Department of Agriculture chooses OnDemand training software.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is currently completing its implementation of OnDemand Personal Navigator software from Knowledge Products, a division of Global Knowledge, enabling the federal agency to more rapidly deploy its PeopleSoft applications and achieve higher productivity by better training employees to use the applications.

The USDA chose OnDemand because it guides employees through role-specific training exercises without ever requiring them to leave PeopleSoft. Employees receive ongoing access to interactive, step-by-step instruction that accurately mirrors the USDA's business processes. This simplifies the training process by ensuring that users learn exactly what they need to know at precisely the right time. OnDemand's in-application support also lets employees learn while they work, which minimizes the need for costly classroom or document-based learning.

"User productivity and transactional accuracy were real problems for our PeopleSoft project. Our help desk was receiving more than 100 calls per day, which was hardly manageable," said Hans Heidenreich, project director for PeopleSoft systems at USDA. "With OnDemand Personal Navigator, our employees can receive instant help directly within PeopleSoft, which results in a lot fewer help desk calls. We're anticipating big cost savings and an increase in data integrity."

USDA selected the OnDemand training software over several other venders' e-learning products for its Do It! mode, which creates live, step-by-step user guidance within an application; the software's ease of building instructional content; and the ability to deploy OnDemand quickly and easily.

"Having a major government agency like the USDA enlist Knowledge Products to help solve its employee training challenges and gain greater productivity from its new enterprise applications is a significant win for us in the public sector," said Dale Cline, president of Knowledge Products.

Knowledge Products is a provider of software solutions that enable rapid adoption, broad acceptance and increased accuracy in the use of enterprise applications related to enterprise resource planning, supply chain management, procurement, e-commerce and customer relationship management. The patent-pending software provides users with context-sensitive training that is seamlessly incorporated into enterprise applications. Founded in 1986, Knowledge Products has more than 700 Global 2000 customers in 12 countries.