During a pandemic, the e-learning market grows in the needs of business

Today, e-learning has great potential. It is estimated that the e-learning market will grow by 2026 by approx. 8% in CAGR, from USD 200 million in 2020 to USD 370 million in 2036. The conditions of the pandemic have meant that, on a global and national scale, classic training and training become becoming less and less popular.

The PIFS report shows, that over 75% of companies in the training sector experience a significant drop in revenues, almost 50% of the surveyed companies plan to implement e-learning, and already 44% conduct training of this nature.

Cybersecurity and digital qualifications are becoming extremely important for business in the area of e-learning – including filling the competency gap of IT resources supporting the development of companies.

Despite global increases in the area of e-learning, the Polish training sector also felt a decline in interest in this part of the offer, that it implemented online. We do not know the exact reasons, but we can presume, that the subject and the proposed form of e-learning did not meet the needs of companies, looking for support in building team knowledge.

Macro situation

In a short time after the lockdown of the global economy, business and organizations made a real digital transformation – at first, it was the transition to remote working mode. The main need of companies has become to adapt processes to online communication and operational activities. The level of digitization of the offer of the training sector in this area turned out to be insufficiently high to meet the scale of needs and… topics.

Training developers – Managed Services

The use of applications serving the above-mentioned purposes and the correct and effective operation of the digital back-office required an urgent transfer of knowledge and availability in the form of e-training. It is worth noting here that the IT sector was best prepared for this situation – the communication software vendors themselves, global players providing tools and their business partners.

This opened the path to this market for experts from the Managed Services sector – advanced IT services. Managed Services companies already have extensive experience in using e-learning platforms and building e-training courses for the most demanding organizations and corporations in the world. It is true, that training developers do not build mass solutions, which have generally been used by the training market, but they set leading trends and become pioneers of modern e-learning.

Managed Services, thanks to its above-average digital competences, enters the business training market with digitized reality, not only as a service provider, but also as a smart competition in some areas.

Onboarding and improving digital qualifications

Business needs service and operation in more and more modern business applications. The already functioning or introduced solutions require efficient operation from users. However, training cannot take place in a production environment. The risk of introducing inappropriate or embarrassing changes is too great for the business. After all, the data that employees work with in a digital environment determines the security of business continuity and the quality of customer service.

The Managed Services sector eliminates similar risks in business by offering advanced training support services. In sandbox solutions reflecting the real application environment on the Learning Management System (LMS) platform, training developers also propose instructions, hints and exercises in the implementation of employee tasks.

The competency gap in IT resources

In addition to learning the system or completing tasks in business applications, similar solutions can also be used in the quick training of programmers or specialists to operate ready-made cloud systems in the form of SaaS or own (on-premise) solutions. IT competences in business are simply lacking, and they are necessary for its development. E-learning is an excellent tool for learning how to use highly automated application delivery and development. Entire training programs are already being developed for IT specialists, which verify the knowledge and skills of specialists at individual stages. In this way, business provides itself digital resources for the future and the security of the development of the digital structure, because participants of such programs obtain access to the implementation of specific tasks after verification of competences in e-learning programs.

Cybersersecurity

Safe environments that reflect real e-work environments and a safe cyberspace are a real challenge for business today. A human being – an employee does not keep up with digital changes and does not fully understand the technology that surrounds them and therefore remains the weakest link in digital security policies.

The Managed Services solutions proposed in the field of e-learning for cybersecurity go a step ahead of the traditional ones. They are based on tools that are more effective for generations raised in the world of mobile and computer games than written instructions. In addition to the aforementioned “sandbox” environment, the phenomenon of gejming is already used in the area of ​​cybersecurity. For e-generations, gameplay in which they can play the role of a person who detects security vulnerabilities or avoids attacks will be most effective by building digital experiences. We know from research and the measures adopted for similar solutions that recognizing threats and dealing with them after e-learning training is at a much higher level than after traditional ones. The latter require the user to apply theoretical knowledge to the digital environment and analyze the actions taken, for which the employee simply does not have time or is unable to carry out. E-learning teaches by engaging users’ senses in the cognitive process in a safe, digital environment.

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Kamil Bojarski, e-learning expert at Transition Technologies MS S.A.