beyond eLearning

Is it E-Learning or eLearning?

November 1, 2014Blog

During our recent website rebuild, everything ground to a halt while we argued about the spelling of e-learning/eLearning. Is it spelt with or without the hyphen? Tempers got heated. Blood was nearly drawn.

We create it, so you’d think we’d know how to spell it. Embarrassingly a quick check of our old website showed wild inconsistency. Reassuringly a look at our main competitors’ websites showed they’re no better. Even our industry professional bodies, the US based E-learning Guild and the UK centric Elearning Network are pick-and-mix. So it wasn't just us that could not decide.

One of the briefs for the new website was to pick one spelling and stick with it. Menacingly, there was a threat to the developers to ‘make sure you pick the right one’. Research was clearly required. Our company has a phrase when we’re stuck: J-F-G-I.  The ‘J’, ‘G’ and ‘I’ stand for ‘Just’, ‘Google’ and ‘It’.  I’ll leave the ‘F’ to your imagination.

So the first point of call was Google Trends.  At first glance this showed that ‘e-learning’ with a hyphen is the most common typed variation in search engines in the UK. We have a winner!  No, hold on…  A closer look shows this only stands when looking cumulatively from 2004. If you use only more recent data, say since 2010, ‘eLearning’ no hyphen has the majority. The size of the majority grows throughout 2011, 2012 and 2013. It has the kind of momentum that wont be reversed. Now we have a winner.

In many ways this mirrors the debate we had around 20 years ago over how to spell email. Back then we used to type ‘e-mail’, but over time that hyphen got dumped. History repeats itself, so the same trend can be seen for e-commerce, e-business and, yes, eventually e-learning.

We’re actually not the first people to mull over this great issue of our time in learning technology. There is a great blogpost which is in violent agreement with our findings and annoyingly beat us to the punchline. So we’re sold. eLearning it is.  End of debate.  Almost. Work has now ground to a halt whilst we argue whether it is eLearning or elearning?  Capital ‘L’ or not? But we’ll leave that one for another day.

Article by Guy McEvoy, MD Guykat Solutions, research by Natalie Jensen 

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Interview with a GuyKat Intern

May 9, 2014Blog

Internships at GuyKat:  Over the past three years we've offered a number of recent graduates the opportunity to undertake a paid internship. These typically last around 3 months. We try to make our intern programme a little different by having the flexibility to tailor the role to the individual’s talents and interests. We keep in touch with our 'alumni' and so far every single person has successfully used the opportunity as a springboard to their next thing. Some remain in eLearning (even at GuyKat!) and some in other industries. Our latest GuyKat intern, Mair Ahmad, leaves us today.  Here is a quick interview:

What attracted you to the role at GuyKat? "The role at GuyKat attracted me because of its broad nature. If you had an interest in marketing and/or eLearning, then you would have a great experience and real clients to work with. I found this exciting as the work was always changing, giving me something new to focus on with each coming day or week."

What kind of work have you been doing? "During my time at GuyKat I have been a part of many projects, including doing some real client work! This involved helping design particular slides and amending on-going projects using programs such as Adobe Captivate. In addition to this I was marketing GuyKat’s LMS system (Docebo) by creating help guides. This was for users to go through if they had a question about a certain function in the system itself.  My other work included things like blog posts, editing in Photoshop and doing press releases. I also was given a chance to use our partner training site called Lynda. I really liked this because it helped me to learn new skills that I did not know before and by having access to online videos about multiple subjects."

What's it like working at GuyKat? "Working at GuyKat has really given me a great team experience, we aren’t the largest team out there but as a small team, I feel the experience is more as you get to see the different processes of the company as compared to a large team environment. Faraday Wharf is a quaint community of small businesses and it gives a perfect opportunity to network with all types of organisations. I really liked this aspect of working with GuyKat as it helped me to gain a neutral mind when completing my own tasks during a working day. If I didn’t know something then I made sure I learnt about it and expanded my knowledge in that area."

Would you recommend the experience?  If so would you offer any advice to your successors? "Yes I would recommend the experience and my advice I would offer would be to not be afraid to go out of your comfort zone, you may surprise yourself and this may lead to a great idea in the workplace. Another point would be to ask questions! If you are really confused about a task or project, make sure you get clarity on your doubts. This will help you and everyone else feel much more relaxed about a large project or even a task if you understand what you are doing."

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BLOGPOST: Articulate Storyline or Adobe Captivate?

April 2, 2014Blog

I often get asked 'which authoring tool is better?' Captivate or Storyline?  The way I usually explain it is that both Captivate and Storyline rock. My sense is that if you take two equally bright people with identical skills and you gave one Storyline and one Captivate, then after a couple of days your Storyline user's content would appear to be better. It would be the same story after a week or a month, after three months they'd maybe be neck and neck, but after six months your Captivate user would be limited only by their imagination while your Storyline user's material would start to look 'samey' (which isn't to say it is better or worse learning).

Put simply, Storyline has a much shorter learning curve and you'll look great quickly. The flip side is that you'll also hit its capability limit sooner and be using hardcore workarounds to extend capability when you attain mastery in a way that you would not if you had mastered Captivate.

So, both tools are great. I'd recommend either. But remember they are just tools. Having a saw and workbench doesn't make you a carpenter. Having a rapid authoring tool will not make you an instructional designer. Enthusiastic or even reluctant amateurs can and do make brilliant material with these tools. In the modern workplace budget constraints often mean that option is all you can do. However, if you want to train thousands of people, if you have a proper training budget, if you want to concentrate on your day job rather than the technology and if you want the training to truly engage then the DIY approach is misguided. You would likely be better commissioning a professional agency such as ourselves to build your online training for you. If this is you, we'd love to talk. Details are here.

But back to the initial question, if I really had to pick just one, which would I go for?  I'll say  just this: my company makes eLearning for third party clients, we are doing it all day every day, and we choose Captivate.

Guy McEvoy is MD of GuyKat Solutions. The company is agnostic about clients authoring tools, but happens to use Captivate itself. GuyKat are partners of  Docebo, an LMS that handles both Captivate and Articulate output equally well.

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