Challenges and Strategies for Sustaining eLearning in Small Organizations

The fact that small organizations have been slow to adopt elearning is not because of a lack of need – in fact elearning offers tremendous benefits for small organizations in the form of time savings, captured expertise, improved workflow and improved staff development – but rather because small organizations tend not to have the right components and working atmosphere in place that allow for the adoption of elearning. There are three main ingredients that will enable this to occur for even the smallest of organizations: a learning culture, a web savvy staff, and the presence of at least one good training professional. Economies of scale that often help justify elearning for larger corporations are not applicable for small organizations, therefore managers must therefore take a closer look at how elearning can solve multiple problems faced by the small, busy staff. By integrating elearning into an organization’s strategic plan, and by combining e-learning with a knowledge management system, a virtual network, education partnerships, or other tools and strategies, smaller organizations can improve office efficiency and program effectiveness on a sustained basis with elearning. Challenges and Strategies for Sustaining eLearning in Small Organizations The United States and Europe each contain approximately 25 million small businesses, and in both regions these small businesses employ more than half of the entire workforce. Since the dawn of elearning, it has largely been designed for and marketed to larger organizations. Large organizations in just about every field are utilizing elearning through some of the latest and greatest technological advances. eLearning is helping them to fine-tune production, maximize sales and build the capacity of their workforces. They are gaining a competitive advantage that, in turn, encourages them to advance further along the elearning adoption curve. What about small organizations? After all, it is small organizations which, through shear numbers, pose the greatest untapped market for elearning developers, and yet the training industry is extremely slow in taking advantage of this opportunity. Is it true that elearning is simply not feasible for small businesses and organizations? The amount of information in cyberspace that discusses elearning for small nonprofit organizations is negligible, with the few published reports mostly coming from Europe. The need for this paper immediately stems from the sheer lack of academic analysis of elearning in small organizations. The truth is that the small organization elearning market is a complicated market to access. Small businesses are as diverse as they are geographically dispersed around the globe, and they often do not have the funding available for investing in distance programs and elearning. Developing unique elearning solutions for their individual needs requires money and time, the two resources which small businesses lack the most. There are, however, a number of possibilities for small organizations to take advantage of elearning and increase their own effectiveness and efficiency. This will not likely be done by an outside vendor or external contractor; the creation and implementation of elearning must come from the inside if it is to be sustained over time and replicated in the future. This paper focuses on starting small and integrating elearning into the fabric of small organizations from the inside. Defining a Small Organization The definition of a small organization varies by industry and country. It can be defined by the number of employees, the amount of production, or the annual income. Fitting the description is important because it can qualify businesses for certain grants and programs. For the purpose of this paper, a small business or nonprofit will be defined as having between 1 and 25 employees, being financially independent (i.e. not owned by a larger company) (SOLT, 2004) and having a small annual budget of less than $USD400,000.00. This paper focuses on those organizations that have been in business for a number of years and which struggle year after year to slowly grow. Approximately 93% of small businesses tend to have owners or managers who like to get their hands dirty working alongside the staff (SOLT, 2004). Often employees must fill a variety of roles depending on the needs of the day. Job descriptions are sometimes not clear and identifying training needs can be a challenge. Included in the small organizations examined in this paper are the countless charities, nonprofits, and for-profit businesses. These can either be centralized in one single location or they can be scattered throughout a state, country, or around the world. Similar to businesses that may desire to market products to communities far away or draw on resources from a long distance, so too, these organizations, whose outreach and communities served can often be on a national or international scale. To eLearn or Not to eLearn Before trying to determine how to integrate elearning into the fabric of an organization, the organization’s leaders must be able to answer several important, interrelated questions—the first of which is why does elearning make sense. Improving employee performance is an obvious, general answer, but the analysis should go much deeper. eLearning poses numerous benefits for small organizations. Just as it has helped automate and streamline processes and training in massive corporations, so can it contribute to small organizations; the bottleneck has been on the energy and money needed to design and create elearning for such a few number of people. Now the field and the technologies are changing, and elearning is becoming appropriate and feasible for addressing many challenges faced by small organizations. eLearning can help a manager address multiple issues at the same time. There are numerous questions that small and large organizations alike must answer: which competencies do employees need to enable the organization to be successful; what knowledge is required; and what resources are accessible through the Internet or otherwise (SOLT, 2004). Answering these types of questions can often be challenging for the typical small organization, but the decision to use elearning and the method through which it will be delivered must be well-analyzed. “Technologies should only be bought when they are proven to be useful, not simply because they are available” (Berge, 2001, p.123). Most small organizations only need training in small pieces to satisfy immediate needs as problems arise (DG Education & Culture European Commission, 2005)—just enough, just-in-time. Four Major Challenges Faced by Small Organizations Small organizations present a number of challenges that can make the adoption of elearning difficult. Research has shown that there are four main reasons for their lack of elearning: managers are either too busy, unaware or disinterested in elearning; there is a lack of appropriate infrastructure; they cannot justify the need; and/or they cannot identify their training needs (McCullough, 2005; Reich & Schumermann, 2003). Challenges with Managers There is often a total lack of training or learning in the small enterprise. Managers and employees are usually so busy working on a variety of projects and trying to keep up with the daily workload that training and preparing for future improvement is not an option. This is certainly the case with many small nonprofits who are more concerned with surviving year after year than preparing their small staffs for future expansion or new skills. Whereas larger corporations often have an entire department that focuses on in-house training, most small organizations do not even have one comparable individual assigned to the task of training. Training employees is the responsibility of a program manager who is often juggling many tasks and expects new employees to play active roles in the organization after a quick orientation and a short probationary period. Research has shown that most small organizations are “crisis-driven.” They are so consumed with putting out fires and trying to take advantage of opportunities when they are recognized, that they never actually are able to make a plan to strategically improve the human performance within the organization (PJB Associates, 2001; Reich & Schumermann, 2003). Even more common in small organizations is the existence of informal coaching, experiential learning, and peer groups (SOLT, 2004) rather than formal training programs. Because of close proximities among employees and the hands-on role managers play in day-to-day activities, it is easiest to coach new employees when the need arises rather than taking the time and energy to create formal training programs. Furthermore, the training that is required is usually very specialized, and, while big businesses may benefit from standard elearning products on the market, small organizations tend to need very specialized content (Hamburg et al., 2005). Managers’ lack of commitment for elearning is usually a challenge reported by small organizations. There is a wide array of issues involved with managers’ preferences, decision making, prioritizing and awareness. If they have a different learning characteristic or if they are accustomed to more traditional learning methods, the adoption of elearning receives more resistance. We also commonly see that while young employees have grown up with technology, many older managers prefer to avoid technological solutions. Reich and Schumermann (2003) interestingly make the point that many managers in small organizations have difficulty “to accept the added value of further qualification of employees to the company in general” (section 3.1, paragraph 2). Especially in small organizations struggling to maintain and financially support a workforce, making employees more valuable may lead to future salary disputes. Lack of Infrastructure Small organization