Everyone needs a little more time in their day, but since no one has invented the 27-hour day or a way to be in two places at once, we simply have to get more creative with how to use the time we have. 

Time crunched eLearning professionals know all about trying to maximize their time to address the many competing and yet vitally important priorities in front of them. Course building, product updates, communication with clients — these all take immense time.

But, there is a way to work smarter, not harder for effective eLearning development. Here are seven time-saving tips to help you create eLearning fast and easy.  

1. Create a Plan

When faced with a mountain of work, we too often want to dive into the work and start getting it done without first figuring out a plan for achieving the outcome we want. When we take this route, the enduring understanding of an eLearning course can get lost. 

For effective eLearning development, start with a storyboard of the complete program. Storyboards are simple drawings outlining each screen of your course. They document the textual and visual content of your course, the way learners navigate and as well have a place to capture notes about slide properties, hyperlinks, and other essential development details. This will help you see where the learning flows, or doesn't, and provide a concrete method to ensure you get to the outcome you desire. 

2. Go Minimal

Yes, less is more. The tendency when time is short is to add bells, whistles and an overload of information to make the eLearning seem more engaging. But actually, the opposite takes less time and leads to more effective instruction. Use a minimalist approach to give learners the bare minimum of information needed to get them "up and running" on the task to be learned. 

Define the learning objectives and outcomes, and then restrict course content to information that supports these outcomes. Include only the "Must Know" content. Include animations and interactions only when absolutely necessary to support specific learning outcomes. 

3. Use Templates

You do not have to reinvent the wheel every time you build a course. Instead, use templates available through your eLearning authoring tool or templates you have created, especially for standard pages like course overviews, an FAQ page and demo screencasts. 

Templates let you focus on what’s really important; saving valuable time you can now spend on developing engaging and interactive activities specific to each course. The key is to have these ready-to-use designs handy. This way you can put together a functional and great looking course without investing a lot of thought in the look and feel.  

4. Reuse eLearning Assets

Have you found a model that works? Great! Reuse it as you plan additional eLearning. Reusing key eLearning assets saves time and brings in elements that have proven effective in other courses. For example, you can reuse:

• Introductions;
• Activities with minor adjustments for specific course content;
• Effective learning games;
• Evaluations;
• Or simulations.

In essence, reusing these assets is like creating a course shell where you can add content quickly for effective eLearning development.

5. Create a Style Guide

A style guide sets forth rules and guidelines for formatting and visuals. It's something your eLearning team can easily reference when building a course. Titles go in one font. Content, another font. Images always align left (or right). Figuring out these design elements ahead of time and then sticking to them helps you design courses more quickly rather than waste time deciding which fonts go best together.

6. Organize Online Content

In essence, create a filing system to archive and manage learning content for your resources such as audio, video, images, reference materials and documents. These are items you will use over and over and knowing exactly where to find them cuts down on the time you spend hunting for the content. 

7. Collaborate Through the Cloud

Cloud computing has revolutionized many aspects of work, particularly the ability of a team to work collaboratively and simultaneously on projects to reduce overlap, increase productivity and create a better end product. 

If your eLearning tool isn't collaborative, use cloud tools like Google Docs, Dropbox or other apps to work with your colleagues to develop better content in less time. SHIFT for example, is a web-based authoring tool that enables team members to work on the same project at the same time, in multiple geo-locations, making communication smooth and speeding up development time. 

We can't offer you more hours in the day and we can't clone you. But, with these tips, we can help you move toward more effective eLearning development through more effective use of your time.