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7 KPIs to help you evaluate LMS success
Some helpful LMS KPIs are user logons, course completions, number of courses completed, total cost per employee, course pass rate and average interactions per employee.
KPIs can help a company's learning and development leader measure the impact of their organization's learning management system on its employees as well as the system's ROI.
The goals of a learning management system are for employees to be able to easily engage with the LMS and develop new skills. Giving employees access to an LMS is a step in the right direction, but the system is not adding value if employees aren't using it. KPIs can give insight into whether the organization is achieving these goals. Learning and development (L&D) leaders can measure some LMS KPIs using a dashboard or report, but other KPIs may require data from other systems.
Here are some of the KPIs that a company's L&D leader should consider when evaluating the value of the organization's LMS.
1. User logon as a percentage of employees
Examining the percentage of employees who logged on to the LMS in the past week or month can provide insight into whether employees are using the system.
One consideration for this KPI is to keep in mind which courses were launched during a given time frame. For example, a large number of employees may have logged on during a particular month because they were required to complete new compliance training.
2. Course completion
Ideally, all employees who register for a course will complete it. However, a course completion rate can give more insight into how many users are dropping out before finishing a class.
Knowing the percentage of course registrations versus course completions will give the L&D team insight into whether the offered courses are meeting the needs of employees, particularly for optional courses.
A required course will likely have a high course completion rate, since users will have received reminders to finish the class and potentially face disciplinary action if they did not do so.
3. Number of courses completed
Employees completing courses beyond required training, like a compliance class, is a good indication that they value learning and find the course content to be valuable.
L&D leaders can find ways to encourage users to complete more courses if the "number of courses completed" metric is low. Some LMSes include leaderboards that may help motivate employees.
4. Total cost per employee
The total cost per employee metric helps the L&D leader track the cost of the LMS over time.
A company's L&D leader should track expenses to get a clear understanding of the LMS's total cost in addition to calculating the licensing and support costs. For example, in order to get a true picture of the cost to run the LMS per employee, an L&D leader may add up the cost of creating or licensing courses, the cost of consultants to help manage the system and the cost of learning specialists to develop course content.
5. Average interactions per employee
The average interactions per employee KPI can include information beyond course completion. Other data to consider for this KPI could include amount of likes that a course received, employee requests for new courses, number of times that employees shared a course with a colleague and number of times that users added their own content to an LMS.
These types of activities give insight into how much employees are using an LMS beyond completing mandatory courses.
6. Course pass rate
Tracking the course pass rate helps the L&D leader understand if course content is presented in a way that employees can understand.
If the pass rate for a course is below a certain percentage, such as 75%, the L&D leader may want to look further into the test questions. For example, the L&D leader can decide whether the test questions are a good reflection of the course content and change them if needed.
Tests shouldn't be too easy, but a high failure rate will likely negatively affect employee usage of the LMS.
7. External employee performance metrics
Data from other systems can give insight into the effectiveness of courses provided to employees. For example, employees may complete a cybersecurity course with uniformly high scores, but the company's cybersecurity team may then report that the number of employee-related cybersecurity incidents has increased.
Some external company metrics can give insight into whether employees are actually learning the required skills.
Eric St-Jean is an independent consultant with a particular focus on HR technology, project management and Microsoft Excel training and automation. He writes about numerous business and technology areas.
