Where Learning Means Business

Autodesk Outsourcing Case Study

Autodesk Empowers Worldwide Business Partners with a Global Enterprise Learning Ecosystem

Challenge

Global software companies are relying more and

more on a network of partners to sell their products

– so naturally, revenues and profits depend deeply

on their resellers’ collective product knowledge and

sales skills.

Autodesk has been a pioneer and leader in

leveraging its sales channel. Its 3,075 distributors

and resellers account for over 90 percent of the

company’s worldwide software sales and generate

software revenue on every continent and in almost

every country in the world. Many of these partners

are fully dedicated to only selling Autodesk products.

Although Autodesk has mastered the art of selling

through the channel, challenges arose due to the

number and timing of major product releases which

fueled an increased training demand; and the global

economic recession and shrinking training budgets

meant that partners had to do more training with

less money. It became imperative that the learning

organization at Autodesk find an innovative solution

to cost-effectively minimize the time salespeople

were out of the field, reduce time in the classroom,

and maximize selling time.

Solution

Recognizing the crucial role training would play,

Autodesk looked for a smarter global approach. The

first thing it did was find a social learning platform

called ExpertusONETM, from Expertus, learning

software and managed Services Company.

The learning platform was branded “Autodesk

Learning Central” and would do the following:

1. Support a diverse, global audience with

content delivered in 13 regional views and

10 localized languages.

2. Integrate training offered through four

unrelated enterprise systems into one

centralized learning environment.

3. Provide on-demand 24/7 worldwide access

to virtual training and elearning that could

be accessed regardless of bandwidth

constraints both within a reseller

environment and in the various countries in

which they operate

4. Incorporate meaningful “social” elements,

such as interactive course ratings and

comment capabilities, so resellers could

share opinions and collaborate with other

channel partners.

From the beginning, the biggest challenge for the

Autodesk and Expertus teams was to create a single,

engaging user experience for all channel partners

worldwide, but it couldn’t be one-size-fits-all. The

new platform had to account for language, product-

focus, region and industry. Needless to say, it was no

small feat.

To do this, the learning platform was configured

to push only the most relevant information and

training to the channel partner in an on-demand

self paced format, virtual classroom, traditional

classroom and various blended combinations.

Autodesk used these ten languages:

• Russian

• Japanese

• Korean

• Simplified Chinese

• English

• French

• Italian

• Portuguese

• German

• Spanish

... which they filtered into 13 different portal views:

• Australia/New Zealand

• Asia

• Greater China

• South Asia

• India

• Japan

• Central Europe

• Northern Europe

• Southern Europe

• Emerging Countries (Russian Federation,

Africa, Middle East)

• Latin America

• Canada

• USA

Impact:

Despite an incredibly aggressive timeline (less than 4

months from start to finish), Autodesk and Expertus

delivered a flexible and scalable global reseller

environment. Now, for the first time, Autodesk

is able to globally share critical new product

information and personalized training plans and

content – quickly and easily – all under one platform.

This unprecedented level of universal global access

to the most up-to-date information and knowledge

means Autodesk product rollouts are faster, more

effective and are far less expensive to manage.

The time it takes to roll out new training was

decreased by 30-40 percent and time spent in the

classroom was reduced as much as 85 percent in

many regions.

Moreover, with full access to better product

knowledge, the global reseller community is

equipped to sell more software to more customers –

sooner than ever.

Usage statistics indicate a growing reseller reliance

on the new platform as a central learning resource.

Within one year after the launch of ExpertusONE …

0

500

1000

1500

2000

2500

3000

3500

ExpertusONELegacy System

New Courses Offered

404

3248464%

0

10000

20000

30000

40000

50000

60000

70000

80000Course Registration Volume

ExpertusONELegacy System

757%

6000

9000

12000

15000 Estimated New Learners

ExpertusONELegacy System

13780

6128

125%

0

1

2

3

4

5Registrations per New Learner

ExpertusONELegacy System

4.8

1.3

281%

When asked about the future of learning at

Autodesk, Brian Cloughley, a Senior Manager at

Autodesk, summed it up, “This is a game-changer

for everyone who sells Autodesk software. We

ended with an innovative solution that transformed

how our channel partners learned. It will enable

us to reach our aggressive sales goals in this

challenging economy.” Capitalizing on the impact

of this initiative, Autodesk has begun the next

big step of rolling out the full functionality of

ExpertusONE to Autodesk employees and the

customer communities.

To develop multiple portal views, the Autodesk and Expertus teams

analyzed multiple ways of slicing and dicing the geographies

and eventually settled on this framework of interaction between

geography and vertical industry.

©Copyright 2010 Expertus, Inc. All rights reserved. All products and services referenced herein are either trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.

Corporate HeadquartersExpertus Inc 2091 Landings Drive Mountain View, CA 94043

Telephone: 650-691-1440 Toll Free: 877-827-8160 Fax: 650-691-1287 Email: info@expertus.com

Salessales@expertus.com

Public Relationspress@expertus.com

Product Supportsupport@expertus.com

Enter Dynamic Learning Maps

With such a globally distributed external audience,

Autodesk implemented Dynamic Learning

MapsTM from Expertus to solve one of the bigger

imperatives: figuring out how to automatically

assign a learning path to a reseller based on role,

location, industry vertical and product authorization.

Since the reseller’s roles changed quickly and

in many cases they had “matrixed” roles, their

learning plans had to be dynamically calculated and

training had to be displayed as mandatory, required

or optional.

Within a few months of deployment, this feature

was modified to accommodate competencies as

well. Now, a reseller starts by taking an assessment

to measure competency level and see what courses

are mandatory, recommended or optional based

upon the score.

Core

Product Knowledge

Civil 3DRevit

Implementation Skills

Sales

Presales

Postsales

AE

Roles

Competencies

M&E MSD AEC PSEB

Structural CivilVertical

Experience LevelExpert Experienced Entry

Mandatory

Mandatory

Recommended

AutodeskOnboarding

Sales Tools

Attend 2009Geo Launch

Demo Skills

Mandatory

Recommended

Recommended

The four main criteria used to develop the Dynamic Learning Maps were experience level, product focus,

role and vertical industry.