JSE-listed CS Holdings, through its IT training division, has completed a successful R1m user-training project for the Metropolitan Group, one of South Africa`s leading financial services providers.
The project was split into two phases, the first for the training of 1100 Metropolitan staff migrated to Microsoft`s Office 97 and the second for 1000 users migrated to Microsoft`s Outlook 98. Office migration was launched in October 1998 and completed by the end of February this year; Outlook migration ran from December 1998 to March this year.
Metropolitan`s IT training manager, Jenny Smith, says the aim of the project was to ease the bulk of the Group`s staff onto Microsoft`s office productivity and messaging software platform, Office and Outlook. "We took a long term view of industry standards in productivity software and decided to align our internal software infrastructure accordingly," says Smith.
"The decision necessitated the retraining of our staff in the use of the new software, with minimal impact on our service and maximum benefit for staff."
The training schedule was part of a project designed to provide a Y2K-compliant, industry-standard electronic office environment that: increases user productivity and reduces total cost of ownership; is compatible with Metropolitan`s business partners; facilitates timely communication internally and externally; improves business efficiency and information flow; and readily facilitates access to information.
"Our end-user training was previously conducted in-house," says Smith. "However, since training is not a core function of our business, we found it made more sense to outsource it to a specialist company. That way we were assured training was kept to the highest possible standards, with up-to-date material and training methods."
With offices throughout South Africa and as far afield as Namibia and Botswana, CS Education Solutions had the advantage of offering us either a local presence or mobile resources to reach all of our affected users. Not only did they have extensive countrywide coverage, but where necessary their regional offices arranged for our staff to be transported to their training facilities," says Smith. "That`s just one of the value-added benefits we were shown as an example of their commitment to this project."
Sheila-Jane Engels, project manager for the Office 97 migration phase, adds that the response to the training was "...nothing short of phenomenal." "In a quality assurance report by an independent firm, 99% of users surveyed felt that they had benefited from the Office 97 migration training, with 96,5% benefiting from Outlook 98 training," says Engels.
"In addition, not even a single user responded with negative feedback on the training instruction received." Users were given two training options: instructor-led and computer based training (CBT). "33% of users chose to make use of CBT, with 30% opting for a combination of the two," says Engels.
"This is not only a positive reflection on the calibre of CS Education Solutions` instructors, but also gives our users flexibility in their preferred training methods and allows them to optimise their own service delivery schedules accordingly."
Subsequently, CS Education Solutions has been officially selected as the preferred end-user training supplier to Metropolitan staff countrywide. "Six companies were selected to tender," says Smith. "CS Education Solutions` quality and proven training methods and, of course, their extensive national coverage played a leading role in Metropolitan`s decision."
Share