Many IT managers are pushing their staff online for basic training needs because it's cheaper than traditional classroom-based learning. Problem is, online learning has been dubbed "ineffective" in the wake of a recent survey.

The survey, conducted in September by research company The Leading Edge, questioned the IT training managers of 58 companies and will officially release its results within the next couple of days.

"Running courses online is shown to be ineffective as a result of the survey," business consultant at The Leading Edge Alan Bowman, told ZDNet.

"Online learning only scores well in terms of convenience and cost effectiveness," Bowman said, because "IT training managers are trying to juggle training, on a budget that is relatively static, against the increasing need to up-skill staff."

60 percent of companies surveyed said they were using some form of online learning, however, 32 percent of respondents rated online learning "not successful at all" and where staff participation and enthusiasm were involved, 47 percent of training managers surveyed considered online learning to be "completely unsuccessful".

Corporates, although well-intentioned, are largely basing the decision not on the effectiveness of learning but on the cost, according to Steve Ross, general manager of Com Tech Education Services.

As well as that, staff enthusiasm for this mode of learning is low because it is "mass personalised and a very sterile, very artificial form of communication," Ross added.

"People are all different, yet online courses are pitched [to everyone] in the same way."

Ross believes the shortfalls of online learning are apparent in the continued worldwide shortage of skilled IT professionals.

Executive director of the IT&T Task Force, Brian Donovan, sees re-skilling and retraining as the key to lessening the IT skills gap and believes that companies must play a leading role in re-educating their workers.

However, Donovan described what passes as online learning in Australia as "pretty abysmal" and nothing more than old-style "chalk and talk".

"The problem is that there isn't a national agenda for the development of online learning [in Australia]," Donovan said.

The IT&T Skills Exchange hopes to commence the development of that agenda in early December as a means of making the most of the full multimedia capabilities that online learning could offer.

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