Table of Contents
Employees are every organization’s biggest asset. According to a survey by Forbes, companies that invest in training their employees generate 218% higher income (per employee) than those who don’t. Hence, it is imperative to lookout for the right features of Learning and Management System.
One such powerful tool for employee L&D is a Learning Management System or LMS. An LMS is used by organizations to streamline their employee development training, as well as for training their extended enterprise including partners and customers.
What is an LMS in Learning and Development?
An LMS is essentially a software that simplifies your corporate learning and development processes and makes them more efficient. It is a centralized and user-friendly platform that houses all your L&D training.
With an LMS, you can monitor your team members’ learning progress and receive automated reports to ensure they are on course. It helps better manage your business’ evolving training requirements for all stakeholders.
11 Must-have Features of Learning Management System (LMS)
As the market today has a plethora of options when it comes to an LMS, so which one should you choose as your L&D tool? Let’s find out!
1. Integrations
An LMS needs to integrate seamlessly with all the other systems that you may need to use for your business. These could be your HRMS platform, talent management software or you’re your communication platforms.
The robust integrations capabilities of the LMS enable you to synchronize your employee training records with other crucial employee data. This strengthens your learning and development strategy.
2. Data Tracking
An LMS should be able to store latest and updated data related to your learners’ journey. As an HR and L&D pro, you can use this data to get a comprehensive understanding of your learners’ performance and engagement in one centralized location.
This helps you make the most of your corporate training programs for employees since you can track learner progress and tailor content accordingly. It also makes it easier to identify areas for skill enhancement.
3. Personalized Learning Experience
Learning is no more a one-size-fits-all approach. Every learner is unique and so are their learning needs. An LMS should be able to effectively tailor content based on a learner’s history and role.
For instance, a salesperson should easily be able to find training and development material on topics like ‘negotiation skills’ or ‘how to close deals faster’ within the LMS. Adaptive assessments and quizzes that adjust to a learner’s performance throughout a course can help users focus on areas that need improvement.
With personalized learning, learners become more engaged and invested in the learning and development process.
4. Alerts, Nudges and Notifications
Even with a robust LMS, HR managers and L&D professionals need an overview to identify a learner’s needs effectively. Automated alerts and notifications within the LMS are essential for this purpose. These features ensure that L&D trainers stay informed about learners’ engagement and course completion.
By sending automatic nudges to learners about training deadlines and notifying trainers of user completion rates, an LMS delivers timely feedback to the right people.
5. Centralized Course Materials
An LMS should be more than just an eLearning platform. It should house videos, written manuals, slide decks and various other learning materials in a user-friendly, centralized location.
This kind of centralized platform helps learners as well as HR and L&D teams to stay organized and maintain consistency, which are key to boosting learner engagement. Plus, having a uniform space for different types of learning materials supports blended learning, a key approach for employee development training teams working with distributed groups.
6. Reporting and Analytics
If you want to measure the effectiveness of your learning programs, look no further than your LMS. Your LMS should offer flexible reporting and analytics that match your eLearning objectives.
It helps to have graphical/visual representations of learner data. Besides, customizable reports help you fine-tune training HR programs by identifying and addressing specific pain points. Quickly spotting patterns allows for timely adjustments to L&D programs, which is especially crucial in industries where compliance is a top priority.
7. Mobile-Ready
As workforces become more dispersed, on-site training is challenging or even impractical at times. This is why your LMS needs to be mobile-ready to serve this workforce. A mobile-ready LMS helps ensure learners can access materials anytime, anywhere. This capability allows companies to conduct talent training, regardless of location.
Mobile-ready training is also particularly beneficial for industries like healthcare, construction or retail, where L&D training often occurs on the go and within the flow of work. This ensures that even in high-pressure environments, training is never compromised.
8. Compliance Training
Maintaining compliance as per government regulations or corporate policies is critical for every business. This means ensuring timely training for the right people. It is also about assessing learners’ understanding and awareness of regulatory requirements.
An LMS should be able to track and record compliance training activities while providing management with notifications when issues arise that safeguard the company.
9. Assessment & Certifications
While LMS reports and analytics are necessary to track learner engagement, it’s equally crucial to assess learner retention and understanding. An effective LMS should support assessment tools such as simulations, exam engines and more. It should enable HR and L&D trainers to offer immediate feedback to learners as per the assessments.
An LMS should also streamline the process of creating certificates. Once employees finish a training program or course, they should receive a Certificate of Completion which gives them a sense of achievement. Certificates also help verify training completion for compliance purposes.
10. Smart Scheduling
Today, with remote work, it is hardly easy to schedule face-to-face L&D training sessions that suit dispersed teams.
A smart scheduling tool in the LMS solves this issue by enabling instructors to offer learners multiple training session options. This flexibility ensures that learners can access important L&D training at their convenience. It also eliminates the need for them to juggle tasks while acquiring new skills.
11. Security & Privacy
Robust data security measures in the LMS are imperative to safeguard your company’s sensitive L&D training and other information.
At a minimum, an LMS should offer strong password requirements, two-step verification, restricted data access, better monitoring system activity and assigned user roles and permissions to ensure privacy and security.
Parting Thoughts
Finding the perfect LMS can feel a bit overwhelming. Start by collaborating with your team to define your learning and development goals. Next, list the features your LMS needs to achieve these objectives. What other features you think are necessary for a learning management system? Let us know in the comment section!
You can also pick platforms like Akrivia HCM that easily help you streamline your L&D with the best LMS System.
