Rob Bernard, EdDthe Al Ain HCT Colleges

robert.bernard@hct.ac.ae

Using a GPS to Maximize Your ROI

My “thinking about thinking” has led to some new thoughts since my

conference proposal….

Caveat Emptor

GPS was Generating Practical Strategies

I’ve changed it to

Generalizing Business Strategies (GBS)

Who am I

Why Ratios?

• Ratio analysis is used to compare the performance of one company with another.

• With them, a business can know with some degree of accuracy, how it is doing.

• Like all formulas, the information you get out of them is only as good as the information you put into them.

More on Ratios

• We look at ratios over time to compare ourselves to ourselves.

• Ratios help illuminate some aspect of the firm’s performance. Anyone can invent their own ratios to help them know about the health of their venture.

More on Ratios

• We look at ratios over time to compare ourselves to ourselves.

• Ratios help illuminate some aspect of the firm’s performance. Anyone can invent their own ratios to help them know about the health of their venture.

More on Ratios

• We look at ratios over time to compare ourselves to ourselves.

• Ratios help illuminate some aspect of the firm’s performance. Anyone can invent their own ratios to help them know about the health of their eLearning venture.

Liquidity Ratios

• Liquidity Ratios suggest how well a firm is managing its working capital. These ratios relate to short-term assets and liabilities and are relevant to short-term analysis.

Liquidity Ratios: Current Ratio

• Current ratios illustrate a measure of the short-term safety of the firm. Current assets can be turned into cash in a short period of time and current liabilities are those which might have to be repaid at short notice.

Current Ratio

Current Assets

Current Ratio = -----------------------

Current Liabilities

Current Ratios for eLearning

• Current ratios illustrate a measure of the short-term safety of the firm.

• Current assets can be turned into cash in a short period of time

• Current liabilities are those which might have to be repaid at short notice.

Current Ratios for eLearning

• Current ratios illustrate a measure of the short-term sanity of the teacher.

• Current assets can be turned into teaching in a short period of time

• Current liabilities are those which might be wasted if the project doesn’t get finished in a short period of time.

Current Ratio

Current Assets

Current Ratio = -----------------------

Current Liabilities

Current Ratio for eLearning

Effort

Current Ratio = -----------------------

Readiness for Use

Liquidity Ratios: The Quick Ratio (acid-test ratio)

Current Assets – Stock

Quick Ratio = --------------------------------

Current Liabilities

Liquidity Ratios: The Quick Ratio (acid-test ratio)

Effort – Investment by Others

Quick Ratio = -------------------------------- Readiness for Use

Gearing (Leverage) Ratios

• Show the relative amounts of capital contributed by owners or shareholders (equity) vs. cash or credit from lenders (debt).

• A firm that is highly leveraged (a high gearing ratio) has a high level of debt and a relatively low level of equity.

Debt to Equity Ratio

Total Debt

Debt to Equity Ratio = --------------

Equity

Debt to Equity Ratio

Total Cost of Laptop or “e” migration

= ----------------------------------------

Benefits & Re-usable materials

ROI Return on Investment

• ROI - the return that is made on all of the assets

ROI Return on Investment

• ROI - the benefits arising from expenditure of the assets

Time

Energy

Creativity

Technology

Help from Others

Your Experience

Your Content Knowledge

Assets

ROI Return on Investment

• ROI - the benefits arising from expenditure of the assets

New Learning

Autonomy & Independent Learning

Life Skills

Positive Motivation

Benefits

How Do We Get a Better ROI?

• Remember when I noted:

Anyone can invent their own ratios to help them know about the health of their eLearning venture?

How Do We Get a Better ROI?

We change the way we do our business…

…by changing the formulas

How do we get a better ROI?

• We do this with a collaborative eLearning process and system.

• We work together - as opposed to our usual isolated, autonomous ways.

• Possibly with a Collaborative-Distributed Learning System – an Enterprise system.

Benefits of e-Collaboration via a Distributed System

• Redundancy decreases

• Quality Increases

• Access Increases

• Depth of Knowledge Increases

• Relevance and Timeliness Increase

• Cooperation Increases

Our Old Debt to Equity Ratio

Total Cost of Laptop or “e” migration

= ----------------------------------------

Benefits & Re-usable materials

Our New Debt to Equity Ratio

Total Cost of Laptop or “e” migration

= ----------------------------------------

Collective-Distributed Learning System

A final thought…………

• There has been one other time where a technology changed education in this fundamental way – to the point where:– Redundancy decreased– Quality Increased– Access Increased– Depth of Knowledge Increased– Relevance and Timeliness Increased– Cooperation Increased

A final thought…………

• There has been one other time where a technology changed education in this fundamental way – to the point where:– Redundancy decreased– Quality Increased– Access Increased– Depth of Knowledge Increased– Relevance and Timeliness Increased– Cooperation Increased

A final thought…………

Redundancy decreasedRedundancy decreased

Quality IncreasedQuality Increased

Access IncreasedAccess Increased

Depth of Knowledge Depth of Knowledge IncreasedIncreased

Relevance and Timeliness Relevance and Timeliness IncreasedIncreased

Cooperation IncreasedCooperation Increased

A final thought…………

robert.bernard@hct.ac.ae