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Is Your Learning Management System Leaving Your Users Dazed and Confused?
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HOW A VIRTUAL CORPORATE UNIVERSITY CAN MAKE YOUR EXISTING LMS MORE ENGAGING, ACCESSIBLE, AND USER-FRIENDLY
LMS CHALLENGES FOR TRAINING MANAGERS
Learning management systems
have been around for many years,
developed to help companies train
their employees more efficiently and
at lower cost. The term “learning
management system” is actually a
misnomer; most existing LMS systems
are actually training management
systems.
“Training” is something that is pushed
to users in a uniform fashion, with
the content determined by managers
and delivered to all users in the same
formal way. “Learning,” on the other
hand, is user-specific, personal,
and informal, consisting of finding
and using content that meets the
unique needs of individuals. Learning,
therefore, is much more difficult to
manage and measure.
Recent studies show that many
training professionals are not
satisfied with their existing learning
management systems. Nearly half
rate their systems as “average,” “poor,”
or “very poor” for the following four
reasons1:
1] Difficult to use
Learning management systems have
typically failed to adapt to users’
learning needs, with 25 percent of
training professionals reporting that
learners have challenges with LMS
usability. Learning management
systems began as relatively
complex tools to be used by trained
administrators, and so it is not
surprising that learners find them
difficult to use. LMS providers have
only recently begun to make their
systems more user-friendly.
ABSTRACT
Today’s learning management
systems (LMS) lack the flexibility
necessary to meet the growing
knowledge demands of users.
They are also difficult to use and
expensive to implement.
Improving learners’ performance
requires that they have the
ability to easily locate the
training materials they need and
complete the coursework in a
timely manner. For these reasons,
training executives are looking for
ways to link their existing learning
management systems with new,
complementary technologies that
can deliver easier, more engaging
learning experiences.
This white paper describes the
current state of LMS and the
challenges facing corporate
training managers. It also
discusses how companies are
using virtual corporate universities
in conjunction with their existing
LMS implementations to improve
learning outcomes. Finally, it
describes the ON24 Virtual
Corporate University and how
companies are using the ON24
platform to make their training
more engaging, accessible, and
user-friendly.
ON24 Virtual Corporate University for New Hire Onboarding
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Beyond poor usability of learning management systems,
training professionals have also reported challenges
searching for specific training programs and information
within the systems, as well as IT issues such as bandwidth
concerns and password management problems.
2] Lack of “holistic” training programs
One of the greatest shortcomings of existing learning
management systems is their inability to easily incorporate
and measure coursework that resides in external content
repositories. Today’s LMS platforms need to link to other
enterprise content management systems to deliver more
robust learning experiences, including federated searches
(comprehensive information searches both inside and
outside of the LMS), dashboards, and personalized training
paths.
3] Need for personalized learning
Forty-four percent of companies have identified
personalized learning plans as one of the top-three most
essential functions of future LMS designs1. Personalized
learning is extremely important; content must be provided
in ways that accommodate various learners across a broad
spectrum of demographic, generational, and geographic
categories. And with so many workers using a rapidly
increasing variety of mobile devices, personalized training
must also be integrated with—and easily delivered via—
mobile and handheld devices of all types.
4] Limited measurement and reporting
Many training managers believe that their LMS reporting
tools are insufficient. Limited reporting poses major
challenges. Learning professionals need the ability to
quickly add training content to meet evolving learner
needs and then track the new coursework’s use and
effectiveness.
KEY CORPORATE LEARNING TRENDS
Changes continue in the corporate learning industry.
In recent years, industry interest has moved from basic
technologies such as systems that provide tracking and
management of learning activities to advanced learning
systems that integrate with social media and can be
accessed anytime, anywhere, from a variety of devices.
• Social learning / social media
Users expect learning management systems to
integrate with social media and social learning tools.
Combining social and informal learning with formal,
LMS-based learning creates comprehensive, blended
learning solutions that accelerate employee and
business performance. Social learning uses social
media to leverage shifts in corporate culture that
encourage ongoing knowledge transfer. More than 12
percent of companies plan to launch social learning /
social media technologies within the next year2.
• Mobile learning
Mobile learning is making significant advances, with
companies across industries planning to implement
systems that support learning on a variety of mobile
platforms. Companies have recognized the need to
provide learning resources to their users at any point
in their daily activities, and that means comprehensive
mobile access. Other critical success factors
for mobile learning include providing engaging,
interactive content and ensuring that learning can be
tracked and managed by the company’s LMS.
SOLUTION / OPPORTUNITY – VIRTUAL CORPORATE UNIVERSITY
The rise of the “virtual corporate university” reflects the
need for companies to deliver training materials that
are easier-to-use, more interactive and engaging, and
accessible anytime, anywhere, on any device. Companies
must also provide varied levels and types of learning
programs and content (e.g., centralized, functional, and
geography-specific). And given shrinking budgets, the
new training programs must be more cost-effective than
traditional learning methods.
