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BMW uses virtual classroom for E-learning

By Tischelle George
InformationWeek
June 17, 2002 12:00 AM (From the June 17, 2002 issue)

For luxury automaker BMW of North America Inc., employee training and development is an important part of the company's culture. Lunchtime training sessions are a regular function at the Woodcliff, N.J., headquarters.

The company also needs to train its people in compliance with Equal Employment Opportunity Commission regulations, as well as business ethics and technology. But travel expenses to fly at least three trainers from New Jersey to BMW offices around the country were adding up, and the process was inefficient. "It's not cost-effective to fly someone to California to deliver a 90-minute class," says Victoria Macdonald, BMW of North America's training manager.

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Macdonald chose a hosted version of Symposium, a virtual classroom product from collaboration software maker Centra Software Inc. The Symposium ASP subscription model for concurrent use is $2,500 per person, per year. The one-time fee BMW paid for 22 concurrent users to access its one-year Symposium license is equal to three business trips from New Jersey to California, she says.

Last week, Centra launched version 6 of its CentraOne content-creation and knowledge-management platform, which bundles Symposium and applications for Web conferencing, knowledge management, and content creation into one package for $6,000 a year for an individual ASP subscription to $77,500 for a 100-user license. "Increasingly, people are buying the single license," Chris Reed, VP of corporate strategy, says of the CentraOne 6.0 pricing model. Previously, customers had to purchase separate licenses for Centra applications; now they can buy one license and access various apps.

BMW will use PowerPoint slides, discussion groups, and live question-and-answer periods in Symposium's virtual classroom app to keep employees engaged as they participate in business-ethics training via PCs. Business ethics is a hot topic because of federal probes into accounting problems at many large companies. Macdonald expects the ethics surveys to generate discussion among employees. A sample question: "If your department developed training on hazardous waste handling and your spouse wants to use this training method at his or her job, is it OK to let them use that program?"

If employees are unsure of the answer, BMW guides them to resources to help them make the best decisions and understand company rules. BMW of North America wants to have all of its 1,100 employees trained in business ethics by year's end. It's testing the training software with a small group of employees and will roll it out to all employees this fall.



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