FEATURES (and PITFALLS) of EMAIL LESSONS

Email Lesson Features

By delivering training in the form of email lessons, a company can realize the following advantages:

• Introductory training is delivered quickly.
• There are no costs for seminars.
• There are no costs for travel.
• No additional employee time (after-hours or weekend) is required.
• A large classroom is not required for training a large group.
• All email recipients receive the same material at the same time.
• Disruption of current work is minimized.
• This technique also encourages individual studies when interest and time permit.
• By participating, recipients know what level of expertise to expect from fellow employees.

Depending upon the email application used, you may be able to stage lessons in advance on a server, to be mailed at a predesignated time. Then the lesson administrator can be away from the workplace and still send lessons on a daily schedule.

Email Lesson Pitfalls

These usability lessons are provided as a courtesy of Modular Mining Systems, Inc. They are an example of the type of training you can provide to your company's employees using email as a delivery medium. However, if you use these or similar lessons, keep the following points in mind.

• If you use a series of email lessons more than once, you must check each lesson's links and update expired links when necessary. Keep a notebook with all lessons and web pages for reference.
• Due to time and resource limitations, these lessons do not include exercises to reinforce training.
• Be aware that some employees may be tempted to spend unproductive time on the Web after reading the lessons, although this did not seem to be an issue at Modular Mining.
• When selecting source content on the Web, be careful that you are not using content from a site where you established a user account in the past. Such a site will not be accessible to students until they first start their own accounts, which they may be reluctant to do.
• Many email applications do not fully support HTML content. Additionally, some employees may be using a text-based mail reader. Therefore, unless you know the capabilities of your audience's email applications, you may want to send email lessons using a plain text format.
  For a chart containing the capabilities of various email programs, see Web Marketing Today's "HTML Email Client Program Summary" article at http://www.wilsonweb.com/wmt6/email-client-summary.htm.

To provide automated feedback from lesson recipients to the lessons administrator, each email lesson can be linked to a web-based test form. Feedback improves learning for the participants, and testing can certify a minimum level of competency in the subject matter.

"Learn'N'Earn"

Email lessons that include feedback forms allow for creative ways to engage employees in a company's interests. For example, you can incorporate a monetary incentive for completing desktop training into email lessons. Employees can be required to submit a completed web-based test form after each lesson. When a participant submits the form, each correct answer automatically generates a credit to his or her "education account." This account could be converted to a monthly monetary learning bonus, or earned points might be traded for company shirts or other items.

Having such an incentive could make learning fun and might make employees eager to participate. For new employee orientation and education, a company could use this bonus technique to make an enjoyable first impression. New employees will also learn that desktop training is a normal and accepted mode of professional development at the company.