Those of us whose education included management science and those of us who learnt more and better about human motivation doing our masters in the University of Life have realized that motivation, either positive or negative, doesn’t work on everybody in the same manner.

Way back in 1960s itself, Douglas McGregor’s Theory X and Y enlightened us about the two contrasting assumptions of human motivation, leaving us to choose between the carrot and the stick and we now have Stephen Covey who talks about the wisdom of migrating from an industrial age (Theory X) to that of an Information Age (Theory Y) to get the best of people.

I am sure all of us, as seasoned managers, have our own experiences and opinions about what works in motivating our people and what doesn’t. We know that monetary rewards are necessary but so are the small little trinkets that even battle-scarred and war-weary generals and soldiers love to receive in recognition of their services.

As a first generation entrepreneur most of my working life, I have always used non-monetary motivation copiously (for an excellent reason that I couldn’t afford too much of monetary rewards!). It worked very well for me, cutting across levels, departments, gender and education/ experience.

A small example – In the beginning of this year, when we conducted a climate/ morale survey, we found that the team felt that they do not have enough freedom when it comes to taking leaves. We decided to give total freedom to avail eligible leave – a person need not take anybody’s approval before taking leave; they need to only inform in advance that they are availing leave. We had our usual share of Doubting Thomas’ apprehensions that this freedom is bound to get abused and will result to utter chaos. It is 2 months since we announced the new leave policy and there isn’t a single case where a person has not behaved responsibly when availing leave, keeping the company’s interest very much in mind.

A number of visitors – business associates, customers, suppliers – who visited our facility and came to know about our initiates toward making ‘Happy Employees’ have commented that “too much of a good thing is bad”; too much of praise, recognition and freedom is bound to bring about negative returns.

We don’t think so. What would you say? I would love to hear your comments, advice and experiences.

Thank you for reading my blog. If you are interested in the subject of motivation, you will find our free online course on ‘POSTIVE REINFORCEMENT’ quite interesting. Click on the link to access it: http://www.commlabindia.com/elearning-gurus/elearning-freecourses.php?course=C1

RK PRASAD
CEO

Financial superpowers such as the USA, UK, Canada, Japan, etc. are reeling under the heat of intense recession and the rising mercury is taking its toll on jobs and investments. India, which caters to these major outsourcing powerhouses, is also being exposed to the recession wave. Pink slips and cost-cutting have become the routine in organizations here too.

So, what should we do? Wait for the dust to settle? How long will it take?

All one can do is to predict but no certainty can be worked out. As a marketer, I should not wait for things to settle, but instead infuse my focus, energy and wisdom to make things better. How?

The world is reeling under one mantra “MORE FOR LESS.” This is the requirement of the day. If we could study this requirement and come up with strategies, these can act as the ammunition to fight recession. There is a saying, “Attack is the best form of defense.” So, why wait when we know the mantra? Just attack by making strategies around pricing. Instead of cutting jobs and investments, if we can take a cut on our margins, it would work wonders.

I see this as a fight between marketers and recession. If we have the guts to make strategies to provide “More for less,” we can definitely bring back the derailed purchase wagon on track. It would be a win-win situation for both suppliers and buyers. If we can recreate demand, the battle is won.

Murali Krishna
Sr. Manager- Business Development

Nowadays, Social Media Marketing is much talked about as an effective medium to building new business relationships. Common sites in this field are Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, YouTube and writing blogs.

How do you generate an interest and publicity through social media and attract prospective clients? The answer is simple – it’s the Law of Harvest. You always reap what you sow. If you give anything in value, you will get back equal value. But the basic underlying principle is that you need to give value first.

Effective marketers realize that in order to attract potential clients, they need to understand their need and give them something of value. They build their strategies around this principle. E-learning will boom with social media when people give value to their customers.

Here are five tips to communicate with your e-learning audience.

1. Use blogs to educate your audience on the latest e-learning trends and the importance of e-learning in imparting cost effective training. Create webinars, whitepapers on Instructional Design strategies and theories and discuss popular authoring tools to develop effective e-learning solutions.
2. Use LinkedIn to become members in industry specific forums so that you contribute to the discussions.
3. Use YouTube to impart learning by creating small e-learning modules and to demonstrate your products’ features.
4. Offer free courses so that users experience your product quality and worth.
5. Use Twitter and Facebook to inform your users about the knowledgebase you created, such as blogs, YouTube and free courses.

If you wish to learn more about Social Media Marketing, I recommend that you visit http://www.hubspot.com/inbound-marketing-kit/ and download the Inbound Marketing Kit. I found it to be very useful.

I invite you to take advantage of our Free eLearning Courses at www.commlabuniversity.com

Dr. Ayesha Habeeb Omer,
Chief Operating Officer

With busy work schedules and advanced technology such as internet, people want everything at a click of the mouse—whether it’s paying bills, communicating with people, shopping and now, even learning. When I think of learning, the first thing that comes to my mind is e-learning.

E-learning is witnessing a boom in every industry and field. With Web-based training, individuals and professional needn’t have to follow the hectic schedules of day-to-day classroom learning, but can work and learn at their own pace. People are beginning to appreciate this flexible, convenient and affordable mode of learning. In fact, there are innumerable reasons why Web-based training is more effective and efficient than the traditional instructor-led training.

E-Learning definitely yields additional benefits including flexible learning i.e., learning is self-paced, accessible anytime, anywhere, around the globe, apart from being highly interactive, available at an optimum cost, and most important, it provides quality learning. But what goes into designing a good e-learning course?

Let’s talk about the basics of designing a course.

Understand the target audience: Firstly, you need to understand the training needs and the nature of the target audience.

Informative content with interactive features: The key parameters for making a good e-learning course include informative content and interactive features such as Rich Streaming Media, simulations and online assessments.

Learner-centric: The design philosophy should always focus on the learner, i.e., it ought to be learner-centric. Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) and Instructional Designers (IDs) play a vital role in designing effective and engaging e-learning courses. SMEs provide the actual content required for a course that makes it informative and instructional designers make the course interesting and engaging.

Reduced process time: Instructional designers should be capable of reducing the process time and optimize utilization of various resources. They play a pivotal role in the smooth transition of the entire design and development process. A rich learning content and a visually engaging course make for the best pedagogy for increasing learners’ attention and motivating them to learn more.

Whether you’re a novice or an expert, off-the-shelf courses are a great way of enriching knowledge and addressing the training requirements of both individuals and employees. Today, thousands of companies across the globe are offering comprehensive range catalog courses.

CommLab India is a custom courseware solutions and learning technology services company. I am delighted to report that now it’s offering catalog courses on career-enhancing subjects like Lean Manufacturing, Legal & Work Compliance, Authoring Tools, Business Writing and many more.

From first hand experience, I can confidently state that this library of e-learning courses will definitely meet the online training requirements of individuals and organizations. They bring you the complete collection of engaging and interactive courses with features like assessments, case studies and media-rich simulations.

I will elaborate my views in the subsequent post.

Happy learning!

Asma Zaineb

Sr. Executive – Business Development