Fredrickson Communications

by Lola Fredrickson, CEO, Fredrickson Communications

Selecting a vendor to help you design eLearning content, or redesign an existing eLearning website, can be an overwhelming task—especially if you don’t have extensive knowledge of current practices and skill sets. To help you establish a framework for comparing and evaluating vendor strengths and weaknesses, we’ve compiled a list of essential questions to ask during the selection process.

by J Hruby, Director of Marketing

Social learning—the use of social media tools to enhance and extend learning experiences—holds great promise. The challenges have been around organization acceptance and implementation of the technologies. Are we ready to make 2010 the year that social learning goes mainstream?

by John Wooden, Director of Usability Services

Drawing on the recent work of Jonathan and Lisa Price and Nick Usborne, the research of usability experts such as Jakob Nielsen, and our own experience, we have compiled this list of 25 tips for writing online. This is the bread and butter stuff that everyone writing for websites and e-newsletters should know.

by John Wooden, Director of Usability Services

As of this writing, “Web 2.0” delivers 273 million results on Google and has already been the subject of two annual conferences in San Francisco. If asked though, most web users couldn’t define what Web 2.0 is, even if they’ve heard or seen the term before. No surprise—its a slippery concept obscured by a certain amount of hype.

by John Wooden, Director of Usability Services

Fredrickson’s John Wooden summarizes and comments on the findings of John Hagel, John Seely Brown, and Lang Davison and their research into what they call “The Big Shift”. They make a compelling case for the idea that the forces of change and technology have combined so that an economic return-to-normal is now “mission impossible”.

by J Hruby, Director of Marketing

Are you ready for the New Ruthless User? More importantly, is your website ready? If you’re not sure, read on.

by Tony Tao, Instructional Designer and eLearning Developer

At Fredrickson Communications, we are often asked questions about Articulate and Captivate—the two most-popular rapid eLearning development tools on the market. Fredrickson’s Tony Tao compares them head-to-head.

by Bill Lindsay, Senior Consultant

This article summarizes one of the techniques that Fredrickson Communications used to automate the process of developing online help topics. Once the underlying structure and macros were in place, we were able to generate hundreds of help topics at the rate 15-20 per minute.

by J Hruby, Director of Marketing

by Josh Welsh, Usability Analyst

Many companies and public-sector organizations are considering the benefits of collaboration tools like the wiki. Wikis and other collaboration tools may be a roaring success on the wild, wild web, but in the tamer confines of the business or government organization, implementing them effectively requires planning and thought. As the first of a two-part series about online collaboration, Josh Welsh offers some do’s and don’ts for the organizational use of the wiki.

by J Hruby, Director of Marketing

Over the past two years, there has been a constant conversation about how leaders of learning organizations should plan for, and respond to, the ever-deepening recession. Yet now that we’re on the verge of a recovery, there’s been little, if any, discussion about planning for happier days to be here again. J. Hruby makes the case for getting started now with your learning organization’s plan for recovery.

by Jay Kasdan, Project/Account Manager

Focusing a training effort to achieve business results is the most important thing any training group can do to provide value to its organization. Asking one simple question combined with tapping into the power of acceptance can make a huge contribution to the success of any initiative.

by John Wooden, Director of Usability Services

In Jakob Nielsen’s list of Top 10 Web Design Mistakes of 2005, Flash is number 3, which he regards as “a personal failure” after his usability work with Macromedia, the company that produces Flash.

by Site Admin,

In this edition of the Fredrickson eZine . . .

• New Article – Surefire Ways to Manage Reviews of Online Content
• How’s that LMS working for you?
• Coming attractions for learning and development professionals

by Site Admin,

In this edition of the Fredrickson eZine . . .

• Happy Holidays
• New Article – How Do We Improve the Learner Experience of LMSs?

by J Hruby, Director of Marketing

In this edition of the Fredrickson eZine . . .

• New Article – Tapping into the Wisdom of the Crowd: Making it Work
• Let Fredrickson help with the small stuff – Don’t let the technical hurdles stop you.
• Networking Opportunities for Learning Professionals

by Site Admin,

In this edition of the Fredrickson eZine . . .

• New Article – The Learning Organization’s Brand
• Workshop – Leveraging Learning in a Down Economy

by J Hruby, Director of Marketing

In this edition of the Fredrickson eZine . . .

• New Article – Crowds, Wisdom, and Work: Do’s and Don’ts for Documentation Through Online Collaboration
• Featured Links – Designing Usable, Self-Paced e-Learning Courses and The Impact of Corporate Culture on Social Media

by Site Admin,

In this edition of the Fredrickson eZine . . .

• New Article – Adjusting to The Big Shift
• New Article – Usability and User-Centered Design at 3M: an interview with 3M’s usability and user interface manager
• Learning Leadership Summit 2009 – recap and looking ahead

by J Hruby, Director of Marketing

In this edition of the Fredrickson eZine . . .

• New Article – Danger! Economic recovery ahead.
• Is your learning organization recovery-ready? Join the discussion.
• Need a speaker for your gathering or event?

by J Hruby, Director of Marketing

In this edition of the Fredrickson eZine . . .

• New Article – Going Beyond Bullets: Creating Engaging eLearning Courses with Articulate Studio.
• Got Compliance? Keeping up with the learning group’s role in compliance.

by Site Admin,

In this edition of the Fredrickson eZine . . .

