business goals to assess learnability and its impact on business on account of application of learning.  "Our ability to stay ahead of the curve is crucial when it comes to eLearning and mLearning solutions. We are constantly developing ways to improve our products, interpret our customers’ needs and make our presence felt in the industry. Establishing our brand is one thing but we plan to be in business for a very long time and for us that means constantly strengthening our business at the core", affirms Asha. Integral to this process is training staff internally so that they acquire the necessary skills to better their products by understanding the business and learner expectations. Also included is a plan to increase the level of knowledge and skills expected of new employees to make it possible for them to jump right into the process. It also involves putting in place robust frameworks that capture learner feedback and data and build workflows that subsequently become a part of the development plan. EI Design is rebuilding that core through skilled hiring, internal staff training and achieving the necessary certifications to expand the ability of its employees to perform at optimal levels. "Our customers are our pulse and we hope that these initiatives will help us cater to their demands more efficiently, every day", summarises Asha. To learn more about EI Design, visit eidesign.net and eidesign.net/our-expertise/ About EI Design EI Design began in February 2002 as a small team of three and has come a long way since. The company is now capable of generating over 500 online learning hours in a year. The company’s employees have been the core of its success throughout the years and are experienced, passionate and committed to providing the best solutions to exceed the customers’ expectations every time. Team EI Design’s positive and dynamic energy has proven to be contagious and attractive. Many of the company’s business relationships have continued through the decade and developed at every turn. This success in building unique learning solutions has led to the company’s consistent profitability throughout its existence. The post EI Design Outlines Competency Lab Initiative appeared first on EI Design.

The article describes the methods that can be used to create effective assessment strategies in eLearning courses. It also outlines the various types of assessments that are used in eLearning courses. Additionally, the article elucidates the various ways to create effective assessments and provide diagnostic feedback to the learners. An interesting framework, Assessment Map is also discussed here. Assessment map helps the Instructional Designers to create the right assessments for each of the Learning Objectives. How To Create Effective Assessment Strategies In this article, I will share the learning strategy used by us for the "Creating Effective Assessments" course for our Instructional Designers. I will provide tips on how we can use a master scenario to drive the entire course and how we can highlight each learning aspect through a series of questions/answers and discussions. Background As we know, every eLearning course includes Formative and Summative Assessments. Are there any principles that we need to adhere to while creating Assessments? Are these merely questions that evaluate the learning outcomes? How can we use the theoretical frameworks to develop effective Assessment strategies? These are some of the questions that every Instructional Designer faces and the course addresses them in an interesting Q&A format through a simple narrative. This course was initially designed as an internal training material for our Instructional Design team. Earlier this year, we converted this into a product; our ProductLine InSight Suite that has 15 online courses for Instructional Designers. Each course featured in our ProductLine has a distinct learning strategy and is a case study for Instructional Designers on how to create an immersive learning experience. Learning mandate The course mandate was to outline strategies to create effective Assessments and highlight the theoretical frameworks with a focus on how they can be applied practically (through an Assessment Map). Instructional strategy The course strives to provide the answer to "How to create effective Assessments?" in a Q&A format (rather appropriate given the subject) through two Instructional Designers. Cast of characters We identified the following cast for our narrative: Tim Brenda Tim and Brenda are Instructional Designers and they discuss their observations, questions, and tips on how to create effective assessment strategies. Their discussion and questions form a cohesive and connecting thread for the course. While both are Instructional Designers and colleagues, they have a slightly different view on each learning element in the course. We have used the difference in their viewpoints to create a forum to: Question a given perspective or assumption. Discuss theoretical frameworks and how they can be used. Deep-dive (focus on what, why, and how). Evaluate strategies. Introduce a new learning aid (Assessment Map) and the value it brings in. Our solution Using characters that the learners can relate to enables them to imbibe information comfortably and also helps them get the context to map it to their work. The characters pose appropriate questions and engage in discussions/conversations. This approach can be used in other courses to: "Inform" or "introduce" a concept in a screen "Summarize" the takeaways of the concept/idea that is presented Provide a walk-through on the key learning areas (process, procedure, and so on) Provide interactive exercises/pause and think questions Outcome Through the use of two primary characters (Tim and Brenda), the course is able to logically chunk and provide information about: Assessments and their types Tips and guidelines for creating effective questions How to provide suitable feedback Theoretical Assessment frameworks and how they can be used practically A useful learning aid (Assessment Map) that can help Instructional Designers practically apply the learning at work The characters raise and debate on questions that any Instructional Designer would face in a real-world setting, thereby providing "answers" to queries on how to write effective assessments for an actual course. I hope you found our approach useful and will be able to use it to engage your learners. I look forward to your feedback.The post Learner Engagement: How To Create Effective Assessment Strategies appeared first on EI Design.

