Terry Schade, senior vice president in the Wholesale Banking Division
of financial services provider National City, had a big training problem
on his hands.
The company had just adopted a new payroll processing platform for
its banking industry customers, many of which deliver payroll and direct
deposit paychecks to employees of merchant clients large and small.
“We had to convert 15,000 employees and get our 45,000 customers
trained and converted on the new payroll processing system in 60 days.
We had a contractual obligation with our [former] software provider to
do so,” he said. “Failure was not an option.”
The company decided to roll out an automated online approach for
training its workers on the new system, complete with single sign-on so
that they were logged in once to many different databases. The online
training environment allowed workers to log into training portals
anytime they needed, many of which did so after their kids were in bed.
They were able to build it using Web services
built on a service-oriented architecture
different databases to talk to each other, and share data.
But National City may be the exception to many companies’ training
experience.
In a global study of over 300 chief human resources offices, IBM
found over 60 percent of HR professionals operating in
mature markets had difficulty identifying and developing the critical
employee skills and talents that are vital to remain competitive.
The 2005 IBM Global Human Capital survey also said more than half of
the CEOs surveyed believed their staffs do not have the skills to move
into new markets and capture emerging growth opportunities.
IBM calls the trend “The Menace of Maturity.” The term suggests that
companies a bit long in the tooth are likely to see atrophy in their
ability to train employees swiftly.
That’s why Big Blue’s global services group is taking its Web
services and on demand road show to the education crowd, from the
corporate market on through to K-12.
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| Click to view an SOA architecture example |
Enter SOA for the education sector. James Sharpe, director of
e-Learning Technology in IBM’s Learning Solutions group, said Service
Oriented Architecture can be a foundation for building online,
collaborative learning environments.
Because SOAs help different databases talk to one another, the
framework becomes the foundation for rolling out Web services so that
portals can access different databases for specific purposes.
Take the Cingular example. After the Department of Justice signed
off on the $41 billion merger with AT&T Wireless, the company had 19
days to train 129,000 of its newly-merged work force about the new
company, including retail outlets where cell phones and voice services
are sold. That’s on top of the 39,000 employees it had to organize under
one company.
“Sleep was not an option,” said Rob Lauber, executive director of
learning for Cingular Wireless. He said Cingular took a balanced
approach with its Web services education goals in order to blend 4,100
instructor-led sessions with the online aspect.
“This was not just because the importance of face to face teaching,
but because of the importance of face time in change management,” he
said, referring to the largest merger (in cash terms) in U.S. corporate
history.
“One of the challenges we faced, pre- and post-service, is that we
needed to provide core information, procedures and services, how to
handle the wireless services, legacy stores, and how to handle the
customers’ questions,” he said.
Also critical to the task was the ability to scale up the online
training as Cingular absorbed AT&T’s employees and platforms. “Being
able to work in a collaborative environment was critical to our ability
to be successful.” The portals, built on SOA architecture, rolled to the
masses on time, providing tailored information to staff, employees and
third-party resellers.
For Cingular, the process included building a database that helped
train employees on how to up-sell customers to new data services. He said as a result, the company saw a 25 percent lift in average revenue per transaction around data sales.
“At the same time, the systems are helping us reduce transaction times at the point of sale.”
Today Cingular is working with 26 training modules it completed
within a 60-day window.
“We realize learning transformation is a journey and we’re a long way
off,” said Nancy DeViney, general manager of IBM Learning Solutions
division. “You have to find what concepts you agree with and recognize that it
will be a cultural journey.”
For the most part, both companies found that some employees loved it
right away. Others struggled against it mightily, added National City’s
Schade. “But take it away and everybody loves it.”
