Learning Management System Checklist

	Things to Look for While Left Brain Media is not a Learning Management System provider, we are very familiar with the features and functions that are important to consider when making a buying decision. We also know that many popular LMS environments include bells and whistles that add to the price, but are virtually useless to many customers. While you will get the most value by having LBM consult with your organization about is LMS plans, here is an overview of the important factors to consider.
		Speed We have witnessed big companies who have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on well-known LMS systems. Then, after months of installation and testing, they discover what they got was a pathetically slow system. The problem is that even some of the largest and post popular LMS systems were not built from the ground up as true web applications. They are simply expensive hacks of legacy client server software, so they have performance that resembles the speed of a turtle on a bad day. Bookmarking & the ebay Test Give your LMS the the ebay test. The LMS should allow the user to lookup, bookmark, add to their catalog, the courses in the LMS as easily as a user can lookup, bookmark, and add auctions to their "watched items list" on ebay. Now ebay does not have the best user interface in the world, but it is obviously easy enough, because has been incredibly successful. Bookmarking allows you to link directly to courses from other websites, which is incredibly helpful when you are trying to promote a course or two from the hundreds or thousands listed in the LMS itself. AICC & SCORM Compliance Many LMS developers claim that their systems are AICC & SCORM compliant, only to turn around and treat courses in this standard as second-class courses. This type of LMS makes AICC and SCORM training modules hard to edit and manage once they are imported. Your LMS should allow you to edit all imported AICC and SCORM data through a GUI interface. It should also let you export new file descriptors based on your edits. The LMS also needs to support the resetting of student test data in the same manner it does for its own proprietary courses. Administration vs. End User Experience Face it! It does not matter how much time the LMS saves you in administration if the students dislike the interface. The student experience is the most important thing about any LMS. The administration functions are important. They should be easy to use and help you quantify training; this will save a few people in the training department some time. But the end-users screens have the potential to save every single employee time. So do not choose an LMS based on the ease of interface on the administration screens. Analyze the LMS from the students’ perspective first. Enrollment Be sure that it is easy for your students to enroll using the LMS. A good system can save students time while saving you administrative costs. Depending on the size of your training program, look for ease of enrollment and billing (if applicable). If you use online enrollment for both online and classroom training, you will need a much more robust system. It should help you manage student, instructor, and classroom locations and availability, and it should provide travel and housing guidance, wait listing, dress code information, notification, and reminders. Scalability Be sure the LMS you choose can grow with your organization. It must work well for the company as it is today as well as what it will be tomorrow. Countless companies and universities find themselves shopping for a replacement LMS because their existing one fails to provide the scalability to handle increased student loads, the flexibility to accommodate new document types, and the capabilities for tracking training in a growing organization. Few Useless Features Perhaps you need a text chatroom in your LMS, but most companies and groups have instant message and text chat capabilities already. In addition, most of the time, a 10-minute conference call can accomplish as much as a 30-minute text chat session. Also, many LMSs track every move each learner makes. While this is nice if you need that type of “big-brother” information, it’s useless if you don’t. Having 100 different training reports is only useful if there are people in your organization who need 100 different types of training reports. Don't pay for what you don't need.