What Is an LMS and Why Should You Use It?

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• What is an LMS
• Types of an LMS
  • On-Premise LMS
  • Cloud-based LMS
• What is an LMS used for
  • Learning materials in one place
  • Ubiquitous learning
  • Continuous learning
  • Greater engagement
  • Customer education
  • Partner learning
  • Supplier training
  • Employee training
  • Easy onboarding
  • Employee testing and certification
  • Remote work
  • Solution for HR
• Benefits of using an LMS
  • Training starts quickly
  • Learning on autopilot
  • Reducing costs
  • Personal training for each employee
  • Unified knowledge base
  • Ability to use gaming and interactive tools
  • Detailed learning analytics
• How to choose an LMS
• Examples of LMSs
  • BeED LMS
  • Skillcast LMS
  • Moodle
  • Looop
  • Learn AMP
  • Agylia
  • Skolera
  • Matrix LMS
  • Talent LMS
  • Totara Learn
  • Upside LMS
• Conclusion

Introduction

A Learning Management System allows you to manage your education process the same way social networks allow you to manage your profile, post photos, and communicate. You can give others ordered access to educational content, check and track student knowledge, and even create your own criteria for evaluating the results.

If you have never used a learning management system before, now is the time to learn about this tool. The most famous and successful enterprises in the world implement LMS software solutions. Usually, as part of corporate training.

The fact is these systems are not just a new trend, but a tool that allows you to increase profits, save time, and make the lives of your management staff and employees a bit easier.

What is an LMS

An LMS (Learning Management System) is an online learning platform that allows users to access the knowledge base, exercises, and tests.

• Learning. With the help of LMS, you can give access to a unified database of e-courses and educational materials. A base like that is a real storehouse of topical knowledge. Thanks to it, you maintain and increase the internal expertise of the company.

• Management. In a learning management system, you can manage both courses and students. Unlike file sharing, an LMS is not just a dump of files, but a well-organized and easy-to-manage system. To start training, just add students or employees and assign courses to them.

Have some freshly-recruited newcomers? Send them invitations to the introductory e-course. Sagging sales? Send managers to practice working with virtual clients. After all, management is partially about linking academic success with solving daily business problems.

• System. More precisely, an electronic system. Even if your employees are located in different cities, you can train them all from the comfort of your own office. In addition, an LMS automates all the most boring and monotonous tasks in schooling: collecting statistics and preparing reports.

All in all, an LMS is something like your own online university. The system helps you store e-courses, provides learners with access to them, and helps you evaluate the results.

Types of an LMS

There are two main types of such systems:

On-Premise LMS

This kind of system is installed on the owner’s server. Users can connect to that server and gain access to training courses with the owner’s permission. This was the very first type of a learning management system that originated in universities and is still used by them today. It is also the go-to choice for large corporations that value complete control over the system and information security.

Cloud-based LMS

The content is uploaded to the LMS platform server, which both the owner and regular users can access via the Internet. This is the most common type of distance learning platform. Because of its simplicity and ease of use, it is the default choice for private online school owners and business executives that want to enhance corporate learning.

What is an LMS used for

A learning management system is needed to centralize and monitor learning activities. A modern LMS is a system that supports many school and professional education use cases. Let’s look at some of them.

Learning materials in one place

By combining all training materials in one place, an LMS minimizes the risk of data loss, simplifies content processing, and allows you to painlessly integrate the system into the training process. With a simple and straightforward interface, the system usually requires a simple demo session only to start creating and managing teaching materials.

Ubiquitous learning

With an LMS account, students have unlimited access to educational materials uploaded to the platform, which only requires access to the Internet. Thus, the student is less bound by time and place of study.

Continuous learning

What is an LMS great feature is that in a case when a student is unable to attend a lesson for some reason, an LMSit will provide them with access to training materials, which will prevent knowledge loss and allow them to obtain everything remotely.

Greater engagement

Students who study using the methods of gamification, which is available on the LMS platform, perform better than those who perceive educational information in lectures and lessons. Also, teachers can track the progress of students in the system and, if necessary, adjust the program in accordance with their strengths and weaknesses.

Customer education

It’s a simple and effective solution for organizing high-quality services. If you use an LMS to train your support service, you will be able to give fast competent feedback and increase audience loyalty to the brand.

Partner learning

Partner learning management is a great way to improve partner programs and provide more value to partners.

Supplier training

Supplier training services are an exceptional opportunity to build productive relationships and reach mutual understanding.

Employee training

Using an LMS to manage staff development is about supporting talent, as well as training and developing the staff’s skills. An LMS can provide your employees with courses that help them acquire the necessary work skills, be informed about product changes, etc.

Easy onboarding

Using such a platform for recruitment management helps in training new employees and facilitates the implementation process, allowing newcomers to onboard and develop faster. In essence, it makes adaptation much more efficient.

Employee testing and certification

An LMS is often used to ensure that employees receive mandatory training and undergo knowledge, clearance, regulatory, and certification tests. The test building feature streamlines employee testing and centralized learning evaluation in a way that reduces risks and helps avoid any potential compliance problems.

Remote work

In today’s world, having an electronic distance learning management system is a vital necessity.

Solution for HR

An LMS is a unique opportunity to digitize databases and documents, create programs for HR specialists, and automate up to 70% of the routine HR work.

Benefits of using an LMS

Training starts quickly

Many LMSs work via the Internet. You don’t need technical specialists to launch it – just register on the site and you’re ready to go.