There’s a lot of speculation about emerging technology and what role it might play in learning, but we wanted to collect some data rather than opinion.We’ve been asking L&D people to take the Emerging Tech Survey to find out what technology they’re using right now and what they are interested in adopting in future.Our survey was launched to coincide with #EmergingTechWeek, so it’s really early days to report the findings. But bearing in mind these are initial results only, some interesting trends are coming to light.Respondents were offered a list of technologies (with the option to specify others) and asked to identify the tech they are currently using.Predictably, multi-device comes top of the list with 47.8% of respondents currently using it in their learning approach. Surprisingly, internet of things technology comes second with 30.4% of respondents saying they are using it right now. This may relate to a broad interpretation of what constitutes internet of things technology, and certainly requires further investigation and clarification.Interestingly, only 26% of respondents are using learner analytics at the moment which once again highlights L&D’s chequered history when it comes to using data to drive decisions. Around 30% of those who responded to the survey are not currently using any technologies in their learning approach.Looking ahead proved a fascinating exercise, with more than half of respondents planning to incorporate a new technology in the next 12 months or beyond.Again, multi-device tops the table with 45.4% of people planning to incorporate it into their training approach in future. Learner analytics is the second most popular choice at 31.8%, but internet of things and virtual reality are not far behind at 27.7% each.The reasons why respondents are not planning to incorporate any new technologies in the foreseeable future threw up some interesting insights. Typical comments included:"The client/user base does not have cutting edge tech… yet!""No budget for new technologies. WebEx, SharePoint and Brainshark will remain key technologies used for training.""Waiting for some of the technologies to mature before investing."Respondents were asked to pick out the emerging technologies they viewed as having the greatest potential within learning, regardless of whether or not they were planning to incorporate that particular tech.Virtual reality was the most popular choice with 46.2%, followed by learner analytics at 38.5% and multi-device at 35.9%. Just over a quarter of respondents thought wearables have the greatest potential in learning; it’s perhaps surprising this figure isn’t higher given the level of interest in wearables generally, and the launch of Apple Watch. The survey asked, what do you believe to be the next ‘big thing’ in learning technologies? This question threw up the most diverse range of responses although augmented reality and virtual reality were the two most popular answers. Here’s a snapshot of some of the comments on the next ‘big thing’:"Social learning - empowering learners to knowledge share within communities and curate their own content and resources; moving L&D/People Development departments to more ‘enablers’ rather than creators of learning.""Bringing down the barriers that are raised with the term ‘e-learning’…. creating flexibility in learning with the internet of things, which will also increase value through contextual interactivity and multi/trans-media approaches, and be more applicable, understandable and successful.""More interaction with students who are learning online…development of webinar - although unsure what that may be…"These early indicators are certainly food for thought and a starting point for further research on the subject. The Emerging Tech Survey is ongoing so please take part and share it with your community.We’ll be providing results at regular intervals and hope to run the survey each year so we can build up a more accurate picture of emerging tech trends within learning, and find out more about the L&D community’s changing views and attitudes over time.The post Early indicators - Emerging Tech Survey appeared first on Sponge UK.

