Improvement – Training Triumphs

August 17th, 2015 | by ViaDataWebAdmin |

We had a problem where user manuals were taking a colossal amount of time and effort to create and write, especially if they included screenshots (which we had to mark-up). This way of doing things required someone who had an excellent grasp of English and who also understood the inner workings of the system very well. They had to be able to describe precisely what was required to perform a series of steps when executing a business function or action.

These manuals took a lot of time to produce, and they tended to get left gathering dust and were rarely read by the customer, particularly if they were in printed form. They also got out of sync with the system quickly and refreshing them with up-to-date screen shots was laborious and infrequently done.

We knew this was a problem that had to be addressed and so we started looking for a solution that required minimum effort and time from the staff, particularly the system architect and programmers. We also required that the training material be easily available, viewable and comprehensible. Lastly, the new methodology had to be able to show off any system competencies in an exciting and entertaining manner.

The solution:

After some round table discussions, we decided to go with a video tutorial solution. We felt that this would be the perfect way to improve our training methodology and make it stimulating at the same time.

With our new methodology, our business analyst (BA) decides on the title and business function to be depicted on the video. The BA then writes a brief overview explaining what the function does, why it is required and any other pertinent data. Notes are written in point form on the steps required, without explaining where things are located or what their icons or buttons look like, but instead giving those names.

A screen recording tool (we use Camtasia) is then used to record the steps to perform the depicted function. The BA then sends the screen capture, introduction and step notes to the video editor (we use an outside consultant to do this).

The Video Editor (VE) cleans up the video, removing time delays, jerkiness and odd mouse movements. The VE highlights relevant portions of the screen at the correct time and adds the script to the video. The VE also adds an introduction and title page and an outro (a standardised ViaData ending) to the video and sends the video back to the Business Analyst for final review and publishing.

The results and benefits of our new training methodology:

• Here are two examples of our training videos for you to peruse:

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• The videos are a great improvement on the old printed training material, and are eminently watchable, simple and easy to produce.
• Time spent on producing training material is greatly reduced, a great improvement for a busy team.
• The training video highlights a system’s capabilities very efficiently, a great improvement over the previous methodology.
• The user’s time spent on understanding a function is greatly shortened and improved.

Here’s an example of our new training methodology at work:

A recent system delivered to 2500 users was installed with an email providing the link to the URL containing 8 training videos. (No other training material was required on rollout).

Once again, ViaData was able to take a business process and improve it for the benefit of its users and for greater productivity. Why not give us a call the next time you need an improvement in your business processes?