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by Kevin Siegel You're developing an eLearning module in Adobe Captivate or Articulate Storyline. There's a slide that plays for 45 seconds. As you're listening to the audio, you'd like a screen object to appear in sync with the voiceover audio or some other screen action. If the object in question is already on the slide, you can certainly select the object on the Timeline and drag it until its left edge gets to the desired part of the Timeline. Of course, if the slide is playing for a significant amount of time, that's going to require a lot of dragging. One technique that I use when I want to match screen actions to voiceover audio is called Sync with Playhead (in Captivate) or Align with Playhead (in Storyline).   In the image below, I've positioned the Captivate Playhead on the Timeline by clicking at the top of the Timeline.     The technique is identical in Storyline (except as you'll see in the image below, the Playhead looks a bit different).     On the Timeline in either program, I can then right-click an object that I'd like to automatically move to the Playhead position and choose Sync with Playhead (Captivate) or Align with Playhead (Storyline).     *** If you'd like to learn more about eLearning, come hang out in my next eLearning basics mini course. And if you'd like to learn more Captivate, Presenter, or Storyline, we've got a great collection of live, online classes for you.

I just saw a post by Amit Garg Top 47 eLearning & Workplace Learning Blogs.  His list was very similar to the list of sources that eLearning Learning includes.  It made me wonder how many sources does eLearning Learning include?  Turns out it's exactly 99. Please let me know if I'm missing any blogs that produce good content on eLearning and more particularly Workplace eLearning that would make sense to include.  eLearning Learning is looking for a bit deeper posts that focus on applied issues. If you don't want to subscribe to all 99 sources individually, then you can subscribe to either the Full Feed or Best Of feed from eLearning Learning.  The full feed provides snippets from each source.  And the Best Of feed provides a weekly summary with the top content from all of these sources.  The Best Of also includes upcoming free elearning webinars.  Personally I find that this is high value even though I try to stay up on all the latest and best content. I'll also mention that there's one source that's a bit different than the others.  It's Tony Karrer delicious links.  As I find interesting items that are not part of these sources, I manually mark those.  It's part of the overall social filtering that the technology relies on.  I would definitely welcome involvement of more content collectors.  So … Wanted: Content Collectors and heck, might as well mention… Wanted: Calendar Curators So here are the 99 sources in no particular order: The Learning Circuits Blog eLearning Technology Clive on Learning Corporate eLearning Strategies and Development In the Middle of the Curve Tony Karrer delicious links Rapid eLearning Blog Learning Conversations Learning Rocks Game Changing Idea Informal Learning Big Dog, Little Dog Janet Clarey e-Clippings (blogoehlert) Learning Matters! eLearning Acupuncture Breakthrough eLearning Discovery Through eLearning eLearning Weekly Engaged Learning eLearning Community 2.0 eContent Jane Hart - Pick of the Day Internet Time Experiencing eLearning Learning Next Learning Design and Performance Improvement Adobe Captivate Blog Learning and Technology Learning Circuits eQuixotic Mobile Learning Learning Visions Will at Work Learning Business Casual Bamboo Project ThirdForce Blog eLearning Learning Posts Social Learning and Communities of Practice Jonathan's ID eLearning 3.0 Blog Bozarthzone subQuark eLearning Roadtrip Road to Learning There Is No Chalk Spicy Learning The E-Learning Curve Electronic Papyrus trainingwreck E-learning in the Corporate Sector Daretoshare Dont Waste Your Time eLearning Development News Performance Learning Productivity Performer Support Good Practice Learning in a Sandbox Simply Speaking The eLearning Coach Learning on the Leading Edge Learning Developments Work 2.0 Blog WISE Pedagogy Learning and Working on the Web Learnlets Social Enterprise Blog elearnspace Element K Blog Upside Learning Blog Courseware Development Ignatia Webs MinuteBio Lars is Learning Kapp Notes Adventures in Corporate Education Dave's Whiteboard Blender - Training Solutions Clark Aldrich Learning Journeys The Learned Man Blogger in Middle-earth T+D Blog Designing Impact Onlignment Learning Journal Learn and Lead Joitske Hulsebosch eLearning Making Change Nigel Paine Sticky Learning Social Media in Learning Take an e-Learning Break Bottom-Line Performance Skilful Minds Gram Consulting The Boggs e-Learning Chronicle Vikas Joshi on Interactive Learning Visual Lounge I wonder who will be number 100? eLearning Technology Subscribe to the Best of eLearning Learning for updates from this blog and other eLearning blogs.

View and download the webinar slides. View the webinar recording through Go to Webinar.   Access the slides through Slideshare:       Access the recording through YouTube:     Try out BizLibrary's Online Library! BizLibrary provides 10,000+ training videos and eLearning courses in various business training topics, with new courses added every day.   The Career Journey and Learning Across Generations In this eBook you'll learn the demographic, behavioral, performance, and future demands of each career stage - early career, mid-career and late career. BizLibrary's Mobile Learning App meets the needs of today's digital learners. Employees no longer wait for training departments to push learning content to them. Employees are used to pulling information to themselves, when they need it, on their own terms and conditions, and on their own devices.

by Willam van Weelden   I've previously taught you how to create links between Merged HTML Help projects. This time, let's tackle merged WebHelp. Merging WebHelp differs from merging HTML Help in that you select the RoboHelp project to merge instead of the output. Prepare a Master Project Open the master project's table of contents and click New Merged Project.   On the FlashHelp/WebHelp/Multiscreen/Adobe AIR tab, click the Browse button and open the RoboHelp project you want to merge.   Click the OK button to merge the project. (The child project will appear in the master project's TOC.)   Save your project and generate your master project. Generate Merged Projects Once you've created the master project, you need to generate the merged projects to the correct folder in the master project's output folder. When you generated the master project, RoboHelp created the following folder structure:     For every child project, place the WebHelp output into the mergedProjects\<project name> folder. (Meaning that the child project called Child 1 has to be placed in the folder WebHelp\mergedProjects\Child 1.) Once you generate all child projects to the correct location, open the master project output to see the results:   *** Looking to learn RoboHelp? We offer a live, two-day online RoboHelp class once a month. Feel free to contact us to learn other ways to meet your RoboHelp training requirements.

