"I am enthusiastic about the idea of telelearning: Combining powerful information technology and world-wide communication/interaction between learners and tutors.

But for using telelearning in vocational training, especially technological and pedagogical infrastructure has to improve. It becomes frustrating if you cannot establish a connection, the video is too slow or the audio quality is so bad that you only get parts of the mediated meeting.

When browsing through the internet, you still lose too much time as there is an information overload. To handle information - which will definitely become the most important resource for companies - an intranet-based "frequently asked questions"(faq)-system would be more efficient. For communication, newsgroups and e-mail for everyone will be a good tool to support interaction, getting fast feedback and to facilitate international team work.

A critical mass of employees who use e-mail regularly is important to get instant feedback. Without people participating in such communication, the system of informal learning won't work.

As knowledge management is a strategic factor for internationally operating corporations, creating, storing and making the information accessible to all employees will be a central point. Human Resource Management and Information Management will have to go hand in hand to create a learning-stimulating atmosphere.

Some questions arise: Who should be allowed to take time off for learning? How can be "controlled" that someone is really engrossed into learning activity and who is not? Employees will have less time for work - so who will do the work then?

Important is the acceptance of telelearning: What about older employees not used to work with such media? I think it is a good but hard way to introduce them into this form of communication with colleagues, scattered all over the world. This way, employees can get acquainted to new technology and use it later for dealing with customers via the internet.. But they will need support for hardware, software and of course: pedagogical help from trained tutors.

With sufficient infrastructure and a special culture of learning and using mediated communication, telelearning will become a major factor in handling knowledge and enable employees to become life-long learners. "

" I think telelearning will have a positive impact on vocational training. Think of the possibilities and technology already available. E-mail and ICQ, two very powerful and ultra-fast communication forms, unprecedented until the late eighties.

But I think that we cannot look into the future too far. We tried to pinpoint the potentials of today's technologies projected into the future. But the developments go so blazingly fast, that there will be new technologies and new forms of technologies that we didn't even think of today. Remember that, although the www now is integrated in today's life, it wasn't there only 5 pathetic years ago.

And as I think the real impact of telelearning on vocational training comes when large organizations transform to learning organizations, the real breakthrough of telelearning as a solid component of vocational training will come in 5-10 years. Because of the inertia of these large companies and the time needed to build solid, secure and reliable connections. And those unforeseen technologies will have their impact on telelearning. Smaller and medium-sized companies could benefit earlier, because they don't have legacy investments or organizational forms.

Furthermore, I think that larger organizations will split themselves up. The nineties can already be seen as the decade of the giant fusions and overtakes. AT&T with TCI, Polygram and Seagram, and the lists goes on and on. But as this happens, the first voices are heard on the stock market for split ups. The common example is Philips: As a whole it is less worth than as separate components. I think these voices grow harder and harder: Technology drives changes, but the larger the organization is, the more difficult it is to change. If the trend is setting on the first decade of the new millennium will be the decade of restructuring and split ups….And the age of truly integrated telelearning and vocational training at the workplace. "