Asynchronous discussions between teachers and learners take place intermittently, not simultaneously, through links to HTML content or email, news, or discussion groups. Instructors need to provide insight, motivate learners, summarize discussions, keep the discussion on track, and coach learners. While many online courses include standard tests, these tests do not show if a participant has integrated the concepts and skills and is using this new knowledge on the job. If you require special projects to show this level of learning or enhanced performance, your trainers will need to provide facilitator support during the project, and assessment and feedback when the project is complete. If your organization does not currently maintain standards or guidelines for training materials and written documentation, this would be an excellent time to begin to establish those standards.
Some management teams expect very little in terms of metrics.
This may be especially true for management teams that value education and training, because they feel that what is important is providing training opportunities for employees and they are not as concerned about results. Be aware that this attitude can change with the addition of new members to the management team, changes in the financial position of the organization, or any number of other business factors, and be prepared to establish measurements very quickly. If you decide to measure results, think about the current methods that you are using to measure training results. If you are currently using participant evaluations or standardized tests to measure training results, these methods are easily incorporated in e-learning programs. Some training departments measure the number of hours of training that each employee receives and report that metric to management.