Great post from Charles Jennings -Down But Not Quite Out: what can we learn from the plights of Learning Tree International and Readers Digest? Learning Tree reported a decline of 31.2% in earnings compared to 2008. Operating expenses were down from $22 million to $14.6 million ($1.5 million of that contributed by producing less of those damn catalogues). And overall operating profit was down by 40.7% compared to the same period in 2008. Net income was down 44.7%. This is similar to what I've been discussing in the Business of Learning and we are both citing Learning Tree's woes.  This whole topic has got me thinking about all of the implications and I've been regularly posting on it: Update on Future of Business of Learning New Learning Solutions Marginalized Getting Started Charles discusses what Learning Tree (and all training providers are up against).  There's free content and the assumption that content should be Free. Charles talks about the Changing Expectations of CLOs: Many CLOs in large corporations around the world now subscribe to the view that most organisational learning is informal and even where formal learning is used they expect more than a one-off event from their suppliers. The expectation is that the provider will make on-going support available through some form of online forum and email at least, or make their content available online in an on-demand way such as the excellent Books 24x7 has done. And CLOs want to integrate their provider's learning materials and learning tools with their own internal systems so that they can be made available across the corporation. This echoes what I've heard from several other CLOs.  At the same time, I would be cautious on the word "many" - yes, there are many, but quite a few CLOs still take a very traditional view of their focus (see Learning Performance Business Talent Focus) and are fairly traditional in their view of solutions.  Many vendors are looking forward to the day when CLOs are willing to pay for more of these things.  The reality is that many vendors offer expertise - but if CLOs are not willing to pay for accessing that expertise outside the classroom, then it's not going to work out from a business model perspective. Charles discusses the Reuters Institute of Technology which won a CLO Magazine Award for innovation. The Institute didn't include any courses from suppliers such as Learning Tree, but was rich with resources from Books24x7, TechChek (a web-based technical skills assessment tool), internal company communities and knowledge sharing wikis. A ning site, podcasts, video learning resources, RSS feeds from the large technology providers such as Cisco, Sun and Microsoft, and a number of other facilities including a range short formal modules deep-linked from the corporate LMS that could be pulled on-demand. A lot to be learned from these kinds of examples.  Thanks for sharing Charles. eLearning Technology Subscribe to the Best of eLearning Learning for updates from this blog and other eLearning blogs.

Coaching employees is a standard competency of management and leadership positions. Often times this skill is found to be an afterthought or only pointed out as a weakness when results are poor. Managers are critically important to the health of our organizations - there’s a ton of research to back it up. Great managers, usually have great relationships with their employees. It comes down to people and the processes needed to support our people and organization.   The good news is that coaching is a skill that can be taught and learned. There are some traits that are important such as having a positive attitude and approach to work and life in general, being future oriented and curiosity. These traits help coaches and the employees they help look beyond the day-to-day tasks we all have to complete, and look at the world for the possibilities the future holds, not as limited by the mistakes of the past.   Coaching skills include being highly collaborative, facilitating learning and being a teacher. These skills also reflect an "outward" world view and an approach to work that focuses first on the success of others or the team. It’s such a highly connected world, that coaches must embrace a form of work, connection and learning that fully embraces this aspect of the workplace.   Some coaches are born, but coaching skills can be learned and improved. Here are four key competencies to develop with your managers to make them great coaches:   COMMUNICATION:   Complex communications skills are necessary for effective coaching. These skills include active listening, understanding how to frame and ask questions, courageous conversations, etc. Coaching is not the time for your more senior leaders to learn these skills.   Recommended Resource: Cutting Edge Communication: Overcoming Setbacks     "The leaders who work most effectively, it seems to me, never say ‘I’. And that’s not because they have trained themselves not to say ‘I’ . They don’t think ‘I’.  They think ‘we’; they think ‘team’. They understand their job to be to make the team function. They accept responsibility and don’t sidestep it, but ‘we’  gets the credit…This is what creates trusts, what enables you to get the task done."   Peter Drucker   PERFORMANCE MANAGEMENT:   Since the core objective of the coaching relationship is to improve performance, your coaches need to understand exactly what elements of the work environment actually serve to improve employee performance. This may seem like a ridiculously self-evident part of coaching, but it’s surprising and almost shocking how many "coaches" do not really understand performance management and improvement. They may be great communicators and skilled business professionals. But they may have no foundational comprehension of things like motivation (intrinsic compared to extrinsic), engagement, productivity, conflict resolution skills, etc. The precise blend and mix of performance improvement elements in each organization will vary some, but generally you want to make sure coaches understand the principles of and causes of motivation and engagement, and how to apply these principles to improve day-to-day performance.   Recommended Resource: Coaching Your Team to Higher Performance       BUSINESS ACUMEN   Coaches need to have a high degree of business acumen. This forms a foundational set of knowledge and experience from which the coach can pull lessons and advice for her employee, subject or student. Business acumen is a highly evolved competency. Well-developed sense of business acumen usually takes time to establish in employees. Having coaches with a deep core understanding of the way businesses operate and the ability to translate the understanding into effective decision making is vital to successful coaching of junior mangers and leaders.   EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE   The global workplace is getting more complicated. Workplaces are more diverse in any demographic metric - age, gender, nationality, cultural, linguistic, etc. Emotional intelligence has always been at the heart of successful leaders, and likewise emotional intelligence is required for successful and effective coaches. No two employees are the same. Effective coaches know how to reach, guide and develop every employee they touch. This skill, these results, require a highly developed sense of emotional intelligence to read and understand people and to respond to the wide variety of coaching situations that will arise.   "Emotional Intelligence is the largest single predictor of success in the workplace….Emotional Intelligence is managing feelings so that they are expressed appropriately and effectively enabling people to work together smoothly towards their common goals." Daniel Goleman, Working with Emotional Intelligence   Recommended Resources:   This 7 course series on Emotional Intelligence includes: What is Emotional Intelligence? Developing Self-Awareness Developing Self-Motivation Developing Self-Regulation Developing Effective Relationships Developing Empathy       Looking for online resources to develop the coaching skills of your managers and leaders? Sign-up for a free trial here ! We provide our clients with thousands of video and eLearning courses. Whether you’re targeting leadership development, new manager and supervisor training, project management, communication, computer skills, compliance or safety, we pretty much have something for everyone. So, try out some courses…have your employees try out some courses. Just fill out the short form to the right and start a free 30-day, no risk, no obligation trial! Check out the BizLibrary Collection! --> -->

