SkillSoft and SuccessFactors Link eLearning to Talent Management
by Bill Ives
SkillSoft, a eLearning provider, is continuing its strategy of working with other vendors to expand the access to their content and learning management offerings. Last week I spoke with John Ambrose, Senior Vice President of Strategy, Corporate Development and Emerging Business for SkillSoft to learn more about this move. We discussed their integration with SuccessFactors. I have written about both companies before (see SaaS enters e-learning Through SkillSoft and SuccessFactors: Bringing Web 2.0 to Talent Management).
John said that the SkillSoft vision is to allow access to content at the point of need through a single application, whether the application is theirs or one from a partner such as SuccessFactors. The SkillSoft Open Learning Services Architecture (OLSA) allows partners access to their content and the ability to innovate in the delivery options to their clients. It also contains a series of well-documented APIs. Isn’t Web 2.0 great? Here is sample screen from SkillSoft’s SkillPort LMS.
Their SuccessFactors integration helps companies give employees seamless access to learning assets during their normal course of talent management activities. SuccessFactors users can access SkillSoft content from within the Development module after a single sign-on. They can build this content into their career worksheets. They can also engage in knowledge exploration targeted to their career objectives and the competencies they are currently working on. This exploration can look through the courses, videos, and books uploaded from the SkillSoft library. Once they find a useful offering, they can launch it right away. Then the results can be documented in their SuccessFactors development plans. Here is a sample screen shot form the SuccessFactors Development module.
This makes great sense to me. When I was with a large consulting company a number of my colleagues were engaged in integrating talent management with the other aspects of employee development, including learning. Here is a concrete example of making that vision possible that is made easier to achieve by integrating two SaaS offerings through open APIs. We have come a long way since the 90s.
As I have been doing with other interviews, I also asked John about how he is using Twitter. He said that he is primarily using it as a personal notetaking tool, creating his personal knowledge management system. When he goes to a conference, for example, he twitters the key points in a session and tags them. Then he can easily go back and find the messages. Many of my FastForward colleagues where doing this at FastForward 09 while I was creating longer blog posts for the same reason. I think this is a good idea and one that others had not explicitly called out.
