Best of breed

Most trainers, and indeed teachers, are big fish in relatively small ponds. Because classroom training requires real people to be in real contact with each other, it helps if the trainer and the trainee are in the same time zone, preferably the same town. Being the best trainer in the use of Microsoft Office in Basingstoke will not win you fame but it will win you contracts from companies just down the road.

If e-learning really takes off, things will never be the same. Because IT is much the same world-wide (thanks to Microsoft for being a monopoly), e-learning materials can be and increasingly are built for a global market. The high costs of development can then be offset by the potential revenues, not only from Basingstoke, or even the USA and Europe, but also such promising little markets as India and China.

The implication of all this? Well, whether you’re in Basingstoke or Beijing, with the help of the Internet, you can access the best training going in any subject you care to mention. Being the 1000^th best Java trainer in the world could earn you a very good living in the classroom era, but puts you way out of the reckoning when customers can afford to choose best of breed.

If it’s any comfort, university professors should be equally anxious. You want an MBA? Don’t bother with the local offerings, there’s one going at half the price and employing the world’s top experts from a new online college in New Zealand.