by Kevin Siegel    The ability to create Responsive Projects was introduced last June with the arrival of Adobe Captivate 8. During the development process, you can basically create and work on multiple screen sizes (called break points) in one Captivate project. When you publish the responsive project, the learner will automatically be served the break point appropriate for the device they're using.As I've created more and more Responsive Projects, one of the big concerns is to ensure the fonts and font sizes used in each break point is appropriate for the display size. For instance, I might want my font size to be 14 points in my Primary Break Point, 12 points in my Tablet Break Point, and a bit smaller in my Mobile Break Point.While I could manually change the font formatting used on my slides, Break Point by Break Point, if I've got a lot of slides, that means I've got a ton of work to do.As an alternative to manually formatting the slide objects, visit the Object Style Manager (via the Edit menu). Select an Object Style and in the Text Format area, notice that there's a Break Points drop-down menu. The menu contains three options: Primary,Tablet, and Mobile.  Select each Break Point in turn and set the desired Font Family, Size, Format, Color, etc. When finished, click the OK button and you'll see your changes immediately on the project's three Break Points.  ***  If you'd like to learn more about eLearning, come hang out in my next eLearning basics mini course. And if you'd like to learn more Captivate, Presenter, or Storyline, we've got a great collection of live, online classes for you. 

We wrapped up our free elearning webinar on Models for Learning in a New World.  My portion was a fast paced look at several important environmental trends such as: Decreased L&D budgets (see Business of Learning) Faster pace Increased workforce mobility Shorter job tenure Increased job fragmentation - fewer numbers in any one role Constant increase in complexity Greater concept work Need for faster proficiency Changing expectations for learning The bottom line is that Learning and Development needs to do more with less these days or they will be marginalized.  We also have so many more kinds of solutions we can offer.  I described some common eLearning 2.0 patterns that are emerging much along the lines of my previous post Examples of eLearning 2.0. Questions There were some great questions during the session.  Unfortunately, we didn't have much time to discuss.  1) Two issues that come up,  at least in the world of training in a government environment, is that of a) security of information, and b) control of the information given to the learner to make sure it is accurate.  Can you comment on those two issues? Both of these concerns/objections come up quite often even outside of government.  Security of the information is something that hopefully your IT organization is already dealing with.  I recommend adopting their tools and their security mechanisms.  If that's not possible, then start with content that doesn't have the same level of security concerns.  Control can be similarly avoided as an issue by initially moderating all edits.  Yes that takes work, but it's less work than keeping all the content up-to-date yourself.  Over time you will have some areas where moderation can be removed. 2) How do you sale to the NON-Gen Y's and Millennials who are in upper management who fear things like wiki's? 9) When introducing these new learning methods, I have the impression that the resistance from organisation is lies more in the new role of the training department rather then new technologies. Is this also your experience? Resistance can come from a lot of places.  I used to find IT very resistant, but now I'm finding more often there are allies with IT who are helping to make this stuff happen.  I gladly jump on their shoulders (and systems).  So, I would agree that new technologies is less the issue. More often real resistance comes from senior VPs who are not willing to okay something they don't really understand.  Yammer (internal twittering) is almost impossible to explain to someone who has no experience with any social networking (and probably not with anything more than email lists). My suggestion is that you don't really try to sell Yammer or a Wiki or any other kind of tool.  Instead, you simply say that you want to provide a means of editing the content more easily, or following up on the training to get dialog to happen, or whatever the obviously smart solution is that you are proposing. As a side note, I think selling Twitter/Yammer is harder than selling social bookmarking and wikis.  Twitter/Yammer is something new.  Social bookmarking and wikis are often a smart replacement with obvious side benefits. Many of the suggestions in Learning 2.0 Strategy still hold: 1. Start Tactical and Bottom Up 2. Avoid the Culture Question 3. Avoid Highly Regulated Content (and Lawyers) 4. Learning Professionals Must Lead 5. Prepare Workers for Learning 2.0 6. Technology is Tactical not Strategic 7. Avoid the CIO 3) Tony, what is "secondments" that is listed on your last slide? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secondment 4) How is "accountability" for learning specific things being handled in 2.0? 5) How do we ensure learning transfer with Learning 2.0 methodologies. This was discussed a fair bit during the session.  You can certainly still test whether learning objectives were achieved, but … the point is often that "learning transfer", i.e., testing knowledge, is not really the thing you are going after.  Instead, you often don't quite know what content will be covered and accountability is more the end result - for example, a presentation might need to be created.  I might use the analogy of the thesis associated with an advanced degree.  You are not testing for content, rather you are expecting the completion of a process leading to something that is fairly well defined.  You will evaluate using much the same way that we Evaluate Concept Work. 6) Can you comment on the advantages/disadvantages of company-created social sites (private networking sites) vs public sites such as Twitter and Facebook. Not sure I even know how to answer this.  Most of the time, there's pretty clear separation between private and public sites in terms of your goals and use cases.  I will say that sometimes companies get it a bit wrong when it comes to leveraging existing sites to create value that extends beyond the firewall.  For example, having a robust group and network on LinkedIn can be quite valuable when you have employees who should be able to reach outside the firewall for expertise and can leverage LinkedIn to find internal expertise as well.  Similarly having content that flows outside to partners, customers, etc. can be an interesting solution.  I do think there are interesting opportunities here.  However, most L&D are focused much more on the private kinds of solutions at this point. 