E-Learning Lessons: Compliance and IT Innovation

Michael Loria - 7/30/04

As the IT market gets more comfortable with the idea of recovery, speculations abound regarding "the next big thing" and which market segments stand to gain the most when IT spending returns to a more fluid pace. While some markets waned or simply disa

One of the most promising markets for reinvigoration is e-learning. There are several reasons for the renewed interest in this segment. The two main drivers reigniting e-learning are regulatory compliance and technology innovations.

Let's take a closer look at these influences and how they are shaping the future of e-learning and impacting today's CLO.

Regulatory Compliance
Since ignorance is never an excuse for breaking the law, the federal government has ushered in a renewed interest in e-learning as a result of recent regulations. While adhering to compliance regulations such as OSHA and EEOC has been a long-standing requirement for many industries, there is a new set of regulations that have broadened awareness and demand for e-learning.

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and Sarbanes-Oxley legislation are just two examples of the influence that government is having in determining corporate education direction. While HIPAA is designed to protect the privacy and confidentiality of patients and their medical records and Sarbanes-Oxley is related to corporate financial reporting, both of these recent legislations have increased the need for additional corporate training in relation to e-learning, and have boosted the amount of available online content specific to compliance.

Through the combination of self-paced training modules and real-time classroom environments, organizations are discovering that just-in-time online training courses are an ideal solution to address the need to provide staff with job-related coursework while adhering to government regulations.

In fact, IDC Research recently reported that government compliance will be the No. 1 IT investment focus for 2004. Findings from AMR Research reveal that $5 billion will be spent on compliance-related activities and IT purchases in 2004. Keep in mind, however, that AMR's research encompasses all spending related to compliance, not just IT spending. Still, technology expenditures related to compliance are expected to exceed $1 billion this year alone.

As government regulations drive e-learning, companies need to ensure that their employees are getting the most from their investments as compliance training is critical to the overall health of the organization.