Reading this post – here are the three takeaways:
Enterprise staffing should stay lean, not bloated.
Even at 50,000+ users, 2-3 administrators (one senior, others limited-scope) is enough — and one instructional designer often suffices up to 10,000 users, two beyond that, especially with modern authoring tools.
Stop relying solely on aggregators — go direct for content, and verify before you pay in full.
Vendors like Pluralsight, PMI, AMA, and Healthstream sell direct, often with better deals; structure payment (e.g., 50% upfront) so content is verified working before the provider gets paid in full.
“Assign and forget” kills Enterprise learning.
Success requires ongoing marketing to bring learners back, buy-in from the right stakeholders (not just managers), and non-negotiable Q/A — treating the system as something to champion, not a checkbox.
The Post
It’s a wonderful term – Enterprise.
I doubt an Enterprise learning system, whether they are a talent development, workforce intelligence (?), LMS, LXP, Learning platform, or another type of learning system, will pick you up. (US pitch)
The challenge with the Enterprise spin is how the vendor defines Enterprise, because how you see yourselves may not align with that definition.
Plus, unless you were back in, say, the 90’s or early 2000s, the term would be, to be honest, unknown.
In the ERP days (Enterprise Resource Planning – Oracle, SAP, JD Edwards), Enterprise referred to 10,000 plus users. Legacy numbers.
The numbers stuck around for a while.
As learning system vendors entered, those numbers changed.
I have seen and heard from vendors: 300, 500, 1,000, 2,500, 5,000, 10,000, and even 25,000 (those are base numbers).
Whether you plan to have 2,500 users in a rollout, but have 30,000 employees, and the vendor sees Enterprise at 5,000, the question of whether to pivot isn’t applicable.
I mention this specifically because of how a vendor sees the term Enterprise, and it explains why a vendor may privately say SME (Small, Mid-Size Enterprise), Enterprise, and Large Enterprise.
Pricing reflects the Enterprise spin, and industry marketing centers on Enterprise, with a strong focus on one or more (specifically L&D, even if associations are targeted, and where Enterprise isn’t an applicable term)
- Onboarding (huge)
- Employee or workforce development (Big)
- Skills development (huge)
- Compliance Training, Regulatory, or Safety (Popular)
- Business Outcomes (slow, but I believe IOL—Impact of Learning—aligns well, though vendors mostly mention ‘business outcomes’ as marketing jargon).
Understanding both what ‘Enterprise’ truly means for your organization and how vendors use the term in marketing is crucial to making informed decisions.
You should expect and will see ‘AI-first’ or ‘AI-focused’ or something, whereas ‘AI’ plays big with any of the above.
Ignore AI-first. Machine learning is AI.
The real focus is Generative AI when people say AI.
I’m not just saying this from our industry; I’m saying it across the board.
The focus therefore with Enterprise, and in reality any solution targeting L&D (again for vendors, L&D and Training are different modalities, and neither see themselves as one in the same), will zero in – as they always have – even with paper-based manuals are around onboarding, employee development, leadership development, OJT (on-the job training), skills – which uh, is a no-brainer because what’s the point of learning or training if you remove skills as a component.
Anyone—including CLOs and now CHRs—understands this.
Plus, there are many vendors who talk directly with CXO (Chief Executive Officer) or CCO (Chief Compliance Officer) who may or may not understand learning within the original pedagogical – and frankly don’t care.
A CCO is all about compliance training.
And for some reason, folks tie that around only Enterprise – i.e., a CCO is the universal term for Enterprises.
Enterprise Learning Key Components
If you are a large enterprise (minimum 15,000), you need two administrators.
If you are 50,000, three administrators.
The administrators will consist of one high – as in the full rules options, with the additional having limited, i.e., fewer rules they can do.
Reason?
- Eliminates Redundancy
- A top-level administrator needs to be the go-to person, and know the system inside and out – not just the basics here – they can handle Q/A – Quality Assurance – and are fully responsible.
- Secondary administrators – can handle lesser tasks – say uploading users/adding users, removing users, uploading content, generating reports, creating them, sending them out, even sending notifications.
- This frees the top-level admin from basic tasks. Generative AI can help if vendors offer it, but humans must review even after automation.
- Saves money – Resources are not free.
If you have 100,000 users, three admins still suffice. I never understood why companies want five or ten admins at higher levels.
Look, I ran training for 20,000 end users, and on top of my duties, I had to be an admin too. It wasn’t easy, but I didn’t have the budget to go and hire someone.
As an L&D leader, you MUST KNOW the product inside and out. You are responsible for deep expertise, not just surface knowledge. As the saying goes, ‘The buck stops here.’
Instructional Designers
As I’ve written before, the IDs are heading into the RIP – and this was before AI.
This is regarding in-house instructional designers.
At 10,000 plus, if L&D is gutted, multiple IDs become redundant—saving money is key.
However, if your company and specifically your department, with 10,000 plus, could get away with one instructional designer, due to what third-party authoring tools can do these days.
My ideal ID person is someone with a background in e-learning development, who knows all about storyboards, and at least the basics of ADDIE (even though it is on its last breath).
Let’s say you are at 25,000 to 50,000 or higher, two ID folks will suffice, depending on whether the content is just extracting from paper or outlines with people adding their two cents – a horrible idea, on the last part, but people are people.
