January 10th, 2010 by Robin Green

Advances in online training have led to a revolution in the learning space by providing learners with skills they need to have to succeed in their job. For a successful business, e-learning needs to focus on learning for adults and with primary focus related to their job. This simply means, leveraging technology, training needs to be delivered to ensure they have necessary knowledge to be productive and have a constructive impact for their employers.

How would online training guarantee this learning transformation? Most training delivered in class is made for the organization or to achieve business goals. This might not be the solution since training should be designed for learners and help each learner achieve a superior performance. E learning makes this possible by moving away from a ‘one course suits all’ approach to an individual training method.

For any organization that has a large geographic spread, online training of employees can ensure consistent learning. A well designed e-learning provides learners with up to date knowledge using practical scenarios. Most e-learning helps organizations, both small and large reduce training costs tremendously.

For instance, if you have are a product based company, that has regular updates to a product or have a global product launch, you will need to ensure your employees are knowledgeable about the product. In most cases, you will need to send trainers to each region to train the staff or even have regular trainings scheduled to ensure that the information provided to customers is accurate. With such requirements, online training ensures uniformity in training delivery within a fast paced environment.

It reduces travel costs and provides your staff with the flexibility of taking courses to their convenience. Deploying courses online is easy and can be done quickly which allows employees to get up to speed as early as possible. With online training gaining popularity, it is not a huge expense on the budget but can be built rapidly and cost-effective. Some of the training designed includes audio, video and other audio-visual enhancements that can keep the learners engaged.

Some online training for business includes simulations that help learners to understand the product without actually risking a live environment. Tailor made courses are not high-priced and can be built in-house with the right tools. In fact, there are e-learning service providers that identify training gaps, design a training strategy and recommend solutions that can suit your budget.

Usually, online training is a one time expense, you can always choose from customized solutions to ensure the training is focused to the business in entirety or you can pick off the shelf courseware that can be aligned with your business requirements. Corporate training and e-learning are quite sophisticated and have drifted away from usual page turners. The training designed is more oriented to meet higher learner retention and improve employee productivity.

Online training is available for most industries and can be used to train unskilled laborers to prepare them for management. E-learning has had a positive impact on business that have implemented it has a training solution.

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Coggno.com provides high-quality online training.

January 2nd, 2010 by Robin Green

Every organization has an additional responsibility when they send their employees on assignments outside the country such as training, now made easier with compliant platforms of online training. Usually, these trainings teach employees of the work culture, safety tips, how to deal with emergency situations etc. Have you considered using online training to educate your employees? You might find this as an expense for a minor training requirement but since this a one time investment; it has advantages in the long run.

Most employees find any training boring and unnecessary, and attend them because they are unavoidable or a requirement to travel abroad. If you use online training to teach ‘International Travel Safety Tips’, you can change their perception. Elearning can make the program flexible and interactive. An interesting example is to make an interactive solution that would involve the learner going on a short journey.

The online training can have real-life scenarios that an employee would face during international travel. Usually, these trainings are conducted by the travel team or an individual from HR. The trainings are conducted by them every time employees are scheduled to make a trip. This can be a time consuming activity for the trainer and even stressful for the employee.

With an online training program on international travel, employees can learn everything they want to and get certified as well. You can include a bunch of questions as a part of an assessment to ensure that they have retained the training. The training programs are self-paced and do not require them to pull out of their daily schedule to complete.

Organizations have employees traveling to different countries. In such situations, trainers are required to be knowledgeable about each destination and this can be quite tricky. Online training allows you to have a single interface, with content that is focused to each destination. Elearning ensures that each employee that takes the training receives consistent information; this cannot be guaranteed in a classroom setup.

If you have budget constraints to build such training, you can always look for online training that are available on the Internet. Once you find the training, you can customize it to meet your organizational needs. In fact, some of the online training is designed to cover every aspect of travel safety. For instance, the training covers topics that comprise of type of clothing, different aspects of the destination, information that must be seen on your itinerary, emergency contacts, documents for the business trip etc.

In the past, training employees about international travel safety tips was not taken too seriously. With strict rules and regulations defined by the federal and state authorities organizations needs to carry out these trainings. Taking advantage of an online training solution can help you meet your organizational training needs and ensure compliance to government regulations.

Training your employees about safety for international trips can be overwhelming and it is a good idea to cover every aspect. From H1N1 to getting to the airport, every organization must train their employees and make certain they are prepared for an emergency. With the right online training program, you can have your own ‘Travel and Living’ and make this an enjoyable experience for your employees.

Visit Coggno’s online training marketplace now for online training courses on a variety of topics.

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Coggno.com is a leading provider of high-quality online training.

