Collaborative Training Environment

"A new automated staff information system was recently purchased by a major corporation and needs to be implemented in six regional offices. Unfortunately, the staff is located throughout all the different offices and cannot meet at the same time or in the same location. As an instructional designer for the corporation, you have been charged with implementing a training workshop for these offices. As part of the training, you were advised how imperative it is that the staff members share information, in the form of screen captures and documents, and participate in ongoing collaboration."

 

When creating a distance learning module, assessing the use of technology is an essential component of the planning process (Simonson et. al, 2012). Although cloud computing has been around in some form for the better part of a decade, it is only recently becoming a widely recognized as a viable tool for not only document sharing, but collaboration in its’ truest form; this is a benefit for designers as it alleviates one of the most critical hurdles in distance learning. The major hurdle that designers face when implementing the use of one of these applications is the uninitiated that may resist change. In order to best address the needs, there are two performance tasks that need to be addressed: information sharing and ongoing collaboration. There are a variety of options to address these needs that range in price and complexity. The key is to find an effective low-cost option that is not too complicated for the average worker to master in an acceptable time frame.

There are multiple methods for sharing information via the internet, but I believe that Google Docs would the most cost effective application for this process. A lead Google account would have to be created and then the desired document folders would have to be shared with all of the collaborators in the company. Google Docs will allow those granted access to save notes, voice notes, screen captures, picture files, documents (office files, PDF’s etc…). Google Docs also allows individuals to review, edit and share items in real time which would satisfy the client request for information sharing.
 

The Senior Instructional Designer at the University of Alabama has successfully integrated Google Docs into both online course development and professional development for the faculty, stating that Google Docs serves to eliminate the difficulties of collaborating across great distances and multiple time zones.  Additionally, a team of Florida State University professors researched the benefits of using Google Docs for distance learning and presented their findings at the Columbia State University Learning “Now “ Frontier Conference. Their presentation was called Google Docs: A Robust Hub for Online Collaboration; in this presentation they emphasized the affordability, wide compatibility and robust online capabilities. Google Docs addresses one of the major concerns of distance education practitioners, the amount of interactivity/collaboration that is possible in a course (Beldarrain, 2006), is appropriately addressed and should be sufficient for most collaborative scenarios over distance.