7) Is there a method to map different models of learning to different types of projects? Great question. I don't know. There are lots of patterns emerging, but I don't think there's a "method" yet. Is there a method for mapping blended learning to types of projects even taking away some of the newer complexities of learning 2.0? Not sure. Help? 8) We are in the brainstorming sessions of creating a blog and podcast. What tips or advise can you give on the focus and direction of these? We want to allow users to get to know us and our abilities. One of the challenges we have is that many departments don't understand that we could help them identify and solve many training issues. We would like to create a "Get to Know Us" site where we discuss what we are working on lately and some of the recent products we have released. This is interesting.  I personally would be really concerned about making sure that my blog or podcasts were valuable to my target audiences.  Creating an internal newsletter as a blog or podcast that doesn't have compelling information may find few followers. I think rather than "Get to Know Us" or "What we Offer" - maybe instead focus on "Smart Ways to Solve Your Problems" … Taking a focus on case examples or new methods or ??? that is all around how they can get their work done better would seem to be much more interesting.  How about becoming an aggregator for them of this kind of information?  Show them interesting solutions at other (related) organizations so that they can have a more interesting conversation with you. In some ways, I would think of this as you taking the lead in learning the kinds of things that they would want to have time to learn about themselves.  How are other organizations using these things?  How are they improving performance?  What are some interesting trends out there?  Bring that together for them.  That's high value for you and them.  I'd think that's a compelling internal blog and/or podcast. One last note - podcast implies that you have a set of people who have access to iPods / iPhones and time to listen.  I personally, listen sporadically to podcasts.  A blog would be much better to reach me personally.  Maybe you have a good audience for the podcast.  But my guess is that the blog will fit much better.  Heck, you can probably get the blog posts emailed to people. :) eLearning Technology Subscribe to the Best of eLearning Learning for updates from this blog and other eLearning blogs.

View and download the webinar slides. View the webinar recording through Go to Webinar.   Access the slides through Slideshare: <p View the recording from YouTube below:   Looking for online learning resources for your employees? Sign-up for a free trial here ! We provide our clients with thousands of video and eLearning courses. Whether you’re targeting leadership development, new manager and supervisor training, project management, communication, computer skills, compliance or safety, we pretty much have something for everyone. So, try out some courses…have your employees try out some courses. Just fill out the short form to the right and start a free 30-day, no risk, no obligation trial! Check out the BizLibrary Collection! --> -->

by John Gillmore and Bucky Dodd In the previous installment of this series, we provided a purchasing "checklist" for setting up a green screen video production studio. Part III of this tutorial series explains the production steps for recording, editing, processing and encoding video for use in Adobe Captivate eLearning lessons. Step 1: Develop a detailed script that not only describes what the talent will say, but also what they will do while on screen. Be sure to include how the talent will enter and exit the screen and what non-verbal gestures should be performed. Step 2: Set up the studio in a room that allows all equipment to be operated properly and still allows production staff to be comfortable. In this step, the critical production factor is the lighting. The lights should be positioned so the talent is evenly lit and the solid green background is free from any shadows and also lit evenly.The talent should be positioned as far away from the background as possible, while still providing the desired frame for the video. This reduces shadows and greatly improves the quality of the end product.Step 3: Establish and test the video recorder's settings for optimal performance. For audio, make the appropriate connections with the wireless microphone system and ensure the audio levels are within an acceptable range. Next, set the camcorder's recording sessions to record the video at 720p at 60fps (frames per second). Record the talent performing the script several times.Step 4: Import the video into Adobe Premiere CS4 for editing and processing. To begin, trim the video so it starts and stops at the desired locations. Apply the Boris FX chroma key filter to the video by activating the plug-in and choosing the background color you would like to remove with the plug-in's color picker. Adjust the chroma key filter so all the background color is removed and the transparent background is free of any processing artifacts. You may find that having a still image of the Captivate lesson's interface placed behind the video will help with adjusting the video's settings and placement.Step 5: Encode the processed video by selecting File > Export > Media. This will open a dialog box for setting the encoding parameters. Encode the video content as Flash Video (.FLV) and select the option to encode the alpha layer. This allows the background color that is removed by the chroma key plug-in to remain transparent. After choosing the encoding settings and clicking the OK button the Adobe Media Encoder (packaged with Adobe Premiere CS4) will launch automatically. Select Start Que to begin the encoding process.Once this process is complete, you have a video in .FLV format where the background has been removed, leaving just the talent. This video can be used in a variety of ways to support and enhance the instructional value of eLearning lessons. ***   About the authors: John Gillmore is an Instructional Technologist with the University of Oklahoma's Center for Professional and Distance Education (CPDE). In this role, John researches, analyzes and evaluates new technologies for potential applications in instruction; promotes the implementation of technological innovations; creates demonstrations of instructional applications of technologies; and provides assistance to faculty, staff and administrators who have instructional technology needs. In addition, John teaches freshman information systems courses at UCO. John has a B.S. in Business Information Systems from the University of Phoenix and an MBA from UCO.Bucky Dodd is an instructional designer at the Center for Professional and Distance Education at the University of Central Oklahoma. His professional interests include innovation in eLearning, workplace learning and performance trends, and instructional design. Mr. Dodd has instructional design and consulting experience in both public and private organizations. He holds a B.A. in Corporate Communication and a M.Ed. in Adult Education from the University of Central Oklahoma.

