Towards Maturity Benchmarking

Over the last 5 years, the eLearning landscape (including eAssessment) has become clearer with the introduction of the Towards Maturity Benchmarking report. Previously, organisations wanting to find out how their on-line delivery compared to their peers could only access US reports, say from Deloitte, Bersin or Brandon Hall.   The Towards Maturity report, and access to the tools it uses, are freely available at www.towardsmaturity.org/2013benchmark with each organisation participating receiving a personalised report on how they compare.  The report also brings out trends and indicators to how the whole sector is moving into the various delivery modes and technologies being deployed.

Historically the benchmark has addressed the following points:

• What are successful organisations doing with learning technologies and how can we learn from them?
• Identifying emerging trends and changing practices in workplace skills delivery over time.
• Encouraging effective practice by:

o   Providing independent evidence to support business planning, effective learning technology strategy and implementation;

o   Providing all participants with a free personalised benchmark report with activity recommendations to support their journey with learning technologies.

The Benchmark dataset in 2013 is based on responses from 2,900 organisations and 10,000 learners.

How is The Toward Maturity Benchmark funded?   The process is funded through the TM Ambassador Programme.  Ambassadors fund this work in order to obtain the market information about the UK landscape for on-line enabled learning and assessment.

Here is some sample information from the 2013 report:

Of learners who participated:

• 38% say that their Managers agree that eLearning delivers additional business benefit.
• 31% agree e-learning has contributed to improvements in productivity across the organisation.
• 26% say Learners [JW2] put what they learn into practice quickly.
• 24% say e-learning has made a significant contribution to increasing their revenue.
• 22% say that they have noticed positive changes in staff behaviour.
• 21% of learners have recommended e-learning to colleagues to improve job performance.

I hope this introduction will encourage your organisation to join in the Benchmarking community. Towards Maturity are a not for profit organisation:  www.towardsmaturity.org.  Further information is available at:

1. Towards Maturity Benchmark centrewww.towardsmaturity.org/mybenchmark
2. 2013/14 Benchmark Reportwww.towardsmaturity.org/2013benchmark
3. Towards Maturity Learning Landscapewww.towardsmaturity.org/learner

Author: Linda Steedman, CEO eCom Scotland a Towards Maturity Ambassador. www.ecomscotland.com