• New Article – Satirical, Yet Oh So True
• Mainstream Mobile Devices – The Smartphone’s Impact on Learning.
• Coming Event – The Learning Leadership Summit 2010

by Site Admin,

In this edition of the Fredrickson eZine . . .

• The Fredcomm Blog
• New Article – 2010: The Year Social Learning Goes Mainstream?
• Fredrickson seminar at ASTD-TCC Regional Conference: Surefire Ways to Manage Reviews of Online Content
• Fredrickson shares in prestigious web award

by Tony Tao, Instructional Designer and eLearning Developer

Articulate Studio is a popular and feature-rich rapid eLearning development tool. Rapid development tools are a popular choice for those who want to create solid eLearning courses without intensive programming. Fredrickson’s Tony Tao offers some advice to help the new Articulate user produce better eLearning courses.

by John Wooden, Director of Usability Services

Much of the focus on LMS’s tends to revolve around how they function from the perspective of the LMS manager or training administrator. There’s another view of the LMS—one that’s not nearly so talked about: the learner’s view of the LMS. A little usability testing of your LMS can help you gain a lot of insight into how your LMS performs for the learner.

by Monique Benson, Technical Architect

One of the biggest ongoing challenges that comes with owning an LMS is integrating new and existing courseware. This article provides some essential advice for dealing with new courseware and for better managing your LMS.

by Jill Stanton, eLearning Lead

This article guides the eLearning developer through the potential pitfalls of new eLearning technologies overshadowing the needs of the learner.

by J Hruby, Director of Marketing

The July 16, 2009 Learning Leadership Summit brought together a large group of learning leaders from all over the Twin Cities. J. Hruby offers his observations on the discussion of learning’s role in the recovery.

by J Hruby, Director of Marketing

Who can resist thinking about 2011’s trends in learning and development? We can’t, that’s for sure. What are some of 2011’s trends and how far will they take us? Read on.

by Jay Kasdan, Project/Account Manager

This article shows how you can ensure that your training dollar is well spent by going over the ways that you can evaluate your training. It gives examples of technical and soft training skills and how you can use each to their best advantage.

by Jill Stanton, eLearning Lead

The Twin Cities Community of the Society for Technical Communication (STC-TC) has given a 2008 Award of Excellence to a Park Nicollet eLearning course developed by Fredrickson Communications.

by Molly Emmings, Account Manager

The simple act of sending a message is easier in the 21st century. Getting and keeping your audience’s attention long enough so that your message is understood, on the other hand, has never been more difficult. More messages means more competition for short attention spans. Want to cut through the communication clutter? Read on.

by Lola Fredrickson, CEO, Fredrickson Communications

Knowing the essential skill sets for designing, developing, and implementing websites (including those on intranets and extranets) is a key to successfully resourcing and managing website development projects.

by Joyce Lasecke, President

If you’ve ever prepared a cost estimate for a project, you know that you can lose sleep over it. Did you think of everything? Have you uncovered the true complexity of the system? You can reduce anxiety by following a process that answers these questions and results in concrete and measurable information on which to base your estimate.

by Robin Lucas, Director of Project Management

Conducting reviews is an essential part of the eLearning development process. It also can be expensive, time consuming, and frustratingly ineffective if not managed properly. Robin Lucas has managed hundreds of review cycles in her role as Fredrickson’s Director of Project Management. Here are her thoughts on managing the review process toward a more efficient, effective, and pain-free conclusion.

by Josh Welsh, Usability Analyst

There are plenty of examples of how online collaboration works (and doesn’t work) on the broader web, but what about using these tools and techniques within an organization? Josh Welsh has some thoughts on building effective collaboration inside the firewall.

by John Wooden, Director of Usability Services

World Usability Day is a good opportunity to offer a friendly reminder of the value of usability testing.

A recent article in USA Today* cited a Harris Interactive study in which about 85% of those polled said they had become so frustrated with the customer support for a technology product that “they ended up swearing, shouting, experiencing chest pains, crying, or smashing things. Slightly more than half said not being able to get a live person on the phone was their greatest frustration.… Seven out of 10 people polled said representatives weren’t trained adequately.”

by J Hruby, Director of Marketing

Every organization, and in fact some would argue even every person, has a brand image. The value of a positive brand cannot be overstated. Beyond the feel-good factor, there are tangible business returns for the learning group that considers and manages its brand image.

by John Wooden, Director of Usability Services

As 3M’s key advocate for usability and user interface design, Kathryn Bohlke has built the User Information and Usability Group within 3M’s IT group. Her mission is to improve usability and UI design for both applications and websites. Fredrickson’s John Wooden sat down with Kathy recently to talk about building an awareness of the role of usability and managing the usability function within one of the world’s largest manufacturing companies.

by John Wooden, Director of Usability Services

Review of Hot Text: Web Writing that Works. Jonathan Price and Lisa Price. Indianapolis, 2002. New Riders. [ISBN: 0-73357-1151-8. 507 pages. $40.00 (softcover)].

by John Wooden, Director of Usability Services

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) are everywhere on the web, used on all kinds of sites and in all kinds of contexts. From their humble beginnings in the early days of Internet newsgroups, FAQs have become a standard way of providing end users with important information.

But there’s a problem: users don’t like FAQs, at least not the way they are presented on many web sites.