View and download the webinar slides. Access the webinar recording.     Looking for online learning resources for your employees? Sign-up for a free trial here ! We provide our clients with thousands of video and eLearning courses. Whether you’re targeting leadership development, new manager and supervisor training, project management, communication, computer skills, compliance or safety, we pretty much have something for everyone. So, try out some courses…have your employees try out some courses. Just fill out the short form to the right and start a free 30-day, no risk, no obligation trial! Check out the BizLibrary Collection! --> -->

Question from a reader, hoping you can provide your thoughts: I am in the process of selecting an elearning tool that is easy to use, quick to create the demos and does not bloat the file size much. I want to create some online videos that will be a total of about 6-7 hours and upload them on my site. These videos would have software demos, screencasts and PowerPoints embedded inside them. Also every screen would have audio (voiceover with my voice) accompanying it. I will want to have a simple menu system to break up the content into chunks. And I may eventually, but not initially, want to be able to track them under an LMS, i.e., have SCORM tracking. I have been looking into various tools. Here are some pros and cons I found about them. Qarbon Pros: Less File size. Qarbon seems very easy to use. Cons: I'm finding it a bit difficult to integrate my voice with my demos and pull everything together. Creates as screenshot. To present a moving demo I need to integrate another product called Viewlet cam. Makes it a bit harder to pull everything together. Camtasia and Adobe Captivate: Pros: Heard lots of good thing about them. Cons: Worried about file size for both of them The more I am researching, the more I am getting confused. ---- There are quite a few Software Simulation Tools out there. I understand the confusion though because it's a combination of several different kinds of needs that are often addressed by different Rapid eLearning Tools. What questions would you have? What might you suggest? What would you do to find a good solution? Would you consider using a solution that integrates several tools that are possibly best of breed? eLearning Technology Subscribe to the Best of eLearning Learning for updates from this blog and other eLearning blogs.

by Sean Stoker   Are the slides that make up your eLearning lessons text-heavy? Images are an often overlooked component of a good eLearning course. Sadly, when images are added to eLearning, they often have little to do with the content being presented or, just as sad, are of poor quality. You've probably heard the saying that a picture is worth 1,000 words. But consider this: people process information presented in an image far faster than text. According to Mike Parkinson, founder of Billion Dollar Graphics, "visuals are processed 60,000 times faster than text, graphics quickly affect our emotions, and our emotions greatly affect our decision-making." Parkinson went on to say "Study after study, experiment after experiment, has proven that graphics have immense influence over the audience's perception of the subject matter and, by association, the presenter (the person, place, or thing most associated with the graphic) because of these neurological and evolutionary factors. The audience's understanding of the presented material, opinion of the presented material and the presenter, and their emotional state are crucial factors in any decision they will make. Without a doubt, graphics greatly influence an audience's decisions." Mental There's something very helpful about having a pictorial representation of the concept to hang your hat on. An image anchors a concept in a way that words often can't. While text forces you to create an image in your brain from scratch, introducing a picture gives us a jumping-off point, showing us a tangible concept which can be instantly grasped and further explored through text or audio. For many of the same reasons above, a good image can also increase a learner's comprehension and recall. Instead of trying to remember the nebulous image that they produced in their mind's eye, they can simply call up the more tangible picture that they physically saw and didn't have to manufacture themselves. Emotional Any journalist worth their salt will tell you that a story without a picture lacks the punch it might otherwise have. For instance, if I were to describe to you a natural disaster that occurred in some foreign country, you might be pretty shocked by the words alone. However, it wouldn't be quite as real to you as if I included a picture of the rubble, injured people, and all-around devastation. Similarly, I could try to tell you how much I love dogs and try all day to convince you to love them too, but it wouldn't have nearly the same impact as if I just showed you this...     How quickly did your heart melt? How long did it take for the word "awwwwwww" to involuntarily escape your mouth? Instantly, right? And now we both love dogs! (Thanks to Mike Parkinson for inspiring this example.) Punctuating the Text Finally, eLearning images also work wonders when it comes to breaking up the text and giving the eye a chance to rest. When you read, your eyes scan a wall of words trying to squeeze out each nugget of information. If done for an extended amount of time, it can get exhausting. But throw in some pictures periodically... ... and it breaks the monotony of a text-heavy lesson. *** Looking to learn to create your own eLearning? We offer several live, online classes that'll get you up and running in no time. Classes range from 3-hour mini courses to full-day, multi-day events.

