Mark, why should learning management be implemented on top of an ECM - this would exclude small and medium-sized companies who don't have this infrastructure?


Mark Hellinger: In general there is a tremendous amount of content within the enterprise that cannot be used in the training. This is because stand-alone learning-content-management platforms have little or no communication or interoperability with other content-management systems.


If the training department needs content that exists elsewhere within the company, they are forced to search in different systems and then recreate existing versions of the same content, an expensive and error-prone endeavor. When learning-content management is an application on top of an ECM platform, everyone in the organization, including training, now share the same source of content.


But there are technologies that can search in several platforms.


Mark Hellinger: Very few enterprises have installed search engines that cover multiple repositories. While there are some off-the-shelf connectors and federated repositories to connect content-management systems, the uniqueness of learning content - for example, reusable learning objects, industry standards such as SCORM and interactive or sequenced content like assessments - make this kind of connectivity significantly more difficult and training even more isolated.


An integrated platform is a much better strategy because ECM systems already have access to the entire spectrum of enterprise content and are therefore immediately leveraged.


But doesn't it cost more to implement a learning management on top of an ECM?


Mark Hellinger: At the beginning an ECM may mean a higher investment than a stand-alone LCMS, but in the longer run, the broad visibility coupled with the ability to easily access and make use of the entire range of content of an organization will be drastically cheaper than creating redundant learning content out of the existing content.


When learning content is part of an ECM, should all companies throw away their expensive learning platforms?


Mark Hellinger: Over the past five to ten years, organisations have concentrated on the delivery of learning content, and they now run monolithic solutions that cannot be used on other platforms. For the moment, it makes no sense to change it. But content will be the next great challenge as the market demands rapid customization, localization, and multi-channel delivery of learning content.


An integrated solution combines the expertise of learning vendors such as learning objects and SCORM courseware with far more sophisticated functionality of ECM such as collaboration, Web 2.0 technologies, and translation and localization of content to rapidly meet these requirements.


So you mean companies should no longer create explicit learning content?


Mark Hellinger: No, I am saying that an integrated solution allows you to create customized learning from existing content. Of course people have different needs. When they learn a topic for the first time - for example a new software application - it is good to have an instructor-led or online course. But engineers or marketing managers who only need to know a small detail do not want to go through an entire course but rather to find exactly the snippet of information they need.


This is what a learning-content-management system should provide: the ability to filter through volumes of existing content and deliver the information relevant to the learner at their particular moment of need.


ECM is twenty years old - so why didn't you sell this idea ten years ago when LMS vendors started to penetrate the market with their products?


Mark Hellinger: It's true that ECM mainstream technology is almost twenty years old, and the theory has existed for a long time, but even 24 months ago, learning on top of ECM was not possible. That is because the enabling technology is a native XML content-management system with an XML database that allows granular, reusable content.


Until recently, ECM platforms did not provide XML-based storage. But they are quickly recognizing the need for it with EMC Documentum leading the charge, hence our decision to port our 100 percent XML-based system to their ECM platform. We expect other ECM vendors to quickly follow suit.


But what do companies do with their existing content? Can it easily be transferred to the ECM?


Mark Hellinger: This will be an evolutionary process. Learning content today is not compatible, searchable, or reusable in ECM. In addition, the shelf-life of courses differs depending on whether for example they are training oriented to solve a particular problem or product related, with more frequent changes.


Many companies will follow a mixed strategy: They will keep general content until they have to change it; others have to be migrated immediately. The good news is that often this migration is not manual, as there are a number of tools and services to transform content to XML. The second and more important point is that once content is in native XML format, it is future proofed and ready for tomorrow's needs.