Partnering with eLearning Vendors
After reading a detailed six series article on this very topic, I have decided to break down some very important points regarding partnering with eLearning vendors.
Things to consider before approaching eLearning vendors:
Know your audience and content.
Know your constraints and how they will impact the project (e.g. budget, time, accessibility).
Understanding the characteristics of vendors to find one best suited to your needs.
Make a Request for Information.
The Request for Information (RFI) is a great tool to get information you need about possible vendors and their products and services. In general, an RFI is used for preliminary research to help identify which vendors offer the type of product or service needed and what the general costs and turnaround times would be. Here are some details to include:
Information about your company and audience.
What is trying to be accomplished directly through the content of the eLearning.
The scope of product or service that you are looking for with a few specifications you may already know.
How you want them to respond to your RFI (e.g. Email no more than 5 pages).
When engaging a third party eLearning vendor, useful information you can share is characteristics of your audience.
The demographics of your audience.
The roles in your organization that those groups undertake.
The working pattern, so you have some idea of when and where the course may be undertaken.
Their experience with eLearning including whether they have undertaken eLearning before, and whether they have certain expectations about the format of courses.
Their level of skill and experience in the subject area.
The motivating factors of your auidence.
As mentioned in the series introduced earlier, learning is a highly personal experience. In face-to-face training, a facilitator can tailor information on the spot. This flexibility needs to be translated to a function capable of online learning which can directly impact engagement and retention levels in the users.
Certainly take your time and don’t hesitate to ask others what they have done in their own organizations through groups like Cloud Learning on LinkedIn or by simply reaching out to other professionals in your own network.
Genele Rose














