More Work Needed on LMS, TMS Solutions

It's a Continuing Problem That Needs To Be Solved By Vendors and Users Alike

Elearning! magazine’s original research last year indicated a clear, general dissatisfaction among users of learning management systems (LMSs). New research from Bersin & Associates (which pertains to talent management systems or TMSs) parallels ours. Here’s what Josh Bersin and friends found out, according to their “Talent Management Systems 2010” report:

>> General customer satisfaction with TMS’s is medium to low. Across all dimensions, on a 1-5 scale (1=highly satisfied and 5=very dissatisfied), buyers rate their systems between 2 and 3. Buyers are fairly happy with product features and functional capabilities but often struggle with implementation services, support and integration with other human resources systems.

>> In larger organizations, the essential problems are the existence of several  older HRMS systems and now several talent management systems (typically a recruiting system, a learning management system, and a newer performance and succession management system). Most buyers struggle to integrate these systems.

>> The biggest area of dissatisfaction is with “data and systems integration,” a problem caused by the immaturity of the market and newness of SaaS offerings. Vendors are working to build more end-to-end suites, which will somewhat alleviate this problem.

>> Satisfaction with product features and functionality is relatively high, mainly because most buyers cannot ever use even a fraction of the functionality provided. They key here is to identify the critical features you need and select a system that offers them.

>> Customer satisfaction varies widely by vendor. Vendors that focus very heavily on one core market (mid-sized, enterprise or global enterprise) tend to out-perform their peers.

It’s clear from both Elearning! and Bersin studies that e-learning vendors need to continually improve their offerings and that users must do more extensive research (in a mix-and-match fashion) before purchasing LMS and TMS solutions.

“Talent Management Systems 2010: Market Realities, Implementation Experiences and Solution Provider Profiles” is available through theWebsite www.bersin.com.

—Jerry Roche
Editorial director

 

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