Technical challenges are thwarting the roll-out of e-learning programmes in SA, with only 6% of local training taking place via e-learning compared with 29% in the US.
According to Dayne Falkenberg, MD of Cuda Technologies (part of the HPL Group), organisations in developing economy environments such as SA often cannot support the technical assumptions made by international software developers.
Falkenberg says effective e-learning helps to migrate people to rapid learning models, offers significant cost saving possibilities and additional revenue generation.
"South African organisations should be following the international trend towards e-learning as a medium of learning management and delivery, yet they are hampered by a litany of technical, as well as cost constraints."
Falkenberg says South African companies have been reluctant to implement e-learning programmes, due to bandwidth constraints, broken connectivity, outdated hardware, and the inability to integrate across key platforms.
"They battle to find technologies that can operate within limited bandwidths, across disparate technical platforms, that can overcome irregular connectivity or deliver learning via low-spec hardware and diverse browser technology."
Falkenberg says this is complicated by the fact that training teams are often inexperienced in IT systems and are daunted by technically demanding authoring tools. South African companies prefer to start slowly with e-learning technologies, and to scale up as they grow, he says. "Lack of sufficient bandwidth has been a particular stumbling block. Local organisations often need to deliver e-learning at under 30KB per click, which most international products cannot provide. Given that branch offices are often connected via dial-up modem, many South African companies struggle to offer e-learning outside of the head office environment. International technology is also incompatible not able to support legislative reporting requirements, such as NQF."
Falkenberg says the South African IT market is now taking up the challenge, developing e-learning solutions that are adapted to outdated hardware and software, restricted bandwidths and unstable network connections - at a cost that is viable for local needs.
"Local e-learning technologies, such as CUDA, are lowering the barriers to entry by enabling content rich and bandwidth light learning across geographically remote locations," says Falkenberg. "We are designing software that considers both worst and best case scenarios, so that companies operating in SA and Africa have a platform that addresses the myriad of complexities they face."
Falkenberg predicts that with technical barriers now being addressed, e-learning will become a significant component of most companies` training programmes in the next few years.
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