Supermarket chain, Waitrose is rolling out an innovative elearning game about the law on selling alcohol, tobacco and other age restricted products.It is the first ‘gamified’ training module to be used by Waitrose, part of the John Lewis Partnership, and will be available next month (July) to around 50,000 staff, known as ‘partners’.The Restricted Sales module has been created by award-winning elearning company, Sponge UK, and includes a scenario-based game where staff have to decide on the best course of action when confronted with 7 different situations.Kate O’Brien, Waitrose Partner Development, said:"This is a really important area for our business to get right so we wanted to make the elearning as engaging and effective as possible.  The combination of illustrations, photographs and video helps to create a highly interactive learning experience with the game adding in an extra element of challenge. Partners can replay the game as many times as they like so it is a great way for them to practice good judgement when it comes to restricted sales purchases."The elearning game is part of an on-going training programme at Waitrose aimed at making sure all staff are compliant and follow best practice within stores.Louise Pasterfield, Managing Director, Sponge UK, said: "We’ve worked closely with Waitrose to devise a relevant game which explores some of the real-life scenarios that partners might face on the shop floor.  The scoring system taps into the idea of consequences linked to decision making. Games are a powerful tool for teaching decision making skills in the workplace, and Waitrose has embraced the latest thinking in this area within its compliance training."The retailer is also introducing two new elearning modules on Food Hygiene to help reinforce best practice in food safety and hygiene at Waitrose stores.Sponge UK specialises in creating bespoke elearning for large organisations, and was named 2014 Elearning Development Company of the Year at the Elearning Awards. The post Waitrose uses elearning game to train staff on restricted sales appeared first on Sponge UK.

For years, cloud computing has been the next big thing, but what has actually materialised for elearning professionals?In this post, we’ll concentrate on Software as a Service (SaaS) and the potential benefits elearning developers and designers can get from this cloud computing model.Often touted as an obvious next step for many of the authoring tools that professionals use day to day, Craig Weiss has predicted that 2017 is the year that SaaS tools start leading with elearning developers.SaaS for elearningSaaS involves an application being hosted on a remote server which is accessed by the users over the internet, most often via a web browser.The SaaS model offers myriad benefits to developers and designers of elearning using authoring tools:Speed - no need to install, so you can get going faster and integration with LMSs means you can deploy quickerCollaboration - allowing a team to work on the same project simultaneouslyCross platform - any operating system can access the applicationFlexibility - you can use it anywhere you have an internet connectionAlways up to date - the application is updated on the server and you always see the latest versionLess investment in infrastructure - no need for high powered desktop computersEverything’s automatically saved - not to mention automatically backed up for you, never lose your work againAre we using SaaS now?Where collaboration is needed SaaS is in full effect; there’s a good chance you already share documents in Google docs, track issues with JIRA and keep connected with Slack.But other applications are much more likely to be run on a desktop computer. Right now the most popular example for creative software would appear to be Adobe’s creative cloud.Although it has the advantage of constant updates, you still need to download and run the apps locally, and a licence only allows you to use them on two computers at different times. So Creative Cloud is a bit of a misnomer. Popular applications with SaaS options Google Docs - Google’s on-line suite of office applications was launched in 2006, it’s now part of Google Drive and there are over 120 million accounts with access to the service, but Microsoft office still boasts 90% of the business market in this sector. Slack messenger - 500,000 daily users with huge growth since it’s mid 2013 launch, the cloud based messaging tool say they are the "fastest-growing business app of all time" JIRA - 25,000 customers use it to track issues on projects, it can be licensed to run on site or hosted as a SaaS. The name JIRA comes from Gojira, the Japanese name for Godzilla. Learning management systemsCollaboration is one of the biggest drivers of SaaS adoption; platforms like LMSs which bring a group of people together are naturally suited to being in the cloud. It allows your learners to access their courses from any network, interact