Risk Management and Safety Departments, who are charged with providing OSHA mandated safety trainings to all employees, are scrambling to find ways to train employees while keeping training costs to a minimum. While ‘live’ training is preferred, there are large direct and indirect costs associated with it, including each employee’s time away from their work, replacement coverage, travel, and overtime pay if the training is after work hours. Another dilemma of ‘live’ training is what to do for those groups of individuals who have difficulty attending person-to-person training programs. This might include night custodians, off-site locations, institutions without staff development days, and most often it’s the faculty who have the toughest time getting to live training sessions.

It used to be that ‘live’ training was the only training option available. In this technologically advanced age, most employees have access to a computer. Today, on-line staff training is a practical reality that can save scarce budget dollars.

On-Line Training and Webinars

When Web-based training first emerged a decade or so ago, few recognized the potential power of this versatile tool. With technology and bandwidth improvements today — along with th eglobal accessibility of the Web and the ever-rising costs associated with educating large or remote employee populations —have compelled many institutions to get serious about online training solutions.

The business world has embraced e-commerce as a valuable tool for selling and marketing products. Today, many educational agencies across the U.S. are starting to use online and technology-based education to train employees in safety, new-hire orientations, and sexual harassment awareness. In having an e-learning environment in place, it allows them the flexibility and adaptability to meet the needs of their busy employees, as well as remain within budget.

Online training can be viewed as “just-in-time training,” where it would allow employees to get necessary mandated trainings when and where they need them. In looking at the success of e-learning programs from a knowledge standpoint, the consistency in training for a sometimes widely distributed workforce could be a huge budgetary advantage. Being able to offer a training program to employees electronically could increase knowledge, reduce losses and save money.

Another cost-effective innovation in training is the webinar, which is an Internet based "virtual classroom" where the only equipment needed to participate is an Internet connection, a computer, and a phone. Webinars remove barriers to participation in professional development due to time restraints, distance and cost. They allow Risk Managers and key personnel to participate and receive content on-site through desktop presentations, text messaging, voice communications, a whiteboard and polling capabilities.

In addition to providing cutting edge information on-site at their computer, webinars offer amore affordable option. They also feature interactive Q & A, real-time collaboration, the ability to digitally archive sessions for playback, facilitation of registration, attendance management and post-event reporting.

Technology and Training: A Summary of Benefits:

Fast and Easy. One administrator would assign specific trainings to specific groups of employees. Once assigned, a click of the mouse alerts those employees that an online training session is waiting for them at the link provided. Once they've passed the final exam, a completion email comes back to you and you have the data you need for compliance.

Monitored Participant Comprehension. Online trainings are interactive, provide learning scenarios and have quizzes built into the course material. This allows you to solicit feed back, answer any questions that arise, maintain interest levels and formally assess learner comprehension much faster than before.

Up and Running Immediately. Many online training courses and webinars are published utilizing common platforms, such as Macromedia Flash Player, which is already installed on 98 percent of Web browsers in use.

Matched to Different Learning Styles and Languages. Because online training programs are self-paced, learners may pause, rewind and progress through modules at their own pace. Bookmarks allow users to resume immediately from wherever they paused and keep all previous quiz results intact. Most courses are available in English and Spanish.

Easy Updates. All course content may be maintained in a single, searchable database. Existing compliance status and employee updates are easy to find, retrieve, reuse orre-purpose for changing training needs.

Less Expensive.Online training and webinars drastically reduce not only such hard costs as travel and accommodations, but they also reduce the soft costs, such as the time employees must spend out of the office and classroom, replacement coverage,and overtime pay.

Online training and webinar learning solutions are incredibly dynamic, and in many aspects, offer marked advantages over face-to-face training. Budgetary savings, along with the increased flexibility and convenience, give community colleges an e-learning solution that will fit within their new budget constraints.

MORE RISK MANAGEMENT AND INSURANCE STRATEGIES FOR BUDGET SAVINGS In the current issue of iJournal (www.ijournal.us), Keenan & Associates Senior Vice President Tim Keenan offers additional approaches to reduce insurance, risk management and employee benefit costs during the budget crisis.To see this article, please go to http://ijournal.us/issue_19/ij_19_05_article_keenan.html.