December 2nd, 2009 by Melissa

Here is what an ‘Invest for Your 401K’ online training can teach you…401k can best be described as a retirement scheme for employees in the United States. Just like any retirement scheme, 401k takes a portion of a salaried individual’s yearly income and puts it away in some kind of a security that adjusts for the time value of money and sometimes for high cash flows as well. The really interesting thing about the 401k scheme is that employees can use it as a tax saving instrument.

This works with a simple principle. An online training teaches you how an employee can actually reduce his or her deductible salary in a given year by contributing just enough to the 401k so that he or she doesn’t fall within a specific tax bracket. In addition, the money that is put away is completely untaxed and only taxed when the money is withdraw – usually, at the age of 59 or so. With the appreciation in asset value due to investment in securities or bonds, this can almost be cancelled out and would make for the perfect nest egg.

This situation would seem to be near perfect but there are some problems in this system – as it was with many high profile cases like the crash of a major energy company. Some of the online training released on the Internet teaches the audience how investments work at a global level. Investments, in any part of the world, are subject to the vagaries of economics and there is sometimes no greater feat than equity valuation and projection in to the future.

In the case of the energy company, the employees of the company were enticed into investing their 401k investments into the company’s own stock. When the company was shut down for fraud, the stocks were worthless along with the hard-earned retirement money of individuals.

The current economic recession just echoes the fears of the past but this time, it would seem that there is nowhere to run to; therefore, it is of prime importance that you put on the investor cap and wall street suit yourself – if not to invest, to understand where your money is going to be for the next decades. A crucial step in this regard is to get online training on the nuances and principles of equity valuation, market dynamics, and retirement planning laws. Each of these aspects is quite weighty but quite logical. The point is not to become the next investment banker; rather, someone who knows where the right markets are when the chips are down.

There are many online training courses available in the subjects of equity valuation, market dynamics, and law. These can be purchased online as complete curriculums or as individual pieces to understand. It is advisable that you invest the time and money in a paid service because the study material is well arranged and you may also have access to experts that you would like to dart questions to.

Even better would be if you could get an online training that allows you to simulate an investment game where you could decide the best markets, instruments, and countries to invest in. These techniques will sharpen your skills the next time global pundits talk about a recession and even survive the current one.

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Coggno.com is a leading provider of premier e-learning education.

November 30th, 2009 by Robin Green

Occupational training is used to educate or re-skill employees with the necessary expertise which is required for their day-to-day jobs. With most people working, online training has had an influence on occupational training and uses different forms of educational programs. Using web based training to deliver occupational training can avoid conflicts with schedules and provide employees with flexible learning environments.

With the availability of different learning platforms, employees can have real time classes in a virtual environment. This type of online training provides an interactive learning medium. Though majority of the courses are packaged for self paced learning and provide flexible learning environments.

In the discipline of occupational health psychology (OHP), employees need to focus on well-being, performance and prevent ill-health. To provide education in a flexible learning environment for employees/workers from different geographies and meet the demand for qualified occupational health psychologists, online training was considered to be an effective solution. The Kansas State University (USA) and University of Nottingham (UK) deployed the e-learning for OHP program using a blended learning approach.

Another concern that organizations face is training manual laborers and providing them with education on the latest machinery, operational and safety regulations. In such situation, online training can provide a solution since the gamut of training required to meet regulations are quite exhaustive.

Training in an online environment can range from emergency response, Flammable Liquid Safety, Forklift Operator Training, Hazardous Waste Operations and Emergency Response Refresher, etc. The hours spent in training affect productivity and do not guarantee up to date tutorials. When the training offered in traditional methods is converted into online training, the information available in the e-learning packages is the latest.

For instance online occupational training on HAZWOPER regulations is useful for workers that handle hazardous waste, response in emergency, working with heavy machinery etc. This equips works with the skills and knowledge to keep a safe working environment. Organizations invest in such trainings to ensure that the environment is safe but suffer due to lack of in-depth knowledge. To avoid this, online training resolves this problem by developing course materials by experts in the field and making regular updates.

Another industry that requires employees to have up to date skills and knowledge is health care. Healthcare Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPPA) require employees to undergo mandatory awareness training. This ensures that they are aware of the latest security and health safety plans. To meet such a large audience, traditional training can be a huge activity and a constant need to keep employees updated. When this training is converted online training, it can be made available to the audience in an interactive format. With intuitive e-learning environments, these professionals will have flexibility with schedules, immediate feedback, and better retention with exposure to the latest information.

Training employees in different occupations about various safety regulations means that the learning delivered needs to be focused to the particular industry. There are institutes that develop specialized courses for organizations that are required for each occupation. In fact, there are online training programs available for professionals to learn about environment regulations, employments laws, and other important procedures.

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Coggno.com provides high-quality online training.

November 13th, 2009 by Robin Green

So you have decided to pursue an online degree, and narrowed your preferences to a few online training courses! At this point, you will have a few concerns like, ‘how is this going to reflect on your resume?’ or ‘will this be acknowledged by employers in the market’ or ‘is this online degree recognized internationally?’