Learning on autopilot

What is a great feature of an LMS? It automates all routine processes: assigns courses, notifies employees about deadlines, checks tests, and shows employees’ progress.

Reducing costs

You can train employees all over the world without spending money on tickets, travel allowance, and hotels for business coaches.

Personal training for each employee

You can develop growth plans for each position, i.e. a special course for trainees, managers, or salespeople.

Unified knowledge base

Documents, instructions, and courses are always available from any gadget. Training can be done at home or while commuting to work on the subway.

Ability to use gaming and interactive tools

In an LMS, you can use videos, quizzes, and interactive games to make the learning process more engaging. In addition, gamification can be built into the LMS itself: employees that do well in training can receive virtual titles and points to compete with each other on the leaderboard. This helps further deepen their engagement in the process.

Detailed learning analytics

The system shows the progress of individuals as well as the progress of entire employee branches. You can also see the results for individual courses and tests. You will be able to pinpoint which topics cause difficulty to your employees and adjust the curriculum accordingly.

How to choose an LMS

There are a lot of software products that optimize online learning processes today, including solutions for both small businesses and large educational projects.

When choosing a platform, you need to determine what goals you are pursuing first. A distance learning management system for university students will have different functionality from a personnel training system.

You need to understand what you need: is it a solution with course design functions, a roster of learners and teachers, and tests? Or do you need online sales, document management, and integration with other corporate systems?

Another criterion for choosing a platform is ease of use. It should be comfortable for both the educators and the learners. Any interface and functional nuances can be adjusted using the platform’s customization features.

Make sure that the platform is compatible with the desired browsers and operating systems. If you plan to host webinars, determine how massive they will be. It is important to understand that the more complex the system, the higher its price.

Examples of LMSs

BeED LMS

BeED is a platform that focuses on the comprehensive development and evaluation of students. By integrating modules such as gradebook, timetabler, curriculum and content builder, the platform can effectively solve most of the challenges educators encounter in the educational process.

• Users: education, small / medium / large businesses, tourism;
• Company profile: any;
• Installation: web application, mobile application.

Skillcast LMS

Skillcast LMS is a fully managed cloud-based LMS that enables businesses to develop e-learning and compliance applications on a single platform. It can be pre-loaded with compliance and risk libraries making it the best choice for regulatory compliance.

• Users: small / medium / large business;
• Company profile: banks, financial institutions, insurance companies, oil and energy companies;
• Installation: web application, mobile application.

Moodle

Moodle is a free online learning management system providing all users around the world with an open-source eLearning solution that can be scaled, customized, and adapted with the large selection of tools available. It’s easily adaptable for corporate training. 

• Users: education, small / medium / large business;
• Company profile: any;
• Installation: desktop application, web application, mobile application.

Looop

Looop is a simple, flexible educational platform for advanced employees.

This platform has been chosen by many progressive corporations including ASOS, Sky, Discovery, Startupbootcamp, MoneySupermarket & Financial Times. These companies know that educational resources are better than courses and that an LMS does not restrict the user.

• Users: small / medium / large businesses;
• Company profile: any;
• Installation: desktop application, mobile application.

Learn AMP

Learn Amp is an education and communication platform that improves your team’s productivity, helps you find, upload, or create training, and track your teams’ progress.

• Users: small / medium / large businesses;
• Company profile: for any profile;
• Installation: web application.

Agylia

Agylia is a mobile flexible and global LMS that allows students to access digital learning on their preferred devices, wherever they are and whenever they need it. Suitable for customer training, employee training, external and internal staff development.

• Users: small / medium / large businesses;
• Company profile: for any profile;
• Installation: web application, mobile application.

Skolera

Skolera is a unified learning platform that enables teachers to deliver orderly and integrated learning to students. The platform also facilitates teacher-student and teacher-parent interaction. It simplifies school management, student affairs, HR, accounting, payroll, etc.

• Users: Education;
• Installation: web application, mobile application.

Matrix LMS

MATRIX is a simple, powerful business LMS that makes online learning easy. Its mission is to make learning more enjoyable by offering an e-learning solution that engages learners and makes the entire process more productive.

• Users: small / medium / large business;
• Company profile: for any profile;
• Installation: web application, mobile application.

Talent LMS

TalentLMS is an ultralight cloud-based LMS that leverages your time and maximizes your learning outcomes.

• Users: Education, small / medium / large business;
• Company profile: for any profile;
• Installation: web application, mobile application.

Totara Learn

Totara Learn is an open-source learning management system designed to develop courses, train, manage, and engage your employees.

• Users: small / medium / large business;
• Company profile: for any profile;
• Installation: web application, mobile application.

Upside LMS

UpsideLMS is a SaaS LMS that allows you to easily and cost-effectively manage online courses, formal, informal, social, and mobile learning (with a standalone mobile app, UpsideLMS Mobile). The platform has won over 20 awards and is trusted by 1M + users around the world.

• Users: small / medium / large business;
• Company profile: for any profile;
• Installation:  web application, mobile application.

Conclusion

As you can see, a learning management system can become an irreplaceable helper in the process of education. It doesn’t matter if the target audience are students or your own employees – virtual learning systems are universal and highly adaptable. There are many solutions on the market, suitable for businesses of different sizes and from various industries. In case you can’t find one that is perfect for you, consider developing your own unique LMS. Bamboo Agile can become your partner on that journey. Simply contact our team to get a free consultation and start creating your stellar learning management system!