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Success Story

The FAA Migrates Efficiently from MicroStation to Autodesk with Support from IMAGINiT and ASCENT Experts

The FAA Migrates Efficiently from MicroStation to Autodesk with Support from IMAGINiT and ASCENT Experts

Customer challenge

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) mission is to provide the safest, most efficient aerospace system in the world. The FAA is headquartered in Washington, D.C. and maintains nine regional offices, Air Route Traffic Control Centers and Terminal Radar Approach Control Facilities across the nation, as well as other key facilities. In addition, the FAA maintains a presence in every major and regional airport in the United States and has several international offices around the globe.

Within the FAA, the Computer Aided Engineering Graphics (CAEG) Program is responsible for supporting Engineering Services with their understanding and expertise of engineering technology. Engineering Services consists of over 1,300 engineers, designers, and drafters who develop and maintain the FAA infrastructure.

Historically, the FAA used MicroStation to create CAD drawings. As part of an IT modernization initiative, the organization decided to migrate to Autodesk AutoCAD, while remaining on their existing ProjectWise data management system. An integral stage in this process was how the CAEG Program team could train and support all 1,300 users.

Project goals

In addition to learning the basics of AutoCAD, all users also needed to understand how to use AutoCAD with the FAA-specific workflows and with the agency’s ProjectWise data management storage system. Since these workflows are unique to the FAA, there was no “off-the-shelf” training program available for use.

Solution

Over the years, the CAEG Program Manager worked on several projects with IMAGINiT, who then introduced CAEG’s Program leaders to their sister division, ASCENT, known for its courseware development and technical writing capabilities. The CAEG team decided to move forward and teamed up with both ASCENT to develop a custom integrated AutoCAD with ProjectWise training initiative, and with IMAGINiT experts to provide Autodesk software training.

  • The CAEG team assembled a working group of 10 to 15 people who had either worked to develop FAA’s workflows and procedures, were CAD Administrators, or were leaders with an excellent understanding of the requirements from Engineering Services. This group collaborated with the ASCENT team who facilitated instructional design analysis sessions to discuss the required learning objectives.
  • Using the information gathered from these sessions and applying their own industry and instructional design experience, ASCENT identified the learning objectives and the knowledge transfer required for FAA staff to work competently with AutoCAD and the ProjectWise data management system. ASCENT was then able to create the required learning guide.
  • Eight IMAGINiT education specialists utilized the FAA’s newly created custom learning guide to train 1,300 employees over a twelve-month period

During the content development phase, ASCENT used a collaborative design process, obtaining feedback from the CAEG team throughout the project to make decisions. ASCENT delivered a custom learning guide for FAA with relevant instructional content and detailed hands-on practice exercises as well as corresponding instructor tools and supplemental videos for enhanced learning.

The training from IMAGINiT went smoothly and provided attendees with the knowledge they required to work with AutoCAD and ProjectWise in the FAA’s engineering environment.

Business outcome

While in-person classes are more cost effective when run at full capacity, with new employees continually being hired and onboarded, the FAA team recognized that it wasn’t feasible for them to wait until a full class could be scheduled. After the initial in-person classes, CAEG leadership decided to direct users to online, self-paced learning using the IMAGINiT ProductivityNOW learning management system provided. Relevant content from the learning guide was imported into ProductivityNOW in addition to videos of presentations and demonstrations from IMAGINiT instructors.

One obstacle that arose during training was that learners were required to access an FAA production training database which needed to be granted and then reset following each training event. To overcome this challenge, ASCENT eliminated the need to access a production training database by developing simulations for each hands-on practice. Learners were able to practice each task in a simulated software environment that had the same look and feel as the live environment. This online training delivery format with simulation-based exercises has saved significant time and money for the FAA.

Conclusion

The FAA online training program is now an integral part of the onboarding process for new employees. In fact, new hires can’t access the ProjectWise data management system until they have completed the training. The training content is always available through the online ProductivityNOW platform which employees have access to – whenever and wherever they need it.

Looking ahead, the FAA anticipates working again with ASCENT to update the course as new software and workflows are implemented, and with IMAGINiT to assist with additional training requirements.

Project summary

    Duration & delivery

  • 90
  • 2023-07-01

    Autodesk solutions

  • AutoCAD
  • AutoCAD

    Services provided

  • Training

    Customer industry

  • Facility Management
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