Even with SME reviews, a strong ID person can push out content far more quickly these days if they have experience in e-learning development.
There are very few folks with Kirkpatrick, and IMO, besides saying CLO level, the general audience, your target audience, couldn’t care less.
For pedagogy, use Gagne.
But the days of Authorware are long gone, and there isn’t anything on the market that is even close to it.
There are, however, AI tools that allow you to create storyboards and offer options for partial e-learning development with ID, which ties nicely into, say, Articluate (which IMO is over-hyped).
Understanding the whole built-in authoring tool, which is neither highly engaging nor interactive, sans a couple out there that do layers, etc., the build and push out quickly is the goal.
Finally, if you lack ID skill sets and want to learn them, learn them. After all, why should only your employees be required to learn new skills for their job roles, when you, the head of the department, or yes, the CLO, have no interest?
Content
Get some.
An aggregator is a tough sell for me because the gold content you may desire may not be the one you initially see, plus you can often score better deals going right to the source.
If I want technical skills plus hands-on labs (and trust me, you want this), go to Pluralsight and tell them you want the hands-on labs piece – if they want to close a deal, they will do it.
From the AI standpoint, Pluralsight is the best – and that isn’t just me talking – I had some friends who wanted to learn AI, basics even to creating Agents, and they said it was the best courses they ever had – made LinkedIn Learning seem boring.
You want compliance content – lots of great sources out there.
Let’s say you want Project Management. PMI sells content and will have it on your system.
Prefer management courses? Did you know AMA (American Management Association) sells direct?
What about those specific healthcare courses you can’t find anywhere except Healthstream?
They might gripe – but they will do it – without their system – it isn’t cheap though.
The point here is that the days of limiting yourself only to an aggregator are long gone – plus you can strike a deal, whereas the content provider will verify on their end that the content works in your system, and you have the vendor, your learning system, verify too.
Then you verify.
The course provider doesn’t get the full amount until it all works. You do pay them, say, 50% upfront.
I did this with Rosetta Stone back in the day, and a few other content providers who had zero problems cutting out the middleman (i.e., the aggregator).
If unfamiliar with providers, browse the aggregator, find something, and go direct.
OR send me an e-mail, and I will direct you to the folks you should take a look at (and no, I am not getting a reseller fee, an affiliate fee, or anything).
As an Enterprise, this is a must.
The content.
Oh, micro-learning is like saying micro-cars. Micro means short. It’s been around since the late 90’s.
It doesn’t mean good, nor does it take into consideration that people learn at different speeds.
I would always recommend getting at least five courses on AI.
People need it; it is a must.
Foundational is a goal here.
Enterprise Perks
As with any system, you – head of L&D or head cheese of learning – even training needs to market that system, and what it comes with.
This is not you build, they come – even with assigned learning, which they come, complete, and you never see them again.
Give them a reason to come back to your system, especially with Enterprise platforms.
This means marketing it – you do not need any marketing skills – it helps and there are plenty of sites – that will give you inspiration.
As a leader, identify key stakeholders among your audience who can champion the system’s value. Engage those whose feedback will influence adoption, ensuring relevance for the intended users.
Workers do not like having a stakeholder be the manager – that is the worst, and yet I see it often.
The manager should only be a stakeholder for other managers.
If you can get the CXO on board, great.
If you are having content go to different LOBs (Lines of Business) or locations, the buy-in has to come from the top of that location, even if the CXO wants it.
I’ve seen the non-trickle happen, even with retail stores – i.e., the manager doesn’t support it.
In these cases, get two stakeholders. If the store, let’s say, in this scenario, is poor on sales, and you see the content that will help those sales, then one stakeholder who has a similar store, should be the person who supports the mission, and provides buy-in.
If it is a LOB, then you have the CXO or whoever you need to get that stakeholder to buy into it – especially if you are doing ILT – and a lot of Enterprises still do ILT.
Market. Market and Market some more.
Love the System
If you don’t love and care about it, why should your learner?
Q/A
I see a lot of Enterprise customers – the head here – that never do quality assurance.
This is a must.
No exceptions.
Interoperability
It is a wonderful premise, especially with SCORM. It often is a fallacy – hence the Q/A.
Bottom Line
Enterprise learning should be a multi-tiered approach that saves time, maximizes resources, even with limitations, and gets buy-in.
25,000 employees or more isn’t easy to get buy-in for, especially when it is only assigned learning.
How do you change that?
Add content that isn’t limited to their job role – give them variety, include mentoring offerings (systems nowadays usually have that or coaching) – show them the perks.
If you are a believer in Six Sigma, you can find courses out there, but don’t just let the few you see in go into the program; open it to all.
Make it a challenge: nothing should be simple when it comes to Six Sigma.
Have courses that provide certifications that mean something – and offer folks opportunities – not just to grow but allow personal development.
Be the go-to for learning, and embrace it – open up the possibilities.
The reality for any system is that learners go in, take the content, and you never see them again, even with all the whistles available.
You have to change that narrative.
At an enterprise level, it is far too easy to limit the scope and angle to just how things are.
It’s the easy way out.
Enterprises should be leaders, and that includes you and your staff.
If you aren’t worthy of doing that,
Then why offer leadership development?
And not just to a select few?
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