As a client facing techie I’m seeing a developing trend in the meetings I am being asked to attend recently. The conversation inevitably revolves around the new clients existing Learning Management System (LMS) being, as a generalisation, over-priced and under-used, mainly because it is too complex, inflexible, impersonal, impossible to find anything and so on. Does this sound familiar?

Years ago there was a rush of early adopters for Learning Management Systems. Corporate sized systems were squeezed into medium sized organisations – e-learning loaded by the bucket full with classroom based courses stacked up and ready to roll out. Some of the bigger systems even allowing the level of detail that enables the administrators to manage the amount of flip chart pages available in any given classroom! But the sheer size of the beast and the quantity of content it consumed would soon leave the end users – who should be the central focus of these systems; lost, confused and overwhelmed. I’ve seen systems that would confuse even the brightest technical minds, one example had three different ways to search the system on a single screen, each bringing back different results when asked the same question!

The trouble with a lot of these early designs was, not only the fact that they were designed and built by techies, but that they tried to cram in as much functionality as they could per megabyte of code, the majority of which is never and will never be used by all but a handful of users;  all designed to fuel the ever growing functionality war.

I’ve even seen websites that compare LMS’s by the amount of functions they have, a shopping list for ‘how complicated can we make this’, no mention of how user friendly, easy to navigate or aesthetically pleasing they might be. In the age where Apple can sell mobile devices on the basis of “it looks good and is easy to use”, it does beg the question why?

If essentially all you want from an LMS is to manage your learners through a set of mandatory or compliance based courses, give them some options around what to learn next to develop their career and provide them access to people who can answer their questions when they get stuck. Do you really need to hire a team of administrators to run the system for you just because they can make sure that the flip chart is in the right classroom (well, according to the LMS it is)?

So the next time you fire up your LMS and want to find some e-learning, download a video or a presentation file or ask a subject matter expert a question, think about these few simple concepts.

User centred design

This should be the backbone of any software system developed in the past few years, no excuses allowed. The designers and developers should put themselves in the user’s position. This can be achieved by the use of simple testing techniques that allow the development team to build user based scenarios and then work them through with non-technical users as test subjects.

Does your LMS feel like it has the user centred design approach? One simple question to ask yourself might be; have you ever ordered anything from Amazon, Sainsbury’s, Tesco’s or any other of the thousands of online stores, how does your LMS experience shape up against that experience? Remember most people can use Amazon without any training!

Navigation anyone?

This may seem like a logical technique to put into practice, however, you’d be surprised at the amount of experienced designers that overlook this simple way to enhance the user’s experience. Your LMS’s navigation should be clear to understand, easy to find, consistent, contain contrasting colours for current tabs and simple hover-over prompts for everything.

How do I find..?

Nearly all LMS’s I’ve ever seen have a search function; however, there are lots that don’t have this feature easily accessible and available for the users. The search function quickly becomes a habit with users favouring a direct search for content instead of scrolling through your library. All the more reason therefore, that you need to make the search area easily viewable, quickly reachable and returning relative information.

Be consistent

This is one of the most important areas where usability can and will let your LMS down. The user interface needs to flow freely but at the same time remain consistent in order to influence the kind of user behavior that will motivate people to engage and take action.

Structure!

Every LMS at some stage of its lifecycle will have had an architect. It’s their job to ensure that the design is as effective and structurally sound as possible. To make sure the layout is efficient, easy to navigate, simple, not overcrowded or filled with anything but useful content.

Take a look at the screens on your LMS, do they look like a lot of thought has gone into their layout?

An LMS isn’t always the answer

I’m finding that most Enterprise level LMS’s are simply too unwieldy to meet the day-to-day requirements of a busy L&D team. Perhaps a simpler and more agile system would be appropriate – if what you really need is to track learner’s progress, encourage collaboration with Subject Matter Experts and other learners, gather feedback on courses, offer options around both a formal and informal approach to learning. You will probably find that a user friendly system such as our own Involve with consistent layouts, sound structure and simple navigation might just prove to be a more flexible answer.