Why the LMS Would Never Die

Because it’s all about money, and desire to make one’s life simpler!

Please allow me to explain. This is what organizations want from the training function –

• Provide on-demand training where need is primarily generated by the user
• Provide training to bridge identified gaps
• Provide some mandatory training driven by organization’s growth requirements
• Provide compliance related training

Now if the trainings were delivered for no cost, and yet business objectives were met then no one would bother finding out if anyone actually attended the training sessions or not, or whether anyone learnt anything from the training sessions or not.

But if any amount is spent in providing training, then someone somewhere would want to know –

• What was that money actually spent on?
• Were the stated objectives of training function met because of this spending?

Now how did this happen before LMS? Simple – very painfully – through Excel sheets. This process was not only very tedious, but was also very primitive for today’s technology age where all data is needed in real-time so that decisions can be made faster. So in comes the Learning Management System.

Learning management systems allows L&D team to do the same task in much lesser time and with fewer resources (read: less budget – which is anyways never much for L&D Departments even in fair weather!), and help them keep track of:

• Which training consumed what budget
• What was the training quality – scores and feedback
• What was the increase in organizational competency
• And it also helps them take care of the regulatory compliance needs

How about social platforms? Would they replace LMS? Yes, if they can deliver the results for free – and if not, then some structured content delivery/consumption work-flow and tracking would be required – which would be a LMS with just a fancier name!

Can social learning replace formal training (e-learning or classroom)? I have my doubts, and here’s why –

• With the amount of distractions available on Internet, providing unrestricted access to employees seems a distant dream to me. So, an organization’s social platform would primarily consist of their own employees only – this becomes a huge problem for small and medium sized businesses (and even for larger ones, which are essentially a collection of medium sized businesses) where the base may not be big enough to contribute frequently on different topics
• Even if a sizable base is there, would organizations be able to depend on wisdom of the crowd to train their teams on new technology/product/regulatory compliance/soft-skill? What if no one contributes on a particular topic or someone unknowingly gives wrong information? I believe organizations would certainly not like to have such risks on their books.
• Can one rely on motivation of people to learn? What if some of the people don’t visit these platforms, and later there is an impact on organizational results?

So, does social learning have any value for training function? Absolutely! I think there is huge potential value that organizations can unlock by promoting peer collaboration platforms – the knowledge which is passively available with employees can be harnessed and utilized if an appropriate sharing culture can be developed within the organization. Having said that, I firmly believe social platforms are not a replacement, but rather a perfect compliment for L&D’s depts. training efforts – something that can enrich the learning experience before, during, and long after the training has taken place.

So if training is to continue, LMS would live – more social, more integrated with outer world, and giving more control to learner, but live it would!