The virtual corporate university satisfies these
requirements. By combining virtual online classrooms, live
webcasts, social networking tools, and other Web-based
collaboration tools, the virtual corporate university creates
a highly adaptable and engaging learning experience
for wide-ranging employee needs. Moreover, it does
so while allowing employees, partners, and clients to
access training courses anytime and from any location.
This is an enormous advantage, given the need to train
busy employees who are often spread out across global
locations.
Businesses are using virtual universities for a variety of
training and communication needs:
• New hire on-boarding – Companies are using virtual
corporate universities to conduct new-employee
orientation and training, providing an engaging,
effective, and consistent on-boarding experience for
new hires no matter where they are.
• Leadership / management development – Virtual
corporate universities have become increasingly
popular for leadership training and management
development courses. Flexible online training is easier
for busy managers to fit into their schedules, resulting
in higher participation rates compared to traditional
classroom training.
• Continuing professional education – Professional
training on new techniques and procedures is much
more effective when employees can access it on
their own schedules and without the need to travel to
distant training seminars.
• Client training – Virtual corporate universities are ideal
for training clients on new products and applications.
The convenience and flexibility offered by virtual
universities increases participation dramatically.
Other benefits to clients are communication tools for
discussing common issues and sharing best practices.
• Sales training – Increasingly, companies are using
virtual corporate universities to train their sales teams
on new products, services, and promotions, in
addition to basic and advanced selling skills. Virtual
universities also enable direct access to subject matter
experts for technical Q&A and discussion of specific
topics.
• Partner training – Firms use virtual corporate
universities to educate their partners on new
technologies and partner programs. The virtual
university’s social networking tools allow partners and
companies to discuss challenges and obtain timely
feedback.
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BENEFITS OF A VIRTUAL CORPORATE UNIVERSITY
Virtual corporate universities allow companies to create
“virtual dashboards” that can make tremendous amounts
of information easy to find and access. These virtual
environments can also make the LMS more flexible and
agile by allowing the capture of news feeds, blogs, social
media content, and Web-based information, as well as
training materials that reside in content management
systems outside the LMS.
Other benefits include:
• Ease of use – Typically an immersive 3-D experience,
the virtual corporate university can be designed to
mimic any desired learning workflow, leading users
on a simple intuitive path through the required
coursework. More importantly, a virtual university can
be a single point of access for all training materials.
Users are no longer required to locate and log into
multiple systems to complete their training.
• Knowledge transfer – Using virtual corporate
universities, companies can leverage their managers’
valuable knowledge and experience by making
it easy for them to interact with and mentor new
hires and other employees. Subject matter experts
from anywhere in the world can participate as
online facilitators, further enhancing the real-world
applicability of lessons and quality of learning
experiences. Virtual corporate universities also provide
a quick and easy way to communicate with direct
supervisors and other company departments.
• Personalized experience – Virtual corporate
universities allow training professionals to personalize
access to content according to learner groups,
departments, locations, or other criteria. Job
competencies and career paths can be personalized
for learners so they can be more effective in their
current jobs and progress more quickly to higher
levels within the organization.
• Mobile learning – Virtual corporate universities
allow training managers to deliver content wherever
learners are in their daily activities. Virtual universities
not only provide engaging, interactive mobile content,
they also enable tracking of content use in companies’
learning management systems.
• Learning measurement – Virtual corporate universities
track all training metrics, including attendee activities,
enabling assessment of learner participation,
feedback, and completion rates. These metrics allow
training managers to identify training issues and
develop more effective content.
• Social learning / social media – Virtual corporate
universities help facilitate the development of
engaging, interactive social learning programs. They
also enable collaborative learning by combining online
instructor-led training with social networking, expert-
led discussions, scheduled chats, blogs, and more.
ON24: A GLOBAL LEADER IN ONLINE LEARNING
ON24 is a leader in virtual learning technologies. The
ON24 Virtual Corporate University is being used by leading
global companies to provide engaging training programs
using virtual classrooms, live webcasts, collaboration tools,
and social networking tools. Key features of the ON24
Virtual Corporate University include:
• Industry-leading webcasting and virtual environment
platform that fosters attendee participation,
collaboration, and social networking. Combining
social and informal learning with virtual instructor-led
training creates a blended learning solution that can
help accelerate employee performance.
• Flexible social media features, including social
networking, group discussions, scheduled chats,
peer-to-peer collaboration, blogs and RSS feeds. The
ON24 Virtual Corporate University helps facilitate the
development of engaging, interactive social learning
programs.
• Ability to integrate training content from existing LMS
platforms and other enterprise content management
systems. If desired, ON24’s virtual university can act as
a single point of access for all training materials.
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• Extremely secure, reliable, and scalable enterprise-
class platform, including role-based access, single
sign on, SAML authentication, and content restrictions
using IP filters and passwords.
• Training-specific functionality including support for
continuing education, automated registration, testing,
and certificate issuance. It also supports a compliance
workflow, with the ability to remove content before
the recorded version is posted.
