Scaling training to reach the extended enterprise, globally

The challenge

• Difficulty in conducting in-person training due to company growth
• Unsatisfactory experience with basic plug-and-play platforms
• Restricted functionality with SCORM packages, making uploads difficult

Kerridge Commercial Systems held employee training in person. As the company grew and extended to over 1,200 employees on four continents in 10 countries, it became more difficult for people to travel to attend training, due to the company’s diverse global product offerings and multiple office locations. The company started doing blended training, combining offline and online training styles, and realized the value of a scalable e-learning platform.

Some divisions in the company tried using a basic plug and play type platform, but they were not satisfied with the flexibility and customization options with restricted SCORM package functionality, which were hard to upload. The company researched digital training options, looking for a platform that was much more structured, allowing them to build and cultivate the whole learning environment in a more personalized way.

The solution

Kerridge Commercial Systems found CYPHER Learning’s LMS to be the best fit for their needs. CYPHER helps Kerridge to manage multiple training activities, such as building and delivering training content, evaluating employee performance, training clients and partners, and selling online courses.

Kerridge implemented CYPHER in 2017 with IQ Education Junction - one of Kerridge's divisions - to focus on a specific retail product range of courses for users and partners. Based on the massive success on the platform, they saw the value proposition for Kerridge as a group, and in 2019 added KCS University for internal upskilling, product training, and leadership programs. Currently, there are about 550 active learners on the platform.

Implementation

The adoption process was straightforward and smooth; it only took an overview session to teach instructors how to create great content, and a few 30-minute Teams sessions with our platform administrator to review the platform functionality, and after that, things have been running seamlessly.

Features

CYPHER delivers a great user experience while incorporating all the essential tools companies like Kerridge need to support efficient training and learning. Its comprehensive set of features meets all users' needs:

• Learners: The most used features are the course resources and learner progress stats. Also, communication has improved and become consistent and more robust between learners and instructors through messages.
• Admins: They now have defined organizational portals, which makes it easy to categorize and sectionalize the company, appreciating the calculation of active users instead of everyone that has added a course, which supports giving more accurate statistics and realistic reports.
• Instructors: They consider grading to be one of the highlights of using CYPHER, as it has made it easier for them to add grades to the team and assess their performance. They also like the drag-and-drop feature, as it allows them to add any content quickly, thus saving them time.

User engagement

The stakeholders welcomed the new system and changes easily and with excitement! They appreciate the self-paced environment as it allows them to work independently from any device without having to be present physically at the training at a specific time. In addition, learners are now more motivated to complete their training.

The results

• Adoption of CYPHER opened new opportunities for Kerridge, particularly for divisions previously without an LMS
• In the last fiscal year, Kerridge trained 198 resellers, 128 leaders, and 250 internal employees using CYPHER
• Plans for the next three to five years include expanding CYPHER to more divisions for a unified platform

Since multiple divisions did not have an LMS before, the business had new and exciting avenues opened after they started to use CYPHER.

In the last fiscal year, Kerridge has successfully trained 198 resellers who had their sales certifications training on the platform. They have also trained 128 leaders in a three-step leadership program. Lastly, Kerridge added over 250 internal employees to their product knowledge curriculum.

Kerridge has multiple divisions, and at the moment, only two or three are using CYPHER. In the next three to five years, they plan to grow more, as they have different divisions with internal universities, and are looking to take them into one unified platform.