Learn Amp Blog

Do you need a new learning platform?

Written by Michael Main, Senior Learning Solutions Coach | May 2, 2023 11:00:00 AM

Does your company really need a new learning platform? Take the L&D health check to find out.

Today employees actively seek employers offering meaningful and relevant learning and development options2. It’s all the more important, then, to offer employees an engaging learning, development and upskilling culture, wherever they’re located. 

Of course, you don’t necessarily need a learning platform to create a great learning culture. Many companies handle their learning through in-person training providers or allow each department to purchase and manage their own learning resources.

However, a learning platform can make this all much easier to manage and deliver.

So, does your company really need one? Take the L&D health check to find out.

Your L&D Health Check

  • Is it difficult for you to create or distribute L&D materials that are tailored to your company objectives and your employees’ career goals? 

  • Do you struggle to monitor, measure and report on the outputs and impact of your L&D activities? Or does it take you a long time?  

  • Are you offering different learning experiences for remote employees and in-office staff?  

  • Is employee onboarding inconsistent? Does it take longer than you’d like for new hires to get up to speed?  

  • Do you have low engagement with existing L&D tools and options? 

  • Are you noticing high levels of employee turnover?  

  • Do you find it hard to justify the money and time you invest in your L&D?

If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, it’s definitely time to consider a new learning platform.

But what kind of platform is best for you?

Knowing that you need a learning solution is just the beginning. To avoid getting overwhelmed by analysis paralysis, you need to understand the differences between the types of platforms and what they offer. In particular, there’s a lot of debate about which is better for business learning: in LMS or an LXP 

LMS?

An LMS can be great for L&D teams to disseminate and manage onboarding, compliance training and track training sessions in line with company objectives. However, they’re not always built with the learner experience in mind, nor do they encourage a decentralised, grassroots learning experience.

LXP?

An LXP, on the other hand, allows learners to define and design their own learning pathways according to their needs, and enables social learning.

While an LMS delivers a rather top-down, one-way, and individual learning experience, an LXP operates more like an ecosystem of collaborative knowledge and learning.

Combined learning suite? 

For forward-thinking businesses, the best solution might be a combined learning suite, that offers the best of both worlds3.

A learning suite acts as an organic, evolving learning ecosystem, combining governance and flexibility and delivering learning, collaboration, engagement and performance in a single platform.

Your learning platform checklist

So, you’ve done the Health Check and made the decision to invest in an employee learning and development platform. You know the differences between the various types of platforms.

Now, you’re ready to shape your selection process. 

We’ve created a thorough selection preparation checklist to help you review your existing set-up, decide on the features you need, identify your stakeholders and establish your budget.

Download our checklist

Download our platform selection checklist, so that when you start talking to vendors, you’re as prepared as you can be.