• Geographic flexibility, including support for 15
languages. ON24 global support enables broadcasting
of live and pre-recorded content to specific time
zones, which is important for firms with worldwide
operations.
• Mobile-deployment ready, including optimized tablet
and mobile phone views. Tablets provide an HTML5-
based immersive 3-D virtual environment, and mobile
phones deliver a content-focused compact view.
• Real-time measurement of training participation,
performance, and feedback. The ON24 Virtual
Corporate University allows training professionals to
quickly add training content to meet evolving learner
needs and then track the new coursework’s use and
effectiveness.
REAL-WORLD EXPERIENCE, REAL BENEFITS
The ON24 Virtual Corporate University has enabled leading
firms to provide engaging and interactive online training
to their global audiences of employees, customers, and
partners. The following case studies highlight some of
the ways companies are leveraging the ON24 Virtual
Corporate University to create tangible benefits by:
• Providing a global learning experience while reducing
overall training costs
• Increasing employee training participation and
completion rates
• Boosting social learning via expert-led discussions and
Q&A sessions
• Accelerating the transfer of institutional knowledge
among employees
GLOBAL LEARNING PRODUCTS
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt (HMH) is a global learning
company. As the world’s largest provider of pre-K-12
solutions, HMH collaborates with school districts,
administrators, teachers, parents, and students to provide
interactive, results-driven learning.
HMH organizes a sales kickoff meeting each year to
introduce new products to its selling force of educational
consultants worldwide. For its most recent sales training,
HMH created a customized, two-day virtual sales kickoff
meeting for its 900 consultants. Powered by ON24, the
virtual sales meeting included live sessions, exhibits, chat
discussions, and downloadable documents.
The virtual sales meeting resulted in better learning
outcomes than their prior physical meetings. Eighty-seven
percent of attendees said the virtual training was “very
good” or “outstanding.” The event was a big success from
a financial point of view, too—it was approximately 90
percent less expensive to execute than a physical event,
saving HMH more than $500,000.
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PROFESSIONAL SERVICES
A major professional services firm has used the ON24
virtual environment platform to create a private virtual
university for the education and discussion of mobility and
incentive taxes. The community helps members stay up-
to-date and communicate in real time with other tax and
HR professionals on the latest trends and issues. Members
have spent more than 3 ½ hours, on average, listening
to educational forums and engaging in discussions with
their peers. The ON24 virtual environment allows the
professional services company to demonstrate its wide-
ranging expertise, leading to new business opportunities
for its global employer services division.
TECHNOLOGY MANUFACTURING
A leading global technology manufacturer uses the ON24
virtual environment platform to train its employees on
a variety of collaboration and productivity tools. The
company offers weekly live “virtual-brown-bag” webcasts
within the virtual university. The ON24 solution allows the
company to deliver professional development training
cost-effectively to its employees worldwide. The company
also uses the virtual environment to share institutional
knowledge via expert-led discussions, moderated forums,
and Q&A sessions.
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HOTEL MANAGEMENT
A major hotel chain is using the ON24 virtual environment
platform to launch a global training initiative designed to
improve key employees’ understanding of management
fundamentals and leadership principles. Using the virtual
university, instructor-led training—via live webcasts and
moderated discussions—was delivered to the company’s
geographically-distributed leadership team. More than
3,000 managers and company leaders were trained, at a
cost that was 69 percent lower than the industry average.
SURPASSING CONVENTIONAL LEARNING RESULTS
Conventional learning management systems lack the
flexibility necessary to meet users’ growing knowledge
demands. Moreover, these systems are difficult to use and
expensive to implement and fine-tune.
Learning managers are looking for ways to deliver more
engaging learning experiences by enhancing their
existing systems with new complementary technologies.
Increasingly, employees require adaptable informal and
social learning tools that provide just-in-time knowledge to
fit individual users’ needs.
A growing number of companies are using the ON24
Virtual Corporate University in conjunction with their
existing LMS implementations to enhance their training
results at low cost. The ON24 platform allows training
managers to provide highly relevant learning content
to employees anytime, anywhere, and on any device,
achieving training outcomes that far surpass conventional
learning management systems’ results.
1 Training Industry Quarterly, Spring 2011.
2 Industry Buying Plans & Trends for 2012, January 2012.
© 2012 ON24, Inc. For more information on the benefits of the ON24 virtual environment, contact us at 877-202-9599 or visit www.on24.com.
ON24, INC.
201 THIRD STREET
SAN FRANCISCO, CA 94103
877.202.9599
WWW.ON24.COM
THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN SUCCESS AND FAILURE
In the global marketplace, well-educated employees, partners, suppliers, and
customers are a critical success factor. Companies across industries are using
virtual corporate university solutions such as the ON24 virtual environment to
achieve this goal. These organizations are providing highly effective learning
experiences to their global workforces at much lower cost compared to tradi-
tional learning methods.
For more information on the benefits of the ON24 virtual environment, contact us
at 877.202.9599 or visit www.on24.com.