There are quite a few pros and cons to securing an online degree, and you need to be careful that your course is offered by a legitimate distance learning college. Why? In 2003 a report by USA Today revealed four hundred businesses that catered to online training and profited by selling fake degrees. While there were a few legitimate distance learning schools that offered degrees but provided poor quality of education that did not surpass the conventional learning environment.

To this effect, employers were skeptical about the knowledge acquired in an e-learning environment. Some were concerned about the content of the courses, curriculum and even with the outcome of the learning in an online environment.

To assist students that wish to pursue an online degree and ensure that the online training is valid, the National Education Board of the U.S. government has approved six accreditation agencies. These six agencies evaluate and accredit institutions that impart distance education and online degrees. This ensures institutes provide online training programs and degrees meet a certain quality standard and distinguish them from fake educational schools.

Today, all institutions covet to be top providers of distance education and provide access to virtual classrooms, modern online testing methods, online libraries and much more. They have courses accredited by the accreditation agencies and other renowned international agencies that evaluate online training.

There are other specialized accreditation agencies that only accredit particular online course programs. These agencies ensure that the online training meet a superior level of training excellence with major focus on course curriculum.

To most employers, accreditation from recognized agencies is a seal of trust and guarantees that the quality of education meets basic requirements. To parents and graduates, a degree from an accredited institution is an assurance that the online training qualification acquired is justified.

An important point to remember before you sign up for an online degree is to verify if the institution providing the certification is recognized by the U.S. Department of Education. In addition to this, you can also check with Council for Higher Education Accreditation (CHEA). CHEA is an NGO which recognizes agencies that accredit online training programs in the US, organize policy and research on issues concerned with accreditation.

When you list your online certification on your resume, you need to make certain that the learning outcomes, relevance and course accreditation are included. Eventually, it is the decision of the employer to evaluate the validity of the online program. They might be cautious with the rise in fake online course certification but would definitely be at ease to see an accreditation by an agency recognized by the US Department of Education. Doing this is a great way of avoiding prospective employers from trashing your application and clearing any doubt regarding your online training degree.

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Coggno.com offers a wide variety of online courses.

November 9th, 2009 by Robin Green

What makes online training different from traditional classroom training? Is it the cost of training delivery, course of degrees that your learners can choose from, or is the flexibility that elearning offers? We have listed some of the most widespread advantages that online training offers to learners and trainers.

You want to lower the cost of training! With online training you can reduce brick and mortar costs that are needed for classrooms. If you have a global learning audience, e-learning can help you reach this audience with ease and cut the cost involved for travel, accommodation and support material. With online training, students can save on the cost of buying books, notes or additional materials that are required in a classroom. All the materials can be made available online and downloaded as required.

You need flexibility when training! When you have your entire training available online, you don’t need a schedule. All you need to do is upload the training modules, videos, audio transcripts and launch the course. What you need to do is decide on the calendar day to release the training so that your students are aware when the latest online training is available. This approach works well for students as well because they can study at their own pace.

Make your training effective!  It’s a fact that most of the learners do not retain all the training delivered in the classroom. Online training is designed and developed to overcome this challenge and allows the learner to revisit the training when needed. In fact one of the top advantages is that you can have a large audience and better training effectiveness as compared to a large classroom audience.

Flexibility with the audience! Most of the training carried out in the classroom is not suited for learners who are working. They are either at night school with a day job, a part time job with a part time course and or in-house training in organizations. In any scenario this can affect the productivity of employees and be quite tiresome for such students. Online training is an advantage in such scenarios. Why? Learners can decide the schedule, learn when they choose to and get back to the job. The training is always available and can be picked up from where its left off. Even trainers can reach a wider audience, which is not really an option with in house training. Not everyone is willing to leave a job to earn a degree but would find this alternative quite tempting.

Your learners can network! Though classrooms enable face-to-face interaction, it is not a solution when your learners have a doubt. In such situations, online training can give your learners the comfort of asking questions without feeling awkward. This confidence helps learners; trainers and the learners can network while they work with each other. Virtual classrooms like these foster an environment to learn and have a high success rate.

Assignments, assessments and evaluation!  Online training leverages the latest technology to assess learners and provides trainers with customized reports. Assessments can be made more interactive, real life scenarios can be used to engage learners and even basic multiple-choice questions can be randomized to avoid dishonesty. Learners have the advantage of receiving feedback instantly or at the end of the test. In house training assessments do not offer learners or trainers flexibility of this variety.

It is important to remember that online training has proved to help learners better and retain a large amount of training because of a self paced environment. There are other benefits that are seen in an online learning environment but usually experienced by learners that are a part of an online training for the first time.

