If it’s January, then it must be Kensington Olympia for the thousands of training and learning and development professionals who will visit the 2008 Learning Technologies Show.
Many of Europe’s learning and development professionals will converge on London later this month for the annual feast of training technology that is the Learning Technologies Exhibition and Conference.
More than 3,000 people are expected to visit the exhibition – now in its ninth year – over two days at the London Olympia venue, with a further 300 delegates attending the accompanying conference on organisational learning.
Organisers predict the two-day event will be the biggest one yet, with more than 120 exhibitors ready to interact with the profession and highlight the latest developments in training and learning technology. The free exhibition takes place on 30 and 31 January and includes a schedule of seminars exploring cutting-edge development issues.
Organiser Mark Penton says: “Learning Technologies is Europe’s largest event for learning and development professionals. Nowhere else can you see so many of the top learning companies in one place.”
Focus on technology
The event will focus on the technology required to support workplace learning, and this year’s theme is ‘driving performance through learning and development’.
The exhibition and associated seminars will cover themes dealing with everything from blended learning to talent management to developmental gaming.
The seminars will run every 45 minutes at Olympia’s three lecture theatres, and delegates do not need to pre-book.
Among the innovations on display will be software from Datmedia that enables trainers to create their own web TV channels, and a development programme from Academee that is designed to enable culture change.
Other big names at the show include Ashridge, BCS Global, Adobe, Nokia and Video Arts. Training and Coaching Today can be found at Stand 3.
The conference will run alongside the exhibition and will bring together learning and development professionals to explore the key performance issues of the future. The programme will feature more than 40 speakers and will focus on how trainers can exploit technology to make a genuine difference to business.
Practical tools
Conference chairman Donald H Taylor says this year’s conference will place a real emphasis on practical tools that can influence the bottom line.
“The learning professionals’ world is set for immense change, posing many questions about how learning can be organised to help businesses to succeed. The past 12 months have seen considerable innovation in learning, with several new technology threads.
“Things like social networking, Web 2.0, the 3D internet and advances in authoring applications are converging to present learning professionals with new ways to reach learners,” he says.
Discussions will be wide-ranging, with speakers set to tackle issues including social networking, e-learning strategy, the top 100 tools for learning, mobile learning, multi-purpose content and business-driven training.
The conference will be a mix of keynote speeches, theory presentations and interactive workshops, all designed to showcase the latest thinking around organisational learning and the technology that can help to underpin it.
Learning Technologies 2008: what’s on
This year the technology conference will be split into three strands: learning technology, effective learning and learning for performance.
Technology commentator and founder of Internet Time Group Jay Cross will deliver the keynote session, where he will examine recent developments in learning, and try to predict what the future has in store.
His opening address will include advice on how to eliminate old-style learning and challenge the workers of tomorrow to ‘be all that they can be’.
Dr Itiel Dror, senior lecturer in cognitive neuroscience at the University of Southampton, will provide a keynote address entitled ‘Designing e-learning? Don’t leave your brain at home.’ He will explain how the brain’s cognitive architecture acquires new information, and the best way of designing learning that fits in with these patterns.
Other speakers include the BBC’s former head of training and development Nigel Paine, the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development’s online learning specialist Phil Green, and the NHS national director for education, training and development, Phillip Candy.
The conference will also include more than 40 speakers from some of the world’s biggest organisations such as AstraZeneca, Cable & Wireless, BT, Ikea, Toyota, Sky, B&Q and the British Army.
The two-day conference costs £945 (plus VAT), although there are a range of discounts for people booking multiple places and members of various professional bodies and charities.
Further info
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Visitors can register for the free exhibition online at www.learningtechnologies.co.uk
To find out more price details or book a place at the conference, go to www.learningtechnologies.co.uk/conference
