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GCA - GLO of the Year 2007

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	The Week - 03/12/2008

Letter of The Week Ramachandran Nair, on email It was quite interesting to see a change in the concept of learning in Oman (eLearning takes off in Oman). In today’s professional environment, training, learning, workshops, etc are considered a continuous process. It gives an opportunity to learn, refresh and experience a subject, and this process helps people perform better in their professional life. Time is the most critical investment for any organisation. However, the online learning concept helps reduce the time consumed for learning without disturbing the work atmosphere. The concept of eLearning has made tremendous changes to the traditional learning process in the classroom. Opportunities are global for everyone, inclu-ding business people and organisations. It’s flexible and convenient, there is no concern about time and location and it is accessible from across the globe. Apart from training institutions, companies are today investing heavily to establish their own eLearning facilities to cater to the training needs of their employees. The facility supports an organisation to develop customised programmes to train their employees on their products and services and also for personal development. In the organisational outlook, the concept is beneficial to both sides – in terms of time, flexibility, convenience and choice. In this latest initiative in Oman, I would like to mention that the GAC Group, one of the largest shipping and logistics service providers in the world, launched the dedicated GAC Corporate Academy (GCA) in 2007 to deliver cutting-edge learning and development opportunities to all people throughout the GAC World. GCA offers a wide range of relevant professional development programmes that are directly related to the GAC Group. Most courses incorporate state-of-the-art eLearning technology and are combined with highly effective work-based learning processes. The Sultan Qaboos University recently organised a ‘Moodle Majlis’ eLearning seminar focused on corporate training with eLearning. ‘Moodle’ is a course management system, a free, open-source software package to help educators create effective online learning communities. The seminar, the first Middle East Moodle Majlis, has helped to bring together key developers along with designers and instructors at all levels of education. The eLearning further encourages the concept of self-initiative. The powerful tool of forums in the eLearning process helps people from different continents or regions to ‘sit together’ and exchange their views and ideas. The value of learning electronically helps us to prioritise and plan our regular day-to-day work; accordingly the fundamentals of time management are being practised.