In order to determine the key features that a learning management system must have, one should start by reviewing the primary function that it will be fulfilling at an organization. Course building, distributing, and tracking is the most common use for an LMS, but depending on one’s needs, X or Y LMS could also prioritize remote learning, developing materials from scratch, or integrating with different content types. 

A good LMS should work like a master archive where employees can access the company’s online training resources at any time. Instructor-led training could also be facilitated by an LMS. Overall, the primary hope with an LMS is that it’s user-friendly and effective for both the learner and the team that is distributing and updating the company’s content library.

With that in mind, these are the key features for a corporate LMS: 

1. Reporting & Tracking: Like any sort of relationship, online training is a two way street. It doesn’t end with choosing a learning platform and uploading course content. You have to be able to understand how people are interacting with said content in order to fine tune it as you go. Any LMS should come with some reporting, analytics, and tracking capabilities, such as learner progress, completion rates, time to complete each course, individual learning paths, etc. If they don’t, you can check and see if they’ll support any plugins that would help you get those reports.
   
2. Integrations: The learning experience with any LMS is enhanced when it can communicate with the rest of your software stack. Depending on your needs, you might want to make sure that the new tool integrates with your HRMS or ATS.
   
3. Assessment tools: While it may be up for debate if every course should come with a test or some kind of learning assessment at the end, it’s certainly better to have this tool than to lack it. Most of the training tools we’ve discussed come with one or another way of evaluating learning outcomes. They can be as simple as a multiple choice quiz or as complex as exams with several types of questions and assignments.
   
4. Gamification: Features like points, badges, and leaderboards can be a fun way of increasing employee engagement during the learning process. If your company is already into these kinds of dynamics, it will certainly make your life easier if the LMS of your choice has these built-in tools. It is also worth mentioning that the benefits of gamification in eLearning are widespread. ‍
5. Compliance Training & Certification: If your business requires employees to remain compliant with government regulations or a corporate policy of your own, this can cover that need. The exact shape and form of these features will vary from vendor to vendor, but they may include a log of all training activity to easily download and present in the event of an audit, for instance.

Let us insist, the best thing you could do to make sure you pick the right LMS is to test it yourself (and with your team). Assuming that we’ve established that, the next best tips we could offer would be to approach your first encounter with the software, or demo if you book one, with a specific set of questions in mind. 

To do this, you can use the following list of questions as inspiration or download our excel organizer for free. 

• What are the key features I want to try out and validate?
• What expectations do we have for this software? What are the key things that it should help us achieve? 
• How will this solution fit into the rest of my tech stack and therefore what integrations do I need?
• How will others in the organization use this solution?
• How will this tool improve the learning experience of our employees? 
• What are the things that would make me or my coworkers nervous about switching our current processes to this platform? 
• How are employee data and company learning materials kept safe if trusted to this vendor? 
• What conclusions can I start to make about the quality of customer support? Is there a help center? Are the support articles clear and easy to read? Did I experience any issues?

As most of the best LMS software is cloud-based & from SaaS vendors, implementing these tools can be as quick as setting up an account and your company domain. After that, it all depends on the needs of your organization, but you should consider ample time to add users and other admins, manage permissions, upload the training materials and course content you already have, and set up certifications. 

In other words, course building will likely be more time consuming than implementing the software. All of these are made with both the user and admin experience in mind, so often setting up an admin account will be almost as quick as it is for a future learner to set up theirs.

The obvious exception would be an open source system such as Chamilo or Moodle. The initial set-up process will be far more tech-intensive since it’s self-hosted. It will also be more time consuming for a user, since depending on how it’s set up, they may need to download their own version and then log-in to the company portal.

What does LMS mean?

LMS means learning management system.

What does a learning management system do?

Learning management systems allow your business to train new employees and teams on a variety of skills and topics. An LMS is typically used to efficiently onboard new hires and keep employees engaged, leading to increased productivity and higher retention rates.

How do you use a learning management system?

You use a learning management system to provide numerous functions for employees, including efficient and effective onboarding, skill augmentation, certifications and incentive-based learning. In addition, employers can use an LMS to track employee progress and performance.

What features should a learning management system have?

A learning management system can have the following features: administrative suite for instructors and managers, engaging training modules, tracking and reporting, course creation tools, evaluations, gamification, messaging capabilities, certifications, calendar management, mobile adaptability, and social aspects.