eFront is a flexible LMS platform for enterprises that need advanced security measures and extensive customization to train masses of employees, partners, and customers. According to the vendor, eFront is designed to be an adaptable enterprise LMS, and gives users complete control over their virtual training environment and data. Additionally, the vendor says it blends well with any other infrastructure. The vendor’s value proposition is that eFront helps the user’s business grow…
$1,000
per month
LMS365
Score 8.3 out of 10
N/A
ELEARNINGFORCE in Edgewater brings learning management to Office 365 and SharePoint. LMS365 blends with the Microsoft infrastructure and is designed to eliminate expensive integration, time-consuming development, and unwanted complexity. Learners access learning plans, courses, personal progress reports, and certificates from within the SharePoint business process.
You must have an IT staff with knowledge of PHP in order to install and maintain the system. This is not a plug and play solution by any means. If you have that staff, this is the greatest thing since sliced bread. It's a very robust system. Once we solved initial bugs caused by our own errors during installation, the support desk requests have dropped to almost zero, with nearly 2,000 users online every day. That's a good, solid program.
If a customer does not have SharePoint the entry in that kind of solution is a bit harder as the use of SharePoint can be so broad. It does not mean it is not the right solution as a company can use SharePoint LMS to start with and then expand to other functions and features. I strongly recommend to use SharePoint Standard or Enterprise and forgo the "free" SharePoint version as a) SharePoint's core functions and features are greatly enhanced in these two premium versions and b) more and more SharePoint LMS functions make use of these core Standard and Enterprise features in the future, like taxonomy, user profiles, etc. In general with all project it is as well recommended to have the full buy in by upper management and that the project initiative is fully supported. Adding such a solution (SharePoint LMS or any other LMS solution) will require the team not only to have a good plan on how the requirements can be achieved from a technical point of view, but how a training program can be rolled out to an organization of 5, 500, 5.000 or 50.000. The technical deployment of SharePoint LMS is measurable (I would say between 1-4 weeks based on the complexity, scale of the environment). 1-2 weeks of training (depending on the base knowledge of SharePoint in the company and the need to add knowledge of SharePoint LMS). That's it. Technically you are ready. If needed, any custom work, integration and development work comes on top. Where customer struggle is the availability and dedication of their own teams. Course content needs to be created, how should a course look like, what are the parameters, what are top ten things needed moving a course which was taught in a class room, but now to be delivered online. Buying the licenses is one thing, getting the solution up and running form a technical point of view is another, making it YOURS is the challenge!
I'm not sure what else is out there that has the ability to do what our organization needs. We've come across things we didn't like about it, but due to costs of switching and possibly lack of other options, we'd probably renew with eFront. Also, we've invested a lot of time in the software and it seems to be satisfactory at this point.
For most situations, it is extremely easy to learn and use. There are ergonomic issues that seem a bit tedious, but overall, we are seeing a very high success rate with new registrants. They are learning the material and earning their certificates at a rapid pace. This is a good program once it is properly installed by a knowledgeable systems architect.
Two disadvantages: 1. Many staffers who respond don't know how to solve the problem using the User Interface - they want to work from the back end, to which I have no access. 2. The support staff are in Europe and I am in California, so there is an overnight delay in getting a response.
The few times we actually needed support generally were during major upgrades of the system and getting a quick handle on how the configuration changed were the primary reasons.
I'm not the most technical person, so some of the training didn't make sense to me. It wasn't a complete training - it was more topical. The people working at EFront were happy to answer my questions later when I resorted to learning it by doing. This was very valuable to me.
It's important to have a robust course catalog before launching. Courses should be QC'ed to be sure there are no errors or other problems. Don't let engineers write quiz questions! Remember that well-formed quiz questions are not designed to trick or fool the user - they are used to reinforce learning through repetition of important concepts. The "grade" isn't as important as the assurance the information has stuck.
Unfortunately I have not had the chance to try other products, however I would think eFront would stack up fairly well against competitors and it provides all the necessary tools to stay compliant and excel at having efficient KICs.
Throughout my career I came across many different solutions for Knowledge and Collaboration and LMS systems. This includes Lotus Notes, Documentum, Live Link, LMS solutions from Oracle, ADP, another SharePoint based solution. Many years back, with the intro of Microsoft SharePoint, I was drawn to that product and solutions based on SharePoint. SharePoint is very powerful and in it current version, 2013, it is the without a doubt the most feature rich and broad solution platform out there. SharePoint LMS is in my eyes a killer application and if a company, institution or educational entity looks to create, expand, change up their training efforts for employees, customer, partners, students, SharePoint LMS is the tool to look at. If you have SharePoint already installed, it is a must look at, period. SharePoint LMS became the tool of choice, I recommended when I was a consultant, when I worked as a Director for Learning Management Systems at a local University. I am now part of a team which not only sells, but as well consults around SharePoint LMS.
