proj2007trainingOver the years, one of the most challenging changes to the success of project management software has been the lack of training and training materials that are included in any deployment. I wrote about this time ago in an article entitled “Batteries not included“. Organizations used to allocate a portion of their implementation budget to training and, as the price of project management software has dropped to a fraction of it used to cost in the 70’s and 80’s the amount of budget available to training has dropped proportionally. When software costs less than $1,000 and the budget for training is only $100 how do you get enough training time in on the basics to become effective with the tool?
 
One of the aspects of project management software training that has evolved in a very good way has been the evolution of computer-based training. Vendors like Apex Web Media have made
Microsoft Project Tutorial Videos that you can follow along at your own pace. If your copy of Microsoft is handy, you can watch the lesson, then immediately turn back to your project data and try some of the techniques you’ve just learned.
 
 
It’s easy to imagine such tools being used to bring a large number of users up to speed on basic functionality of Project at a very low cost. At Apex, I was able to try several introductory lessons for free online and I was happily surprised to find lessons not only in Project desktop but also in the Project Web Access client among the dozens of lessons available. This type of technology may just fill the gap for those Project deployments with limited training budgets.