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Coggno.com offers world class LMS set of features and benefits.

November 2nd, 2009 by Melissa

Online training has revolutionized the learning and training experience as we know it. Not too long ago we were still using windows dos, dial up, computers the size of an entire room, and big floppy disks. Now we live in an age where we have streamline laptops, portable computers that we can take with us. We have internet on our smart phones, and wireless internet connection. The internet has slowly but surely become an indispensible resource that most of us use continually throughout the day. It has been created into a streamline convenient instrument for us to gain minute by minute updates, and enable continuous communication with people all over the world.

So if we are able to take the internet with us, why can’t we take learning portable too? This advanced technology has enabled learning to take place in the home with various online training curriculums, whether it is for higher education, organizational or government training. The variety in courses is vast, making it easy to find credible courses that pertain to the need for any specific individual. Some specialty Colleges have based degrees on the online learning platform, and various content creating or eLearning companies are receiving government grants for organizational training as well as school training to educate them on health and safety via online training.

New advances within online training module’s are state of the art, bringing 3D graphics, interactive courses, quizzes, and videos with sound and picture into the mix, as well as 24/7 mentorship with highly trained instructors who are available at the learner’s disposal to ensure full comprehension is achieved. With so many style options that these courses provide, learners are exposed to different types of training that could enhance productivity, comprehension, and creativity.

Among the revolution of online training in the education systems, Organizational training is receiving revisions as well. Organizational training no longer means outdated, long, and uninteresting training videos that are played in an isolated room. Online modules and interactive curriculum enables employees to gain working experience as they learn new systems and make the mundane training something that is enjoyable and effective.

As efficient and convenient online training has proven to be, an additional bonus to this new method of learning is the varietal topics of courses made available on the web. For students looking for higher education, they have multiple options of language courses, science courses and math courses. For those in the IT industry they have various system training courses that stay current as new updates within systems and platforms are created. Certifications, such as A+, Network +, Security + in the IT industry, as well as driver, helicopter, first aid and safety certifications are just a few certifications that are offered.

Online training truly is changing the way we think about learning and the mundane training that normally is included when we enter into new positions in the workforce, new systems are implemented or those annually required safety or corporate training seminars. Just as computers and the internet has been streamlined and made portable, training and education is following suit.

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Coggno.com offers high-quality online training courses.

October 27th, 2009 by Robin Green

Online training videos and classroom instructional videos are becoming an indispensable tool across the educational spectrum. Anymore, a video isn’t just a slick little gimmick to slap onto a course, devoid of impact and mostly useless. With sites like YouTube and TeacherTube inspiring ordinary people, educators, and course developers alike to create their own videos, it’s no wonder that instructional videos have fleshed out in terms of functionality.

With the right tools, anyone can create a video. And with a little planning and forethought, anyone can make an online training video or other instructional video not only to supplement learning content, but to work with it as an integrated and vital part of the course material. Videos can work hand-in-hand with other formats of content in a course to make them an enriching and essential backbone of a course.

From training courses (including compliance and other kinds of training) to online high schools, including video is smart for a number of reasons.

In both online training courses and face-to-face courses and training programs, online training videos are able to engage the student and illustrate complex concepts using images and demonstrations. A video can bring a classroom to life and create interest for the learning content.

Another function of instructional videos in a face-to-face or group setting is that it can create a common experience for trainees to share and discuss.

Online training videos are convenient and allow for dynamic instruction any time. An online training video can be easily made up if a student misses a class, and it can be distributed via a learning management system (LMS) so that it is available for students to review any time they choose, at the click of a button.

In order to avoid a passive learning experience in online training videos take the learning content directly from the video (virtual space) into the real world. This means that directly after students watch a video, ask them to put whatever they just learned into practice, whether it be engaging in role playing, answering questions, or building on what was discussed in the video. That way students will learn the information faster, and more effectively and long-term. Perhaps more importantly, however, is that it will also prompt students to invest more attention in video information as it continues to be presented.

Tools like BB FlashBack 2.6 are making their way onto the online training video scene–especially in the online training world. Course creators who make screen recordings using BB FlashBack can integrate these videos with their curriculum, using Coggno’s simple course creation tools, then deliver their curriculum using the Coggno LMS.

Don’t rely on old, outdated company demos or other ineffective video tools. Create your own. Using screen recording tools, you are able to record everything you see on your PC screen, whether it be a video, game, web page, or simulation. BB FlashBack also records your commentary, PC sounds and webcam as picture-in-picture video to give your course content a personal touch.

Another great idea is to make a personal appearance in your own course. Create your own demos, lectures, and visual tutorials for students. Using BB FlashBack and Coggno’s LMS toolkit, you have total control over what students view. You yourself  have the power to create, edit and apply your own online training videos to your e-learning course.

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Coggno.com offers a wide range of world-class LMS platforms.