freely and keep up to date on their progress.Adobe’s recently announced Prime LMS system is reportedly based on the SaaS model, so anyone wishing to use it after its scheduled release in August will not be able to host it themselves.Infrastructure as a serviceOne way you can get many of the benefits of SaaS and still use your favourite software is by using an Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) model.Moodle is an open source LMS which can be hosted on your own server, sounds great, and 70,000 users agree. It’s a self-managed solution, so you will need to install and maintain it yourself rather than just signing up and logging in.There are services that allow you to create a cloud based install of something like Moodle and have it up and running in a few minutes. Bitnami offer a one click install of Moodle and can keep it up to date for you, allowing you to give your users the best features of a cloud based LMS and still have control and flexibility to backup and update on your schedule.Authoring toolsThe most popular authoring tools used in a professional environment are all still desktop based. Although inroads are being made by some SaaS products, so far it’s not been enough to make the bigger names follow suit.All development teams consider efficiency a high priority; building a robust workflow that you can rely on to deliver within a time-scale is one of the most important factors in continued success.It’s no surprise then that the most popular tools for developing, designing and publishing elearning content are being launched from the hard drive of a desktop PC or Mac. Sacrificing the speed and ease of set up for the stability of a closed system is often appropriate. Authoring tools Adapt Authoring Tool - The first version of the open source Adapt builder can be installed locally or on a server, allowing it to be used remotely with all the benefits of a cloud based IaaS solution. Lectora online - Trivantis have Lectora online, a cloud based version of their authoring tool. Trivantis are up front about it being aimed at different audiences, with online being tailored to collaborative content creation. The future of SaaS in elearningThe increase in SaaS is inevitable and it can already offer significant advantages in the right situation. We’ve learnt that using the right tool for the task is an important part of producing effective elearning.Right now, it’s important for an elearning provider to have a flexible approach. Clients often have existing systems in place which will continue to require the use of standard desktop tools.As founding members of the Adapt project, Sponge are at the forefront of creating a leading cloud based tool for responsive learning development.Having the experience in both types of development means the learners needs can be the priority and we can keep producing absorbing elearning for all types of learners.The post The promise of the cloud, SaaS for elearning appeared first on Sponge UK.

  "It has been worse than we had expected and worse than we had expected for the last several years. We have been successively disappointed." - Mark Carney, Governor of the Bank of England on UK productivity.  Closing the productivity gap is a huge challenge in the UK, and one that keeps economists and politicians awake at night.Helping employees improve output will certainly require innovation in training, and elearning has a key role to play in boosting worker productivity. Definition of productivity: The amount of output produced per hour worked. What is it with the UK and productivity?Despite economic growth, low unemployment and longer working hours compared with many other advanced economies, productivity remains below par. It’s a pretty big productivity gap, according to the Office for National Statistics (ONS).Bank of England Governor, Mark Carney sees predicting productivity as one of his ‘most difficult judgments’ , while Chancellor, George Osbourne is focusing on a ‘productivity plan’ to kick-start output.Recognising the problem and dealing with it are two different things, but there is common ground among experts as to some of reasons behind the productivity conundrum.Broadly speaking, economists cite three main causes of low productivity in the UK: Poor training, skills and education Lack of investment in technology and research Poor management It’s worth noting that the productivity gap varies between industries. Car manufacturers and the admin and support services sector appears to be faring better in terms of improving output compared to the financial services and pharmaceutical industries. Closing the gapThere is no ‘silver bullet’ for ending the productivity crisis, and no single solution. Rather, it will take a concerted effort in a range of different areas, one of which is workplace training.Elearning can play an important role in helping to boost the training offered by organisations looking to boost worker output. We’ve