Donna Papacosta has a nice follow up to the interview she did with me last week. It can be found here.

Here are the show notes:

00:01 Intro and welcome

01:20 Followup to interview with Kathleen Gilroy of the Otter Group

01:45 Question from Dave Williams about using the iPod as a hard drive; answer from Kathleen Gilroy

02:20 Comment from Sallie Goetsch, who would prefer an iPod over a five-inch
binder, about Purdue University podcasts and Marketing Online Live

03:55 Podcasting will be used more in training as people understand its capabilities

04:20 Five reasons why podcasts are effective for learning: portable, interactive, searchable, easy to produce, low cost

06:50 Comment from Peter West

08:00 Where to send comments; outro

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I was interviewed by Donna Papacosta about podcasting for learning. She
did a nice job of putting the interview together into a podcast for her
series. Here is a link to the podcast:

Here are the shownotes:

00:01 Intro and welcome
01:13 How the Otter Group started podcasting
02:00 Interactive aspect of the Negotiating Tip of the Week
03:33 Variety of learning services include interactivity; podcasting is newer, better way to deliver material
04:22 Benefits of podcasting: distribution; portability; easier and less costly
05:00 How they are integrating podcasting into learning; Merrill Lynch
project will give people video iPods instead of big black binders
07:15 Screen resolution of iPod is good for learning
08:00 Information is searchable
14:00 Otter Group has been using RSS for years; Kathleen was inspired by the Dean campaign
15:44 Aggregators are a powerful tool
19:45 Where to send comments; outro

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Marketingstudies.net has just published Going Deep in the Otter Group Podcasting for Learning

Here is the full text of the article:

The Otter Group has been making quite some waves recently with their RSS Networks for Learning and their e-learning podcasts, which they are using as part of their marketing mix.

In addition, they recently published an excellent report on using podcasting for learning, certainly worth a look.

I was very happy to have had the opportunity to do an e-mail interview with them, which is published in full below …

1. It seems your podcast is generating quite a business impact, so we have to wonder how you are promoting it?

We did very little promotion beyond mentioning the podcast on our website (http://www.ottergroup.com) which at that time was serving 21,000 unique sites per month. We also listed the podcast in the directories and posted the feed on Itunes the first week that Itunes opened up their store to podcasts. Subscription to the podcast has grown over the last few months. It has really been an example of viral marketing. And publishing the paper has helped draw attention to the podcast series. Last week's podcast on “making the first offer” was downloaded 528 times from Itunes and 535 times directly from the blog that hosts the series: http://www.negotiationtip.com/blog

2. What kind of subscriber growth are you seeing?

Here is a compilation of our podcast subscriptions over time and by topic:

May
392 views

June
691 views

July (so far) 
448 views

breakdown
110 views of the Salary Negotiation podcast
71 Negotiation Tip: “Negotiating Styles” 6/14/05
61 Negotiating Tip Podcast: “Psychological Traps” 6/30/05
59 Negotiation Tip: “Art of Questioning” 6/6/05
54 Negotiation Tip Podcast: “Managing Assumptions” 6/21/05
52 Negotiation Tip: “Dealing with Difficult People” 5/26/05
39 Negotiation Tip: “Empathy” 5/19/05
38 Negotiation Tip: “Approaches to Negotiating” 4/5/05
37 Negotiation Tip: “Being Assertive” 5/12/05
30 Negotiation Tip: “Understanding Alternatives” 5/5/05
24 Negotiating Tip Podcast: “The Split the Difference Swindle”

As I mentioned, the last podcast has had over 1,000 downloads in one week. So our subscription rates are clearly going up dramatically.

More detailed and most recent statistics are available at our site.

3. How is podcasting impacting your business?

Podcasting has been helpful to our business in a number of ways. We come from the world of e-learning program development and management and we have shifted our production strategy to finding very low cost ways of producing and distributing learning materials. Podcasting is a perfect example of our new production model. And we are waiting for the rumored upgrade in the next version of Apple's I-life that will allow us to include graphics and video to our podcast streams.

Our new business strategy is to use RSS to build continuous learning networks for organizations. Podcasts from one new channel for learning and are well suited to certain types of training. In the negotiating tips podcast we are using the public podcast for one of our clients as a means of extending a formal learning program on conflict resolution. We are planning new podcasts on topics such as hedge funds and investing that will also fit this public/private model.

