How was LMS Collaborator 3.0 created? Insights from the developers
Behind every new product release are hundreds of hours of brainstorming, processing countless requests from existing and potential customers, and sleepless nights spent by technical specialists racking their brains over how to implement a particular feature. Usually, all these processes remain behind the scenes. But today, with LMS Collaborator 3.0 already released, our team has decided to break down the fourth wall.
Why did we decide to change the system? What difficulties did we encounter along the way? What updates can our users expect in the near future?
To address these and other equally important issues, we turned to Oleksandr Slubskyi, CTO & Co-Founder of LMS Collaborator, and Viktoriia Balachuk, Product Owner & Head of Customer Success, for assistance.
How did it all begin?
An attentive reader might note that news about the release of a new version of the system appears on our blog literally every two months, so there is nothing unusual about this. However, in reality, the last time we had changes of this magnitude was back in 2019.
It is important not to confuse minor improvements with a complete overhaul of the LMS architecture. We have revised our approach to some of our basic functions, particularly those related to the creation of educational content, making life much easier for administrators. We did not do this before.
Viktoriia Balachuk, Product Owner & Head of Customer Success LMS Collaborator
For this version, we expanded the team specifically in terms of UI-UX, because our main goal is to create a more convenient and understandable system for both the end user and the administrator who works with it on a daily basis. That is why right now we are focusing more on UX than UI.
The new design of LMS Collaborator 3.0 is more thoughtful and more unified. And we’re not saying that what we had before was bad, but now we’ve fixed it. Rather, this is a story about development. We’re not just repainting the buttons, we’re creating a unified design system that will allow the interface to be consistent, i.e., holistic. In other words, there will be no more different add-ons. The entire system will look harmonious and have a unified style. That’s what consistent design is all about.
And if we use some kind of filtering in this form, it will look the same everywhere in the system. The same can be said about the appearance of buttons, downloading training materials, or importing resources. Once you understand how one table works, for example, you will have no problems with all the others.
Oleksandr Slubskyi, CTO & Co-Founder of LMS Collaborator
Reasons for updating the system
First, our team records all requests from current and potential customers, regardless of whether we plan to implement them now or perhaps leave them on the back burner. Accordingly, if this task becomes more interesting to a larger audience, its priority is raised.
Secondly, we constantly monitor global HR and L&D trends. We are interested in what businesses need right now. Take competency assessment, for example. A few years ago, it was hardly discussed. Yes, it existed, and a few companies were implementing it. But only now has this feature become a must-have, so last year we started implementing it. This also applies to other functions.
In reality, IT products cannot stand still, because people want to receive newer, more attractive, and more practical solutions. Therefore, from time to time, it is necessary to update the interface so as not to remain at the level of some old version of Windows. We want our LMS to be truly appealing, so that people fall in love with it at first sight.
Viktoriia Balachuk, Product Owner & Head of Customer Success LMS Collaborator
From concept to reality: automatic test generation
Do you have artificial intelligence? Will you have it? When exactly?
There have been many requests for AI functionality over the past two years. We sifted through them, selected the most relevant suggestions, and set about implementing them.
That’s how the idea of AI-generated tests came about — a tool designed to automate routine processes and save users dozens of hours of work time.
You no longer need to reread training materials over and over again and come up with test questions. And if the correct answers are obvious, you still had to use your imagination to come up with the wrong ones, right? Now, all you have to do is select a list of resources preloaded into the system and ask the AI to generate the number of questions you need based on them.
Viktoriia Balachuk, Product Owner & Head of Customer Success LMS Collaborator
Currently, AI test generation only works with text documents uploaded to the system. These can be page resources, presentations, or PDF files. Videos and images are currently in the works and will be implemented in future versions.
You choose how many questions you need, what types they should be, how many answer options to generate, where to save them, and so on.
It is important to understand that we did not take any specific LLM to train it. You connect the service from OpenAI or Amazon, choose one of the models available there, and pay for it separately from LMS Collaborator. Therefore, this feature is optional, not basic, and can be enabled at will.
Oleksandr Slubskyi, CTO & Co-Founder of LMS Collaborator
This means that LLM is under your complete control. You enter the login and password for the selected service yourself, which is much better in terms of security. If you don’t like something about the payment plan or intensity of use, you can simply turn it off.
Plugin for editor with artificial intelligence and other AI plans
But we are not going to stop at automatic test generation alone. Next in line is an AI plugin that will allow you to create content directly in the editor.
You no longer need to open ChatGPT separately, formulate your query there, copy the result, transfer it to the LMS, and work with the text there. Now you can open a window with the AI assistant directly in the system, give it a prompt, and work with the learning content directly in the editor.
To form theses, expand or elaborate on an idea, paraphrase material because it sounds too bureaucratic, add storytelling, etc., simply select the text you need. Instead of constantly switching to another tool, everything is already built into LMS Collaborator 3.0. At the same time, the AI fully adapts to you and responds in the language you set for it.
Oleksandr Slubskyi, CTO & Co-Founder of LMS Collaborator
Later, we will also add functionality for checking tests with expanded answers. How does it work now? The course moderator reads everything manually to give an objective assessment. However, after the implementation of artificial intelligence, the system will do this independently, based on the resources you upload and its previous experience, on which it was trained.
