Re: Cost/benefit analysis -Reply

Subject: Re: Cost/benefit analysis -Reply
From: Dianne Walsh <Dianne -dot- Walsh -at- MEDECISION -dot- COM>
Date: Tue, 2 Jun 1998 16:29:56 -0400

Oops, looks like I sent this to Lisa only and it should have gone to the list.

_
Lisa has brought up some valid questions. Here are the answers.


______________________________ Reply Separator _________________________________
Subject: Cost/benefit analysis -Reply
Author: "Lisa Comeau" <COMEAUL -at- csa -dot- ca> at Internet
Date: 6/2/98 3:12 PM


Will you be developing the CBT in-house, or will it be third-party?

The CBT will be developed in-house, by a staff of two writers (myself and one
other), possibly a third if I can justify it. We have a staff of reps who
currently spend an awful lots of time in the field training. Because our product
is large and complex, our reps usually spend anywhere from 3 days to 3 weeks
getting clients trained and up to speed with live support. Return visits are
often indicated. The cost of all this is passed on to our customers and some of
them are screaming for mercy.

<snip>

And as an instructor, I can tell you that many people prefer having their hands
held when it comes to new software.

Agreed.

A "live" person can answer questions better than any CBT program I've seen. (A
mix of the 2 is a good idea, but I'd have to know more about the split before I
recommended it)

A mix is exactly what we have in mind. Our product is not the same
from one customer to the next--we specialize in customizing the
product to suit each client's needs.

What this means in regards to CBT is that we want to develop CBT for
the parts of the system that are the same across all clients. The
customized parts would be handled by the live trainer. Our customers
have been asking for something like this as they sometimes need to get
new users up and running and want something these new folks can use to
learn the basics of the product quickly without having to incur the
expense of one or more* of our reps coming on-site for long periods.
We hope that site visits, while not eliminated altogether, can be
pared down by using CBT.

It is not unusual for 3, 4, or more reps to be sent to a customer
site. Multiply each hotel and meal expense by the number of our folks
on-site and it adds up to considerable expense for our customers. CBT
could cut this number down to one. We also think CBT can improve user
retention of the material as some trainers are less effective than
others.

A good way to do cost analysis for this would be to call your nearest computer
training center, and find out the cost of CBT and of an instructor, and average
them. Also find out from anyone who's developed CBT how long it took, what kind
of snags, etc. and figure out how many people are going to be working overtime
to complete this task. Then double any money and time amounts you come up with,
because I can guarantee you'll need more time and cash.

Some good ideas...and we are aware that this will be an expensive and
time-consuming project, especially as there are only two of us to do
it and we have to fit it in with all our other work. Luckily, we will
set our own deadline for this.

I have some info on CBT vs. contract instruction costs, if you like, I can email
them to you off the list.

Even though we don't contract training, I'd like to see these if you could send
them. Thanks in advance!

Dianne Walsh
Documentation Manager
MEDecision Inc.




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