We believe podcasting has driven new traffic to our web site, which has been dramatically increasing over the past five months of our podcasting series. In September we had a total of 48,000 distinct hosts served. In April before we started podcasting, we had only 21,000 hosts served. I believe this traffic correlates with interest in our podcast series.

4. Do you perhaps have some practical advice for podcasters?

I think our paper is full of very good advice on how to think about podcasting. I would say that the most important thing is to make podcasts that are interesting. We are fortunate in working with Josh Weiss who is at the Program on Negotiation at Harvard. His content is great and worth listening to and revisiting. I find myself listening to the podcasts on my airplane trips. I negotiate all the time and I know these tactics well, but I always find something new and interesting in the podcasts–even those I have heard before.

From the paper, there are a few basic things that every podcaster should keep in mind:

Description. Always include a brief description and a title for your podcast so people can find it in the podcast directories and scan for relevant content.

Brevity. Podcasts work best when they are short and to the point. We recommend limiting the length of a podcast to two to four minutes. Or, create a shorter and longer version of the same topic.

Publish only high quality audio. Podcast listeners expect clear, semi-professional audio. With many inexpensive or free audio editing and recording tools, high quality audio recording is within reach of even the smallest budget.

Publish regularly. Weekly or bi-monthly– be consistent and let listeners know when you will be away. Josh advises: “if you are going to do a weekly podcast, you should have a lot of material in 'mental storage.' When you get people to tune in regularly, you create an expectation that something will be coming each and every week.”

Keep it free and open. Keep some or all of your podcast open to the general public. Sharing knowledge with the public can help raise your company’s profile as a leader and innovator in your industry.

Hit the directories. Make sure your podcast is easy to find. People should be able to easily access your podcast, either through your company portal, website, RSS, or desktop program. iPodder and iTunes are free podcast aggregators that can be downloaded on a work or home computer. E-mailing a link to the podcast (or the podcast itself) is also a great way to deliver podcasts.

Use consistent/persistent notifications. Use a combination of technologies to inform your listeners about your podcast. Introduce the podcast on your company portal, weblog, and through email.

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We published our paper on Podcasting for Learning last
week and have subsequently received a number of citations across the
web (one in German and one in Italian). I think this is a great example
of how blogs can be used for viral marketing and promotion of new ideas
and publications. I want to document what we've done and how it can be
replicated:

Here's what we have learned so far:

1. Start with good material. The Podcasting for Learning paper came out
at the right time and was written to be a very helpful, informative
look at what we had learned in our six months of podcasting. It is very
detailed and very specific and includes a section by Aixa called One
Podcasters Diary where she details how she went about putting the
podcasts together. I think the paper has been cited because it is
useful and fun.

2. Use your own network to disseminate what you write. We all read a
number of bloggers who are writing about related topics. So to start, I
sent a link to the paper to people I regularly read and write about. A
few of them picked up the link and the discovery of the paper spread
from there. (See the text of our email notification below.)

3. Use the search engines. I created search feeds/RSS radars for
“podcasting for learning” in google blog search, pub sub, technorati,
and MSN search. Based on the responses I got, I built a list of other
writers/readers who might be interested in the paper and sent them the
link. One search uncovered a conference at Duke this week about
podcasting for learning. We sent the link to the paper to all of the
conference presenters.

4. Use delicious. This morning I discovered that we had two tags on the subject of podcasting for learning in delicious.

Here is a list of the citations we have uncovered so far:

Delicious: We have two taggers:  http://del.icio.us/url/07963105a48cd1ccbce4675b72c13cfe

http://www.wissen-ist-meer.de/
http://www.onlinemeetingsolutions.com/2005/09/25/
http://www.easyonlineconference.com/2005/09/25/
http://www.broadbandnews.info/blog/135/
http://www.elearnspace.org/blog/archives/002200.html

this one asks for best practices for learning vs. entertainment: possibly a nice follow-up paper for Ms. Aixa:

http://radio.weblogs.com/0110222/categories/
http://billives.typepad.com/portals_and_km/2005/09/great_podcastin.html

Here's one in Italian:

http://www.masternewmedia.org/it/2005/09/24/

And it was a big help to be picked up by Robin Good:

www.masternewmedia.org
 
http://www.masternewmedia.org/elearning/elearning_media/
We have just published a white paper on podcasting for learning on our web site:  

http://www.ottergroup.com/blog/_archives/2005/9/16/1232728.html

Here's the text of our email notification:

At the Otter Group we feel we have just dipped our
toes into the pool of possibilities in podcasting for learning. Since
March, we've been producing the Negotiating Tip of the Week Podcast with
Dr. Josh Weiss, Associate Director of the Global Negotiation Project at
Harvard's Program on Negotiation, as a way to reach both a general
audience and to help extend learning for participants in an elearning
course we offer for a client. 