identified five areas where elearning can help businesses improve their productivity through training: InnovationProductive businesses are innovative businesses; they use technology to improve and get ahead. Elearning offers organisations a way of bringing innovation into workplace training in terms of both technology and approach. Whether it’s a module that staff can do on their mobile phones, an interactive leader board showing team completions, or an interactive video game - elearning can help modernise workplace training and introduce innovations to help drive productivity. MotivationThere are lots of theories about the link between productivity and motivation in the workforce, but they boil down to a single sentiment - motivated workers tend to be more productive. Good elearning can aid employee motivation.  It can help them learn skills and improve the way they feel about their job, keep them informed and engaged in the business, and allow them to understand the impact and relevance of their choices and behaviours. Techniques such as gamification tap into motivation through competition and rewards. Elearning is also flexible and cost-effective, allowing temporary staff to have the same access to training as permanent workers. Some analysts think this is a crucial dimension of workforce motivation in the UK, given the high proportion of temporary employees in some sectors. Leadership Bad leaders are bad for productivity so boosting skills in this area should be a priority for any business seeking to improve worker output.  Once upon a time, management training in most organisations involved some form of residential course, and the costs involved often meant it was ‘rationed’ or targeted at the highest pay grades only. Elearning is helping to revolutionise management training, allowing organisations to meet their training challenges in new ways. A good example is interactive video, which some businesses are using to help train leaders across the pay scale in how to deal with difficult conversations. Measuring impactData is driving improvement in all aspects of business, and training is no exception. Elearning hosted on a Learning Management System (LMS) offers advanced reporting and analysis capabilities, allowing organisations to gain a deep understanding of performance and learner preferences. Aligning training objectives closely to productivity objectives, and then measuring the impact, is a good way to drive change which makes a real difference to bottom line output. CustomisationEach business will have a specific productivity gap they need to bridge and it will be much harder to close this with a one-size-fits-all training approach. Elearning offers much greater scope for tailored solutions that meet individual challenges. Organisations will need to review where their ‘productivity pinch points’ existing, what needs to change to improve performance and the role training can play if they want a fully-customised solution. The only way is upIt’s not all doom and gloom when it comes to the UK’s productivity gap with some economists predicting a turnaround in the near future. One thing is clear - organisations will need to integrate their strategy on training with their overall business strategy, and invest in learning technology, if they want to meet their specific productivity gap sooner rather than later. The post 5 ways elearning can help close the productivity gap appeared first on Sponge UK.

The role games can play as a teaching tool for decision making will be explored in an interactive webinar this month.Hosted by elearning company, Sponge UK, the free event will reveal how elearning games are being used by organisations to improve soft skills and support better decision making in the workplace.Sponge UK is one of the leading providers of custom-made elearning games, and has seen a 35% increase in games and gamified solutions for its clients in the past 12 months.aAron Pont, Learning Solutions Architect at Sponge UK, said: "The ability to make good decisions is a highly desirable skill and one that most employers would like to nurture in their workforce.  Better decision making comes through evaluation, exploration and experience, and games are uniquely equipped to help people practice and get it right.  During the webinar, I’ll be showing how this works, looking at how different types of games suit learning needs and suggesting ways to integrate games for decision making into your elearning."Those attending the webinar will get to explore the underpinning features of gamification and find out how best to prepare a brief for an elearning game.The free webinar takes place on Wednesday, July 15 between 12.30 and 13.00 (BST).It’s suitable for anyone involved in commissioning, delivering or creating workplace elearning, and registration is available via http://bit.ly/1Kv6cZYThe post Webinar explores how games can teach better decision making appeared first on Sponge UK.