In addition, we are already working on AI that, based on competency assessments, will suggest to employees which skills they need to improve or acquire in order to move to the next career level. In other words, based on the completed job profile, the system will build a development trajectory and prescribe which soft and hard skills a junior employee needs to master if they want to grow to the level of a middle manager.
Task creation wizard
However, the biggest changes have been made to our approach to creating learning tasks. Let’s recall how it used to be. First, you added some learning resources separately, then went to another page and packaged everything into a course. Only after completing all these steps did you finally get to creating tasks and assigning users.
Now we have completely reversed this process and reduced it to a single page. No unnecessary transitions, searches, or clicks. That is, if you just need to create a task and assign users to it, the system will guide you step by step through the short path of creating → selecting ready-made content → assigning.
If such materials are not yet available, you can indicate here what you want to add – a course, a test, or perhaps some other resource. Once you have the content ready, you return to this same page to create the assignment, again without having to search for where to do it next.
This way, we reduce not only the number of transitions and clicks, but also the total time it takes to find something. When you have a short task to create, you just go ahead and do it. If you need some preparation, it will still be done within a single screen. And this is, in fact, the request we have been receiving most often lately.
Viktoriia Balachuk, Product Owner & Head of Customer Success LMS Collaborator
Analytical dashboards
Since we have already mentioned user requests, data visualization is far from being the least important among them. This is not surprising, because a report is, of course, good, but it contains dry data that you still need to process in order to draw certain conclusions.
With the diagram, everything is much simpler, because you can immediately see which courses are completed or not completed, how long it takes, when it is more convenient for your employees to study, what gadgets they use to log in, and so on. After implementing this feature, you won’t need to calculate, rework, or analyze anything — LMS Collaborator 3.0+ will do everything for you.
The same applies to statistics broken down by departments and positions. In the future, you will be able to view data for a specific employee, a selected course, or all courses in general. We will add these dashboards gradually, starting with those that have received the most requests.
It will now be much easier for the person responsible for implementing distance learning in the company to track metrics and report on them. And not only to report, but also to keep their finger on the pulse. Analytical dashboards will allow you to see in real time where training is falling short and respond in a timely manner. Perhaps there are problems with process design or communication. That means you need to go there, check these issues, and fix them.
Viktoriia Balachuk, Product Owner & Head of Customer Success LMS Collaborator
Dynamic groups for flexible learning management
We have already automated the processes related to assigning tasks to a specific group of people united by a common denominator. There can be four such attributes in total: city, position, department, and tags. In other words, you can select all sales managers or all HR department employees and assign them a soft skills test.
But there are situations when a group of people who are not connected in any way need to undergo training. They live in different cities, hold different positions, and belong to different departments. And this can be a huge list of 500 people that the administrator has to process manually.
To avoid such situations, we are already actively working on creating dynamic groups to which all such employees can be assigned to perform tasks in different parts of the system.
This approach will allow for a more flexible approach to automating the assignment of training or other materials in LMS Collaborator, without being tied to a specific tag in a user group.
Interactive quick poll widget
Constant interaction with staff and gathering feedback are issues that concern almost all of our clients, especially now that so many employees are located in different cities and sometimes even countries. That is why this feature has quickly become one of our priorities.
Its essence will be that you can create one or more surveys on the main page, which company employees can take an unlimited number of times if they wish.
For example, it is important for banks that everyone performs their duties within clearly defined rules and procedures that ensure their activities comply with legal regulations, internal policies, and industry requirements. If someone sees that these standards are not being followed, they can write about it in an anonymous survey, the responses to which are reviewed by the person responsible for this.
Other companies, for example, are open to ideas for improving the educational portal, updating content, or suggestions for improving existing business processes. In other words, when we want to find out the honest opinion of the end user, hear criticism, or even receive complaints, these types of surveys can help.
Viktoriia Balachuk, Product Owner & Head of Customer Success LMS Collaborator
Course versions
Currently, all our training materials are updated in standard mode. This means that LMS Collaborator saves the latest version added, without the ability to view the previous one. However, for companies with mandatory training, without which employees are simply not allowed to work, this point is critical.
Let’s return to the banking sector. Previously, employees underwent training, and the process was carried out according to certain rules. But now a new NBU resolution has been issued, and everyone must familiarize themselves with it. However, reports on completion of the previous version of the course, with all results and metrics, must also be retained.
When new people join the bank, they will be trained using the latest, most up-to-date version. Those who have already completed this course will not have to waste their time doing it again. They will only need to retake the section related to the new resolution.
Viktoriia Balachuk, Product Owner & Head of Customer Success LMS Collaborator
All updates will be recorded in the system. We will see the time of the change and who made it. We will also keep a history of both the previous and current versions of this resource.
Enhanced integration with Google Docs
Quite often, when a new client comes to us, they already have some work saved on Google Drive.
Now, to upload them to the LMS, he needs to create a “Link” resource, and then the system simply redirects employees to this document, spreadsheet, or presentation. It will open in a new tab, because without integration, Google tools are not allowed to be used within any other service. Of course, this is not critical, but you have to admit that it does add some inconvenience.
Once extended integration is implemented, this document will be displayed in the system, and all updates you add to it will be automatically pulled into LMS Collaborator. Given that Google tools have their own built-in AI, creating and uploading great educational content will be even easier and faster.
Oleksandr Slubskyi, CTO & Co-Founder of LMS Collaborator