“Podcasting for Learning” captures the beginning of our journey using podcasts as a new medium for learning. 

If you have a blog and think your readers would find this paper helpful, we would greatly appreciate the link.  

Please feel free to send us comments, which we will post or to post them to our blog.

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Otter recently sponsored a blog for 8th graders at the Willauer Middle School
which was used to document the building of six kayaks. A nice summary
of the 8th grade blogging experience is covered in today's Boston
Globe:

The Boston Sunday Globe comics section has a 4 page insert called “The Fun Pages”, which focuses 
on a compelling local school project. Students working on that school project then submit related 
articles, an interview, games, puzzles, an advice column, and artwork to the the Globe.

This past spring the Willauer School kayak-building project was
selected for a feature and is in today's “Fun Pages”. The 8th graders
assumed complete responsibility for this endeavor. They created their
own groups, elected leaders, assigned topics, created realistic
deadlines, supervised all drafts and revisions, and submitted their
collective work to the Boston Globe.

Today's entire “Fun Pages” insert was designed and implemented by
our Willauer School eighth graders. Take a look; the results are
wonderful!

Hooray for Willauer Students!!

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FT REPORT - BUSINESS EDUCATION
 Extra effort can lead to the top - CASE STUDY: MERRILL LYNCH EXECUTIVE EDUCATION PROGRAMME.
By DELLA BRADSHAW
740 words; 21 March 2005 ; Financial Times ; Surveys EDB1 ; Page 5 ; English
(c) 2005 The Financial Times Limited. All rights reserved.

You might think aspiring managers at  Merrill Lynch have enough to
do without taking on a 14-week executive education programme in
addition to their existing work load.

 But at the global investment bank, high-potential 30-year-olds
are queuing up to join a distance learning programme designed for them
by MIT's Sloan school of management.

 They study at weekends, in the evening and even on international
flights to cram in the estimated 80 hours of work needed to complete
the programme.

 The prize? The opportunity to present their ideas to the top dogs in the firm and launch their careers.
 The course is based on research by Andrew Lo, Sloan professor and
director of the MIT laboratory for financial engineering. It charts how
investors make decisions about their investments rather than the
nitty-gritty of how the investments themselves perform.

 The programme started in 2001 with 30 students a year, but for
the past couple of years 50 students have enrolled on the course.

 Merrill’s commitment to the course was amply demonstrated by its
decision to continue running it in the spring of 2002, when operating
from temporary quarters in New Jersey following the terrorist attacks
in New York the previous September, says Kathleen Goldreich, a director
in the bank's learning and development team for global markets and
investment banking.

 Now in its fifth year, the programme is one of the most
successful implementations of e-learning for short executive courses.
However, it works because it uses basic technology to which all
participants have access, rather than the latest whizzy gadgets.

 In particular, the core of the course is a weekly lecture by Prof
Lo, of between 60 and 90 minutes. Each participant receives the filmed
lecture on CD, so they can watch it on their laptops if they are on a
train or aircraft. Participants then use the internet to discuss the
issues raised.

 The 50 participants also use e-mail and phone calls to carry out
their projects. Each participant, from as far afield as New York and
Tokyo, is put into a team of between five and six and each group is
charged with a developing a product new to the Merrill Lynch portfolio.
Between them they have to profile potential customers, design the
product and carry out the cost-benefit analysis.

 The team has to present the product to senior Merrill staff in the closing session of the programme.

For the first few years the programme produced a number of interesting
projects with significant potential, but there was little
follow-through once the courses were complete, says Ms Goldreich. So in
2003 Sloan professor Deborah Ancona, a specialist in how managers work
in teams, was brought in.

 On the first day, when all the participants congregate in New
York, Prof Ancona asks them to talk about what makes an effective team.
They mainly discuss internal dynamics, she says, but this is only half
the story. Prof Ancona's work is built around the idea of communicating
outside the group with customers and managers.