Interacting and observing peers is one of the most basic forms of learning. On a fundamental level that’s all social learning is; but the rise of social media and social networking has brought new tools for increasing interaction within elearning. Your employees already share knowledge informally . By encouraging the use of social channels you can help direct the flow of learning from the people with the knowledge to the people most in need of it. Albert Bandura’s social learning theory , sets out the psychology behind the way we learn in a group. We’ll look at some of the practical applications of the theory you can use in the context of various social learning platforms. "What makes social a hot topic today is that light mobile tools and vast digital networks extend our access and conversations with all our connections" - Marcia Conner - Author of the new social learning As elearning designers, we’re most interested in how to improve the experience and results of our learners.  By leveraging existing social media networks, we can help boost interaction between the people taking our courses. With careful steering, we can use this cooperation to help reach our learning objectives. How existing social platforms can help your learners YouTube If you need to teach someone how to perform a specific task in some new software, or show them a physical procedure, video offers an effective solution. Towards Maturity list YouTube as the most popular social network that line managers use for learning. Facebook One of the key benefits of an existing platform is the ability to use the networks that your learners already have in place; Facebook often gives you the best opportunity for doing this. The ability to create private groups for your courses can create a bond between members and allow them to interact with confidence in a controlled environment. LinkedIn LinkedIn is popular with professionals who are keen to share knowledge and experiences. A LinkedIn group can offer the same privacy options as Facebook, or you can open it up to a wider audience as necessary. They also host Slideshare which gives you a place to display presentations online and allows people to interact by adding comments. Twitter Short messages are often most suitable for links to external resources or specific questions on your subject. Using a unique hashtag for your course allows people to give you feedback or suggest links to any colleague searching for that tag. All the existing social networks have very capable apps for the major mobile operating systems. Having an established mobile app will be a huge help in getting the most out of any social aspect of a course.Using YouTube to host the video content of a course for Norfolk County Council allowed staff to access the training quickly from their mobile devices enabling just-in-time learning when it was needed. Which areas benefit most from social learning? Induction or onboarding is an area where elearning can be especially valuable. Encouraging interaction for new employees is one of the most important factors in helping them settle in and absorb the company values more quickly.Including a social element can accelerate the process and allow new staff to feel more comfortable approaching experienced colleagues for help and advice.  For companies with a workforce spread over a wide geographical area, an online network is invaluable for fostering this kind of interaction. Sales and product training often involves sharing knowledge amongst a team. Much of the learning will be done informally between team members so encouraging them to share it in an online setting can benefit people in different locations too.Part of many learning and development strategies involves creating a learning culture. Giving staff more of an opportunity to formalise the social learning they are doing day to day can help keep it at the forefront of their mind. Games and gamification can introduce a social element to a learning module. Competition and collaboration are great ways of making staff interact and share skills and experiences. In the successful Learning Leap course, Tesco staff were encouraged to complete compliance training by comparing their progress to peers on a leader board. Internal social networks Yammer - This business collaboration software was bought by Microsoft in June 2012 for $1.2Bn . It’s one of the more popular internal social network sites which caters specifically for businesses. Facebook at work - Facebook is piloting a business specific social network which gives your employees the chance to use a system they are familiar with the extra privacy that a business needs. eXo - An open source enterprise social platform which can be self-hosted for businesses that need a high level of security and don’t want a cloud based solution. Interaction through your LMS or internal social networksWhilst most social learning coverage concentrates on using the various popular social media channels you can also offer interaction through your own Learning Management System (LMS) or dedicated social network.Data security and company’s privacy policies are one of the main reasons to move social learning to an internal network. Many organisations have decided to go for a solution like Yammer, offering similar functionality to sites like Facebook but limited to employees only.Some types of social learning are already happening within LMSs.  You can help learners build relationships with their peers through forums, chat rooms and other discussions around the courses.Real time interaction and feedback is the key benefit from a tool like Twitter, and it’s what sets a true social network apart.  An LMS like Moodle will offer more traditional types of interaction. Whichever type of social learning you go for it’s important to have a foundation of quality learning to build on. We work with clients who use a variety of knowledge sharing tools, and can create custom elearning that compliments them to drive better results. Get in touch with us if social learning is something you want to focus on in your next elearning project. The post An introduction to social learning appeared first on Sponge UK.