View and download the webinar slides. View the webinar recording through Go to Webinar.         Looking for online learning resources for your employees? Sign-up for a free trial here ! We provide our clients with thousands of video and eLearning courses. Whether you’re targeting leadership development, new manager and supervisor training, project management, communication, computer skills, compliance or safety, we pretty much have something for everyone. So, try out some courses…have your employees try out some courses. Just fill out the short form to the right and start a free 30-day, no risk, no obligation trial! Check out the BizLibrary Collection! --> -->

Someone was just asking me about the big trends in learning and the implications of those trends on corporate learning and development.  I initially said - "Look at my blog," but when I looked, I realized it might be a bit harder than I thought to pull out the central themes.  So, here's a bit of a compilation of some of the things I've been talking about in my blog which points to some of the major trends in learning. Environmental Changes Some of the common trends I discuss in presentations are: Decreased L&D budgets Faster pace Increased workforce mobility Shorter job tenure Increased job fragmentation - fewer numbers in any one role Constant increase in complexity Greater concept work Need for faster proficiency Changing expectations for learning The bottom line is that Learning and Development needs to do more with less these days or they will be marginalized.  And the risk is pretty severe as described in the Business of Learning.  Trends in What L&D Organizations are Doing As a result of these trends, some L&D organizations are looking to social and informal learning.  Training Method Trends suggests that social learning tools are beginning to take off.  This will be a slow evolution.  And surveys such as Web 2.0 Applications in Learning suggest that this will be scattered. There's considerable discussion throughout my blog around topics that relate to social / informal / learning 2.0: Formalizing and Investing in Informal Learning No Informal Learning and Blended Learning Mix - CLO Panel Surprises Action on Informal Learning - Leads to Great Questions Numbers and Informal Learning The Real Challenge around Informal Learning More on the Form of Informal The Paradox of Informal Learning (Form of Informal?) Informal Learning and Learning Management Systems Informal Learning - Let's Get Real - Part II Informal Learning - Harold Tells Us Where To Put It - Now What Informal Learning - Let's Get Real Elves, Measuring Results and Informal Learning eLearning 2.0: Informal Learning, Communities, Bottom-up vs. Top-Down The whole social / informal / elearning 2.0 discussions implies some very Disruptive Changes in Learning. In Long Live, I discuss how we are not talking about eliminating instructor-led, but that organizations are looking at alternatives. The whole problem is Long Tail Learning. There is just way too much stuff that people need to learn that we have to make choices about what we spend our time publishing into formal learning events. The audience has to be large enough. As concept workers, we quickly go past formal learning opportunities. There's no course on what I do every day. And you cannot Separate Knowledge Work from Learning. One option is to say that limit of training / workplace Learning Responsibility is formal learning. Once you go beyond formal learning, then there's an immediate question of what else you will provide. I know from Data Driven performance improvement solutions that often informal learning can be very effective in driving results. To me, the answer is pretty clear. You've got to look beyond formal. The Result When you look at Examples of eLearning 2.0, none of them individually seem all that radical.  Many organizations are using SharePoint to implement these kinds of solutions. But when you look at the difference in control in Learning 1.0 vs. Learning 2.0, it's a pretty radical change. There are significant opportunities around Online Coaching.  I'm hearing more on this all the time. Examples of how social and informal learning is happening in the consumer space: Social Learning italki - Social Network for Language Learning  Social Learning Objects - Flash Cards Approach to learning strategy needs to be different: Learning 2.0 Strategy You need to think about systems quite different: LMS and Social Learning  You have to prepare workers for web 2.0 L&D professionals and organizations having changing roles and responsibilities: Leading Learning and New Skills Social Learning Designer Workplace Learning Professionals Next Job - Management Consultant Improving Personal Learning - A Continuing Challenge for Learning Professionals Other Thoughts In Corporate Training, I look at the challenges learning and development organizations face in heading towards these kinds of solutions. There are lots of possible Objections to making this happen. Social Learning Measurement is still an issue. Corporate Policies on Web 2.0 are emerging. Desired Learning Outcomes may differ based on these changes. eLearning Technology Subscribe to the Best of eLearning Learning for updates from this blog and other eLearning blogs.

by Kevin Siegel    How do you collaborate with Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) who aren't Adobe Captivate or Articulate Storyline developers? Specifically I'm talking about text content. How many times have you gone back and forth (and back and forth again) with your SMEs, changing a word on a slide here, removing a comma there. Maddening, right? Wouldn't it be great if you could export the text from your eLearning projects into Word, get your SMEs to make their changes in the document (using Word), and then import those changes back into your project? That kind of workflow is a dream, right? Nope. The workflow exists today in both Captivate and Storyline and the process is simple. Adobe Captivate Open or create a Captivate project and choose File > Import/Export > Export project captions and closed captions. In the Open dialog box, name the resulting document, specify a save destination, and click the Save button. (You will be notified when the captions have been exported.) Click Yes to open the document in Word. The captions will appear in a Word table. There will be five columns: Slide ID, Item ID, Original Text Caption Data, Updated Text Caption Data, and Slide. You can make any changes you want to the Updated Text Caption Data, but you should not change any of the other information. The Slide ID identifies which slide your edited captions go to. The Item ID identifies which caption goes with which caption data.   Make your editorial changes; then save and close the Word document. The final step is to to import the edited text back into Captivate. Choose File > Import/Export > Import project captions and closed captions. Find and open the document you edited in Word. A dialog box will appear confirming the number of captions that were imported. Not only will the edited content be imported, but formatting changes made to the Word document, such as making text bold or italic, are also retained.  Articulate Storyline   The process of round-tripping between Articulate Storyline and Microsoft Word is just about the same as it is in Adobe Captivate. Open or create a Storyline project and then choose File > Translation > Export. In the Open dialog box, name the resulting document, specify a save destination, and click the Save button.   In the resulting Word document, SMEs can make any needed content changes in the Translate this column area of the document and then return the edited document to you.   The final step is to simply choose File > Translation > Import and open the edited Word document. ***  If you'd like to learn more about eLearning, come hang out in my next eLearning basics mini course. And if you'd like to learn more Captivate, Presenter, or Storyline, we've got a great collection of live, online classes for you. 

