Choosing from a Group of Intimate Small Hotel

My family and I are planning a vacation to Barbados this coming summer, but we all agreed that since times are a lot tougher because of the economic downturn, we would all settle for a good quality, but cheaper establishment on the island. After all, my family and I are not the sort who’d be choosy when it comes to accommodations. We just want it to be comfortable, clean, and most of all affordable. We just really, really want to enjoy the place and experience it at least once in our lives.

When I was researching cheap hotels in Barbados on the internet, I encountered a useful bit of information about a non profit organization comprised of almost every small hotel Barbados. This group is called the Intimate Hotels of Barbados and was formed eight years ago. There are about 50 properties in the group, offering about six to 61 rooms in seize, and they offer excellent quality and cheap accommodation for visitors who want to enjoy the exclusivity of the island. The limit for a small hotel Barbados to be a part of the group is to have at the most 75 rooms. Unlike the far larger properties with their star and diamond ratings, these hotels rely on their intimacy, excellent service and affordability.

According to the internet, the hotels in this group offer well-equipped, air conditioned rooms with cable television and internet connection. There are a lot of other basic facilities and services that are uncommon on the island, but are notably cheaper. Some of the hotels have their restaurants and bars, and most have swimming pools.

The important information I gathered was that these hotels are more likely to be family friendly than other lodgings on the island. Plus, the staff members are eager to provide top-class service to guests.

At least now, thanks the Intimate hotels of Barbados I can peruse a list of places where my family can book reservations to enjoy a sunny holiday in the Caribbean.

Do Former Teachers Make Good Elearning Instructional Designers?

rickie fowler

As a successful instructional designer for elearning solutions (or at least I think I am successful enough since I’ve already made a steady and fruitful living out of this career), this question has been asked of me many, many times before. This is of course because I was a former teacher myself. I loved teaching even before I went full time. But of course, teaching was not as lucrative as I would have hoped.

I got into instructional design completely by accident or completely by a twist of fate. It was back when I got a freelance teaching gig at a business seminar that got me some connections which referred me to freelance instructional design gigs. I was successful at it and I found it to be very lucrative, so I went full time.

So what are the characteristics of a former school teacher that is applicable to an instructional designer? Everything. Instructional design for elearning solutions is basically just creating a program course that will help teach a lesson or a field. Therefore, the rules that determine whether the training or teaching method is effective or not are the same and applicable to both. This is why a lot of instructional designers started out as teachers. But of course, this is not an iron clad law. However, it is a trend.

There are some skills for instructional design however that you can’t learn as a teacher. Translating the teaching method into software frames for example is quite a challenge on its own. However, learning that while being unfamiliar with the software itself makes it nearly impossible. Hence, one thing that a teacher must have in order to be able to cross into an electronic learning career is familiarity and adequate or relative mastery of the software tools for e learning design.

Reviewing the Significance of a Channel Partner Portal

It is no secret that shifting a business’ focus on channel sales to make it work for their bottom line is the best way for companies to increase their revenue generation and ultimately survive the economic depression that has plagued the global market for some time now. But this mere shift is not enough to guarantee any positive effects. In actuality, effective channel management is the real secret to this endeavor’s success.

A channel partner portal plays a big part in channel management because this strategy involves a lot of business relationship building and maintenance, communication and collaboration. All of these are vital for the success of any partnership because the successful integration of all these factors into the system can guarantee desirable results.

A partner portal comes into the picture in collaboration and communication. The resulting collaboration through the use of this comes in the form of exchanging sales leads, generating quotes, taking orders, order fulfillment, partner support, programs, patches and update downloading as well as a source to obtain necessary documents and marketing materials. Without a portal, these linked businesses wouldn’t be able to function properly and thus lack the ability to perform well.

This is why it is extremely important that a partner portal exists for a channel. When a network of partners continues to grow, managers would have to invest in the right tools and programs so that partners can be managed well. The more partners there are the more businesses would require assistance and support. These portals can significantly reduce problems and improve the channel management for the benefit of the entire network.

Similarly, it is crucial that they are maintained and updated regularly. One of the worst things that can happen to a distribution network is if the platform for their communication and collaboration is not functioning well. A faulty system disrupts the momentum of work and eventually leads to inadequate ROI and revenue generation.

So if ever you decide that your business needs partner relationship management, never fail to consider the tasks that must be accomplished in order to launch an effective channel partner portal that can be the reference point for all members so they can have equal access to resources, news, programs and other relative information that can benefit everyone as a whole and individually.