Empathy is a fundamental skill for anyone seeking to create elearning that really connects and resonates with learners.But how can you develop your empathy levels and use them to great effect in elearning? This post has some easy-to-follow suggestions.Empathy DeficitThe world’s first empathy museum will be opening its doors in London shortly before going on an international tour. It’s been set up in response to fears that we are becoming less empathetic towards our fellow humans. Studies have shown that empathy levels in the United States have dropped by as much as 50% in recent decades, and the hope is that the museum will contribute to turning this trend around, and generally raising awareness about the growing empathy deficit.Empathy is the ability to see the world through the eyes of another and understand and share their feelings. Ninety eight percent of people have the ability to empathise and it’s deep-rooted in our evolution, helping us build successful relationships and societies.Empathy and elearningIn learning, empathy has long been recognised as an important skill for teachers and trainers. Author, Homa Tavangar believes it’s essential:"This isn’t just a nice thing to do; it’s an essential, active skill. It’s foundational to embracing differences, building relationships, gaining a global perspective, conducting richer and deeper analysis, and communicating more effectively."So given its importance, how does it fit into elearning?  In essence, there are two stages to using empathy in the design of elearning:   Research and understand the audienceThis has to go beyond the pure facts around age, gender and occupation into a more in-depth exploration of the target audience as people with emotions. What are their aspirations? What worries them? What do they think about their job? What makes them laugh? Getting to this deeper understanding requires time and effort as well as a good relationship with clients, subject matter experts and, of course, learners.            Identify the best ways to connectHaving established an empathetic picture of the target audience, the challenge is to select the most effective and appropriate methods to connect. The choice of words, interactions, scenarios, images, colours and sounds all need to chime with the audience. The elearning needs to resonate with learners and respond to their needs. Grow your empathySome people believe empathy is like a muscle that can be improved through training and use. Here are some ideas on how to build up your empathy levels:Pause and thinkRushing headlong into a project can undermine empathy because you haven’t invested in the time to reflect. You risk making assumptions and not getting to know the people and the challenges before diving in. A good idea before starting a project is to write down everything you think you know already about a situation as well as a list of all the unknowns. There’s more advice on the pause technique from the Start Empathy Initiative.     Be a great listenerListening is a core skill for an instructional or elearning designer, but it’s more than just taking in the information effectively. Empathetic listening or active listening is about understanding from the other person’s perspective; truly hearing all that is said both in terms of fact and emotion. Tips for being an empathetic listener include asking open questions, not interrupting and reflecting back on answers to confirm your understanding.    Seek out new experiencesHaving a narrow view of the world or a restricted experience can sometimes narrow your empathy. The wider your perspective, the more likely you are to be able to see things from the eyes of others. To help us all in this pursuit, the people behind the Empathy Museum have also set up the Empathy Library to help people broad their imagination.Challenge your ideasEveryone comes with their own assumptions and prejudices, so part of growing empathy is to challenge these as they arise. Social thinker, Roman Krznaric, thinks the best way to do this is to gain experience of other people’s lives - directly when possible. It may not always be practical for an instructional designer, but spending even a short amount of time doing the job you are about to create elearning for, will go a long way to improving your understanding.   Empathy can make a huge difference to elearning, and help create courses that resonate with learners. It’s a kind of elearning superpower, and one we can all nurture in ourselves, with a bit of practice.Author: Rhea Stevens, Instructional Designer, Sponge UKThe post Why empathy is an elearning superpower appeared first on Sponge UK.

The National Marine Aquarium was the setting for an engaging discussion about Plymouth’s growth agenda and what it’s really like doing business in the city. The breakfast event was aimed at bringing out views, stories and advice around sustaining growth and attracting investment into the city. Sponge UK’s Managing Director, Louise Pasterfield, joined an invited panel, chaired by business journalist and editor of Insider magazine, Miri Thomas.  Louise said: "It was really interesting to hear how plans are progressing in Plymouth in terms of initiatives such as City Deal which is creating more than 800 jobs in the marine services sector.  I was encouraged to hear about the passion, ambition and vision of the business community in Plymouth, and able to offer my own perspectives on growing a business in city.  Plymouth has many advantages in terms of lifestyle and location, and there appears to be a growing determination to do more to promote the city as a great place to live and work."The Question Time-style debate covered a wide range of topics including rail links, the quality of life in Plymouth, waterfront regeneration and English devolution.  Chairman of Plymouth Science Park and Chief Executive at Succession Group, Simon Chamberlain, was also on the panel along with Jason Schofield, Chief Executive, Sutton Harbour Holdings and Patrick Hartop, Head of City Deal, Plymouth City Council.The event was hosted by leading business publication, Insider South West and sponsored by the Institute of Chartered Accountants (ICAEW), Wales & West Utilities and communications agency, Remarkable Engagement.A full report of the debate will be featured in the September edition of the magazine. The post Debate on business growth in Plymouth appeared first on Sponge UK.