Open learning formats in high performance training

Corporate training strategies which seek to improve the performances of organisations and their employees are now likely to incorporate a number of open learning formats. Where training strategies are geared to improving skill performances, and where the productivity of organisations depends upon such improvements, the use of open learning becomes vital. In this article, Peter Bowen, Company Training Manager of W. H. Smith & Son Limited and a Director of Management Performance Limited, considers the practice and promise of open learning as an instrument of performance training. His argument is based upon recent experience with print and computer‐based learning systems in W. H. Smith.