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Things Your Team Needs to Successfully Manage an LMS
Managing a Learning Management System can get complicated quickly. Whether your organization is implementing one for the first time, has migrated systems, or is looking to give your present learning platform a new lease of life, there are many things you require to do in order for your LMS to thrive.
You Possess an LMS, Now What?
For your learning website to stay fresh and engaging, it requires attention and time. A learning platform can, and will, become outdated if it is ignored for a long time. Thus, with that in mind, here are the things required to manage an LMS successfully:
Get a team together with the appropriate skills
It might seem apparent, but whether you have a team of one or 10, you require somebody looking after the system who knows all its ins and outs – and essentially has the time to manage the system. You also want someone in your team who is skilled in managing courses and setting them up in a logical way. The last thing that you require is for your Learning Management System to be the barrier to learning.
Provide your team with the training they want to thrive
Your colleague can do really clever things with their LMS, but only if they know how to utilize it. Find out whether your Learning Management System supplier and platform solution provide training. It is crucial your team knows how to use the system and how to handle any hiccups or challenges.
Ensure the compliance of data
The handling of individual data is increasingly becoming a major concern. Though LMS is designed to make it easier to be GDPR compliant, no solution guarantees compliance. That’s for the reason that it’s down to you, your team, and the organization to be compliant. That means it’s about the individuals and processes you put in place. Ensure you consult a data privacy officer or someone within your IT department who is knowledgeable about the topic to put the correct processes in place. Additionally, look into an off-the-shelf GDPR eLearning course for your team to make sure they know the laws and how to handle data.
Measure results
Calculating return on investment should be an ongoing process. It can assist your team get business buy-in and make your team feel valued. Most learning and development teams want a stake at the table and to be consulted in what courses the business requires, instead of dictated to. The best way of attaining that is to demonstrate your worth and expertise. Thus, generate reports and collect evidence to highlight the success of your team.
Create a plan for the future
Give your group goals to work towards and map out a strategy for your system and team. Besides, you should create a roadmap for system updates to address your students’ and team’s pain points. These plans will help give your real group purpose in their work, and you will make the team members feel like they are making a difference in their company.
Rally some champions for your team
To make every member’s job easier, find the champion team’s job in the business who will be advocates of the system. Who do you ask? Well, typically, you would need to find two types of individuals. The first are those who are forward thinkers and are first adopters of new technologies and better processes. These individuals are the obvious options, but also look for your main opponents and work on turning them into advocates. These nay-sayers are the second types of individuals you want to get onboard because, in truth, onboard will be your most powerful allies.
Challenges of Managing a Learning Management System
The Learning Management System is just a tool and the effort to wield; it effectively presents a host of challenges. Here are some of these challenges of managing an LMS.
Role Delegation
For a Learning Management System to function properly, there are key roles that need to be filled by competent individuals. There are general administrative duties such as registering users and granting levels of access, and then there are instructor duties, which comprise creating and organizing courses.
Delegating roles to major departments such as HR, IT, Operations, etc., is one of the very first necessary steps to managing a Learning Management System. There ought to be discussions on who gets to take on which roles, with clear definitions of what these tasks are of distinct boundaries for what every role covers.
There ought to be no confusion as to who is responsible for every element of running the LMS. With an organizational structure in place, there will also be accountability that pushes every individual to do their jobs correctly.
User Onboarding
Getting individuals to start utilizing a Learning Management System is a big hurdle to overcome. Also, user onboarding is a multi-faceted challenge, from the managers and leaders that might not be the most tech-savvy to the students who have little interest in engaging with a seemingly complex learning methodology. It is crucial, thus, to account for the differing needs of every end-user.
An internal marketing-style campaign which presents the benefits of utilizing an LMS is a great way of creating awareness and educating the rest of the organization. Offering incentives for completing courses is another effective way of enticing students and can help promote e-learning to external partners and learners.
Also, there is the practical issue of having a system to add users into the LMS. Familiarity with the Learning Management System’s features can simplify the process.
Time Management
The enthusiasm that comes with having implemented a Learning Management System can lead to underestimating the amount of time and effort that requires to be put into operating it smoothly. The creation of courses alone can take up significant chunks of working hours, particularly if the courses are to be customized to fit the requirements specific to a company and its departments. And of course, this doesn’t end when the course is published as the material will need updating over time, new syllabus created and older ones retired, and this needs management and resources.
Developing a schedule with reasonable delivery dates is good. Respecting these set deadlines is even more significant. Every element that goes into completing tasks requires to be accounted for. It can be very easy to overlook processes such as getting approval from upper management and getting enough resources from information technology.
Customization
Every company has a different set of training goals that cannot all be addressed with a one-size-fits-all approach. That’s why an LMS needs to have a suite of customization choices. With a degree of flexibility afforded, administrators, the users, and course creators can tailor the Learning Management System’s design to fit the student’s needs.
How much control users have over customization depends on the Learning Management System. An open-source LMS offers free rein to users to change everything from its aesthetic to its interface, as long as they have knowledge on coding/programming. Users will likely have to work with customization restrictions with a paid Learning Management System.
Of course, you also require to bear in mind that your organization’s brand is often updated. Web design practices are always improving so you will be surprised how quickly a Learning Management System theme can look dated and be in need of a refresh. It’s often the case that this is not simple, and the expertise no longer accessible to achieve this work for you.
End-User Support
Some Learning Management System users will inevitably either run into issues or have questions about how certain features work. The inability to answer such questions can make the experience of using an LMS frustrating. In case the LMS has yet to be fully adopted, there is a good opportunity it never will be in case the users find it a hassle to deal with.
End-user support extends to offering training on how to use the more advanced features of an LMS. Organizations that opt to sell their training also require extra support requirements (such as payment handling).
The lack thereof limits the potential of a Learning Management System to truly innovative learning to innovate learning for students truly to creating and updating guides and having a dedicated support staff who can provide an efficient and effective support experience to the learners. This might need dedicated staff to offer phone, chat, and email support. Dedicated professionals might need to be on hand to resolve complex learner challenges, and if learners’ many LMS’ offer round the clock access, your support team may require to be handed round the clock too.