Five Reasons Why Video Training Is at an Inflection Point

Video training is about to blow up.

I admit it. The title of the post and my thesis statement seem boring. What’s the big deal about video training? I understand completely.

Several years ago, most of us were yawning about eBooks. The first eBook readers were released in 1998. In 2000, Stephen King released his novel, Ride the Bullet, only as an eBook initially.

But by 2003, the doubters were saying, “I told you so.” Gemstar, one of the first two to produce a reader, closed its doors. Demand for eBooks dropped precipitously. Barnes & Noble stopped selling eBooks at its online store.

Then several factors began to emerge, not the least of them the Kindle in 2007 and Kindle 2 in 2009. Now eBooks are a permanent part of our consumer choices. They are a yawn no more.

And so it is with video training. The convergence of several factors is leading to an inflection point. The world is poised to change with video training becoming one of the primary ways we learn, both informally and in formal education.

What has taken place? I see at least five factors.

High speed Internet has become widely available. Without this development, the jerky and undependable delivery method of old would not be conducive to widespread acceptance.
The cloud has made us less local server dependent. Thus Internet service providers and organizations that deliver video training have more dependable infrastructure.
YouTube and Netflix have trained us to learn and to be entertained by on-demand videos. Such is the reason that cable and network television are having major challenges.
We are using mobile devices almost constantly. Our tablets and smartphones can deliver to us on-demand video to the palms of our hands.
Our lifestyle and work habits have changed. We expect information and entertainment on our schedule, not on the schedule of an institution or an entertainment provider. The free agent nation, with the growing number of self-employed entrepreneurs, has accelerated this trend.

The implications are staggering for many organizations, including educational institutions and churches. I am proud of the folks at LifeWay for responding to the churches’ need for this growing demand with the introduction of Ministry Grid. It’s a great start for something that will only get bigger.

I believe we will look back five years from now with amazement to see how much training, historically done in person, has become digitally delivered. We are at an inflection point. We in churches, educational institutions, and many other organizations, must be prepared for exponential growth of video training.

What do you think of my assessment? How should we prepare for this new reality?

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