As a very interested party in the developments around online training course and technical standards, we here at BizLibrary have been watching things unfold over the last couple of years with a high degree of interest. Our clients are confused, and so it seems is most of the market.   The confusion, truthfully, is well-founded.   Current Situation Amid all of the confusion and writing about courseware standards we know a few things: SCORM 2004 never really grabbed the market. SCORM 1.2 standards are nearly 15 years old. AICC — the association that managed these standards ceased to exist effective January 2015, and these standards are two years older than SCORM 1.2. xAPI looks like the future of courseware standards, but we are all waiting on the next round of published standards. Confused? You’re not alone if you are, and to be honest, that’s okay. SCORM and AICC courseware are going to be around for quite some time. SCORM courseware is all over the market, and with so much legacy courseware and so many legacy technology platforms still using SCORM standards, don’t expect rapid migration to anything new.   However, the current situation isn’t working all that well. Here’s another way to think about it. A large segment of the training profession and industry are using courseware technical standards (SCORM 1.2, released October 2001) that were developed and published before: iPod, iTunes, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Toyota Prius, DVR, iPhone (smart phones), or iPad (tablets).   The upshot of this reality is that the prevailing and dominant SCORM standards were designed and published in a technology world that bears no resemblance at all to the technology and web environment of today. Learning today is widely dispersed, mobile, video-centric, and shorter than ever before. SCORM standards, while at one time, clearly state of the art, do not currently reflect the existing market realities of employee learning and technology.   To read the full article, click here.

by Sally Cox One of the more obscure features of LinkedIn I have come to love is Pulse, which gives you access to industry professionals and global leaders in a variety of fields. You "follow" them, much like you would on any social media platform. For example, Richard Branson is someone I greatly admire, so he was the first person I followed on Pulse.To access Pulse, log into your LinkedIn account and choose Interests > Pulse. Once you start following people on Pulse, it will automatically begin suggesting influential people for you, with an easy "Follow" button to press, if you want to follow them.In the far right column, Pulse shows thumbnails of people you might want to follow. Click See all to view the entire list. Pulse suggests industry leaders you might wish to follow, based on your prior choices. Use the + Follow button to add the person to your list of favorites.I'm active on social media so I use Pulse not only to find good content to share with the LinkedIn community, I also share on Twitter at the same time.To share an article on LinkedIn Pulse, select the Share icon (shown highlighted in the orange box below). In the Share dialog box, decide how to share the content. If you want to share with everyone, choose Share with Public. To post to Twitter, select the check box at the right of the dialog box. Add a short note if you want (as long as it's within the 140-character limit for Twitter). LinkedIn Pulse AppI love the Pulse app for reading articles on the go, but I can also follow and share via the app as well. The interface is clean and easy to navigate. Above, the Pulse app in my Social Media apps folder. Below, I can swipe horizontally to see all the articles from people I follow. Sharing articles to social media from the Pulse app is a breeze... just choose the venue you want and press Share. Overall, Pulse is a useful feature if you like to read and share good content and is especially helpful if you're active on social media. ***If you like Sally's articles, you'll love her mini classes. Join Sally online for Mobile Photography Basics: Taking Better Photos with your Mobile Device and Enhancing Them Afterward and Building a Strong LinkedIn Profile.

From Jay Cross' Informal Learning Flow Hot List for August, fantastic video with Seth Godin and Tom Peters discussing the value of blogging. .   They sound a lot like what I say about blogging and learning.  This is going to be pretty good for an upcoming presentation to professional speakers about the use of social media. Seth Godin Doesn't matter if anyone reads it. What matters is the metacognition of thinking about what you are going to say. How do you force yourself to describe in three paragraphs why you did something. You are doing it for yourself to become part of the conversation even if it's very small. Tom Peters No single thing in the last 15 years professionally has been more important in my life than blogging. It has changed my life.  It has changed my perspective.  It has changed my intellectual outlook.  It has changed my emotional outlook. Best damn marketing tool by an order of magnitude. Both And it's free. eLearning Technology Subscribe to the Best of eLearning Learning for updates from this blog and other eLearning blogs.

Join us on April 8th, 2015 as our Expert Presenter Nancy Friedman, "The Telephone Doctor," shares her valued insight on customer service, communications, client retention, loyalty and customer experience. Nancy is the President and Founder of Telephone Doctor Customer Service Training and helps companies improve the quality and effectiveness of their customer service and provides brilliant telephone techniques.   During our webinar, The Golden Nuggets of Communication , Nancy will share communication skills for you and your entire staff. It’s for everyone! Enjoy the antics of Nancy and be prepared to laugh and learn with us.   The object of the webinar will be to teach you and your staff how to handle stressful situations, be better at communications and learn Telephone Doctor techniques that will last forever.   "Nancy Friedman is one of the true treasures of the training industry, and her ability to teach with humor and real life examples makes any chance to hear Nancy present an absolutely fantastic experience." Said Chris Osborn, VP of Marketing. "Her expertise in communications skills coupled with her presentation abilities is why we are so delighted to announce Nancy Friedman’s participation in the Expert Presenter webinar series. And this isn’t an April Fool’s joke! The Telephone Doctor herself will entertain, motivate and teach in what promises to be a truly excellent webinar."   To register, click here , or visit www.bizlibrary.com/webinars for all upcoming webinars.