 The result is a better product. “It is a quintessential part of
what makes a product great because the team can mould it to the
strategy of the firm.”

 Of the nine products proposed by the global teams in 2004, four have been implemented.

The programme belies the myth that distance learning is a cheaper way
of conducting corporate learning. The professors set aside time to
check the status of the group projects, as well as attending to the
more traditional elements of the programme.

 ”It is very labour-intensive,” says Toby Woll, director of
blended learning at the Sloan school. “The costs are equivalent to
those for a residential course.”

 She points out that because the participants complete the
programme in addition to their normal job - not instead of it - there
are no opportunity costs.

 Prof Ancona also believes the participants have learnt
team-working skills that they can use again and again, to the advantage
of the company and of themselves.

 Participants are obviously happy too. Of those who participated
in 2004, 93 per cent said they would recommend it to a colleague.

 Perhaps more significantly, despite the gruelling schedule, 79
per cent said they would be prepared to take a similar programme.

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Bill Ives references the Otter Group today in his blog post on business blog providers:

 If you need to go beyond an individual blog, Kathleen Gilroy of
The Otter Group in Cambridge, Massachusetts has recently created
Pingware, a Blogware-based platform for developing communities. The
Otter Group provides custom designed online learning programs and
online communities. Pingware integrates a newsreader, as well as blog
publishing capabilities and can be custom designed for your
organization. It is based on a common vocabulary and a unified view of
the capabilities. The Wellesley College Alumni Association is one of
the first adopters.

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“Wellesley College breaks ground, offering free blogs to all alumni.”

Go to post on Scripting News

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This article was published in the May 2001 issue of Merrill Lynch's “We the People,” an in-house magaizine read by Merrill Lynch's 65,000 employees. Copyright 2001 Merrill Lynch Meeting of Minds MIT, Merrill Lynch connect through online course   The Course provides a powerful analytical framework for designing financial solutions for Merrill Lynch clients across all of the company's business After working 12-hour days, Kate O'Hern, a director in debt markets in New York, and Cassius Leal, an assistant vice president in debt markets in London, head home–and log on to their computers to continue work. But O'Hern and Leal aren't complaining. They consider Investments, the CD-ROM course they take at home on their laptop computers, something to look forward to at the end of a long day. Taught by Professor Andrew Lo, director of the Laboratory for Financial Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Sloan School of Management, the interactive, online class is part of an ongoing partnership with Merrill Lynch. “You may think, 'How can I possibly go home and listen to a class at 9:30 at night after working all day long?' But it's great when you're having dinner and listening to an intriguing lecture by Lo,” says O'Hern, who works in the High Grade, Syndicated Debt Marketing Group. “It's not like being back in college and fighting to stay awake over your books.” The 13-week class, which teaches 35 Merrill Lynch Global Debt Market, Directors, analysts and associates, is a pilot project that began in February and will end in May. The course provides a powerful analytical framework for designing financial solutions for Merrill Lynch clients. As the course progresses, it takes an increasingly complex look at ways to solve a key problem: How should the rational investor decide to allocate assets among a collection of risky investment opportunities? To participate in the class, students play a CDROM on their home computers at their convenience each week, and watch and listen as Lo lectures for just over an hour. The class is one aspect of the partnership that exists between Merrill Lynch and MIT The five-year alliance began in 1999 to bridge the company's command of the financial world with MIT's academic resources and technological talent. “Partnering with MIT to create this unique electronic learning experience elevates our team by combining leading-edge investment thinking with a center of cutting edge technology and research,” says Kelly Martin, head of Global Debt Markets, who sponsored the course. The students were selected for the class by managers based on motivation, business acumen and potential, says Tony Rendeiro, vice president, Learning and Development, Corporate and institutional Client Group. The students come from Merrill Lynch offices in New York City, London, Tokyo, Hong Kong and Australia. For O'Hern and Leal, being prepared means they must juggle busy schedules at the office with homework. The project requires the teams to compose a financial hypothesis that can he developed into programs or products to benefit clients. The teams will present their ideas to, among others, Martin, Lo and the class in May. “I see this project as an opportunity to enhance my knowledge,” says Leal, who works in the Strategic Solutions Group. “It's a challenge that demands nothing less than your best. You can't do a mediocre job.”

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