by Kevin Siegel I had a client recently who needed to include a Glossary in their Storyline eLearning course. Fortunately, this kind of functionality is simple to add to any Storyline project.To begin, open or create a Storyline project. Click Player (located in the Publish group on the Ribbon). From the Data area of the Properties, click Glossary and then from the bottom left of the dialog box, click Add. In the Glossary Term dialog box, type a Term and Definition. When finished, click the Save button. Repeat the process as necessary.The final step is telling Storyline that you want the Glossary to appear in the published lesson. From the top of the Player dialog box, select Features. From the list of Player Tabs, select Glossary. Preview or publish the project to see the Glossary. In the image below, you can see the finished Glossary as a tab beside Menu that can easily be accessed by the learner. *** If you'd like to learn more about eLearning, come hang out in my next eLearning basics mini course. And if you'd like to learn more Captivate, Presenter, or Storyline, we've got a great collection of live, online classes for you.

Sell More by Sharing Usage Strategies   Have you ever been in line behind a wide eyed child at Baskin Robbins?  One who is listing each flavor, and the pros/ cons of choosing it?  I recently had this happen, and it made me think of sales.  I recognized that look, I’ve seen it before from Prospects time and time again.   With unlimited use of thousands of titles, our library has a unique value proposition.  We offer flexibility and choice, but sometimes it can be a little overwhelming.  I had a wise mentor once tell me that a confused mind never buys, and I believe that.   At BizLibrary, we measure Client success though a wide range of data points.  One thing we’ve found consistently over the years is that the more a Client uses our Library, the more likely they are to renew and continue their relationship with us. So how can we take them from wide eyed and overwhelmed, to a long term Client with great usage?   In over 10 years in New Business Development at BizLibrary, one of the strategies I think has helped me win the most deals is what I have dubbed the "Usage Conversation".  People may like the concept of the library, and it may even solve a problem they’ve been focused on fixing, but what if you could solve more problems with the same budget?  That’s where the "usage conversation" helps.  The main goal is to help the Client or Prospect see additional training topics or challenges they can apply the library to improve or solve.   Once we find the Pain Points, Challenges and Initiatives we can help with, we like to make sure they aren’t missing other benefits and values.  We offer content in a wide range of topics, including Sales, Customer Service, Management, Leadership, Safety, Compliance and Computer Skills, to name just a few. Since these are generally standard areas of employee training, I make sure to dig deeper into each area.  How are they training on that topic?  What resources are they using?  Where do they get those resources?  How do they work?  What are their challenges or gaps? Can the Library help?   How would they use it?  Another benefit of this exercise is that it often helps the Client or Prospect communicate the fit of our solution internally, by verbalizing it with them through our conversation.   Empowering your Client to solve more problems with the same budget can create additional value and benefits the prospect was not looking for initially, and which makes their decision simpler.  They can realize reduced costs by discontinuing usage of other specialty vendors or consultants, increase readiness by being able to quickly respond to other needs that they weren’t shopping for or thinking of yet.  By giving them some time back through our library of "ready already" content, we can find out what that time will allow them to focus on instead.  More 1-1 coaching?  Developing Company Specific training?  Those also become value added benefits of choosing our Library.      Our Marketing Team frequently releases resources helping to enable Prospects and Clients to identify and create successful usage strategies.  These resources will offer you some great usage ideas that you can discuss with your Prospects and Clients, to help them get more from the Library.  Check out our latest release in the "New Marketing Collateral" area below, and click the links to access all of our eBooks and webinars.   Enabling through Education and Empowerment, Tom     --> New Course Releases: Distracted Driving Single video course. Preview Course Selling at a Distance: Closing the Sale 12 part series. Preview Course Succession Planning: 8 Critical Steps 4 part series. Preview Course     --> Recent eBooks: How to Create a New Manager Training Program   Download How to Create a Marketing Plan for Online Training   Download How to Measure the Impact of Employee Soft Skills Training   Download

I'm co-founder and CTO of a new start-up, Fantasy World, that creates fun, online games that allow groups of people to have fun, win prizes, play-along with celebrities, and most of all to socialize outside the normal context of the group. It's backed by a major entertainment company and my co-founder comes from the fantasy sports space.Our first game has just launched, Survivor Football '09.If you like American rules football (sorry this is not soccer), and you would enjoy socializing with a group of people who read this blog, please sign-up and join the Fight Club that is called - the eLearning Fun Club. I'd especially welcome any of you who can help us make better picks during the season, i.e., actually have some knowledge of Fantasy Football. I'm a fan, but have never done fantasy football before. Luckily the game is pretty simple, but still helpful to have a couple of ringers in our fight club to help us out.Here's a video that explains a bit more about the game:When you join, make sure you select the eLearning Fun Club as your fight club. That's where we will be hanging out. In addition to Fight Clubs, there are prizes. You can choose the prize you want at any time prior to the start - Week 2 kick-off.Some of the other fight clubs are offering prizes in addition to the prize that you play for. I don't specifically have a prize in mind for the winner of the fight club yet.Any ideas on what we could give? Maybe a copy of some books from authors who read this (and would want to play)? Maybe something from one of the vendors who reads this?More generally, I believe that this represents something we will see more of in the future. Interesting ways to socialize that is outside the original venue and how we are used to socializing. I'm curious what Nancy White might have to say about this kind of thing. But that's likely another whole series of blog posts. eLearning Technology Subscribe to the Best of eLearning Learning for updates from this blog and other eLearning blogs.