LMS Reports: How to Unleash Data in Your Learning Platform.

Written by Tim Newham

22 September 2023

learning management system

complete guide to LMS reports

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Setting up the right LMS reports can help you make sure you’re getting the data you need to prove your impact.

For L&D professionals, measuring ROI in learning is key.

So, it’s no surprise that organisations look for learning management systems with robust and thorough analytics to help them track their impact.

The issue is that not all LMSs have the best reports or features available. Conversely, some provide a lot of data that can be hard to prioritise.

Understanding what data you need is the first step to properly measuring your ROI.

Considering the LMS reports you’ll need can help you in the project set up phase of implementing your new learning and talent solution.

In this blog, we’ll learn:

  • What an LMS and how LMS reports play a role
  • What LMS reports are
  • Why LMS reports are
  • The 9 best LMS reports and reporting features

Let’s get stuck in.

What is an LMS and what role do reports play?

A learning management system (LMS) is a software platform that facilitates the creation, delivery, and management of online educational courses and learning materials.

LMS platforms typically offer a range of features such as interactive course structures, multimedia content, and online assessments.

Related: LMS features you need to consider

With the integration of LMS platforms, it has become easier to monitor learner activity levels and assess their learning progress for whole organisations.

This is where the role of LMS reports comes into play.

LMS reports are a critical component of the platform, providing educators with valuable insights into the learning process.

The data captured by the LMS can be compiled into reports that help to analyse course performance, identify gaps in learning, highlight areas for improvement, and provide feedback to your L&D team.

What are LMS reports?

LMS reports are comprehensive data analyses that provide valuable insights into the performance, progress, and engagement of learners within a learning management system.

These reports gather and organise data from various sources within the LMS, such as assessments, activities, discussions, and user behaviour.

The right LMS reports can enable you to monitor learner progress, track completion rates, identify at-risk learners, and tailor instructional strategies accordingly.

Additionally, administrators can use these reports to evaluate the effectiveness of courses, measure engagement levels, and make data-driven decisions to enhance overall learning outcomes.

Why are LMS reports important?

LMS reporting plays a crucial role in an online learning environment for several reasons.

Reporting provides educators with valuable insights into students’ progress, performance, and engagement1. By analysing data collected through the LMS, instructors can identify areas where students may be struggling or falling behind and make timely interventions.

Secondly, reporting helps administrators evaluate the effectiveness of courses or training programs.

LMS reports provide details on completion rates, assessment scores, and learners’ overall engagement. This information allows administrators to assess the impact of their training initiatives and make informed decisions about resource allocation and instructional design.

Additionally, reporting in an LMS allows for personalised learning experiences. By analysing individual student data, educators can identify learning gaps and tailor instructional strategies to meet the specific needs of each learner1.

Administrators can also share progress reports with upper management, enabling them to track the effectiveness of training programs and make data-driven decisions.

LMS reports you need in your learning solution

When you have an enterprise LMS like Think Learning, you will have a variety of built-in LMS reports to make the most out of.

Plus, you’ll also have access to your own custom reports thanks to the report builder tool.

The 6 LMS reports you’ll get access to with Think include:

  • Compliance reports
  • Completion rates
  • Employee engagement reports
  • Activity reports
  • Course evaluation reports
  • 360 feedback reports

Compliance reports

When you’re in a regulated industry guided by compliance requirements, your L&D team can be under pressure to track, record and improve compliance rates.  

In recent years, the need for staff training in enterprise organisations has more than doubled. This demand, coupled with abrupt changes to laws, regulations, or government policies, adds to the already intense training requirements, making it challenging for both employers and employees to set aside time to complete the training.

Failure to complete the training promptly or lack of reminders to employees results in a surge of incomplete courses, leading to steep declines in compliance rates. In severe cases, this can result in hefty penalties.

To avoid this, compliance reports play an important role in identifying and addressing compliance issues promptly.

Our compliance reports allow individuals to see their own compliance rates and managers to see overall compliance and break it down by team or person.

compliance management dashboard LMS

Course completion report

It is essential to track how individuals engage with a course, especially the number of people who successfully complete it.

That’s where the course completion report becomes valuable. This report provides a comprehensive list of all enrolled users in a course along with the required activities for course completion and their overall completion status.

Employee engagement reports

Understanding where your course content is landing is essential to knowing if your learning material is effective or not.

Engagement reports can help you establish how much users are interacting with your content, and your LMS as a whole.

Not only that, but you can link low engagement to our ThinkNudge tool to send out automatic reminders to any learners that are falling behind.

Activity reports

These reports track user engagement within the LMS, including login frequency, time spent on activities, and participation in discussions.

It helps assess learner engagement levels, identify inactive users, and make necessary adjustments to improve overall engagement.

Course evaluation reports

If you’re running regular face-to-face or online learning sessions, then you might want to capture feedback on its effectiveness.

ThinkInsight is a great tool that can help you collate, collect and share feedback for course seminars, learning events and more.

All feedback data is stored in one place, creating a centralised data pool that can be accessed and analysed with ease.

360 feedback reports

Starting from individual 360 self-rating to LMS-activity-specific feedback, we can offer a range of feedback functionality with ThinkLoop. You can build your own questionnaires and reports to suit your organisation’s culture and needs.

The great thing is that you can pull this data out easily and share what you need with the relevant people.

You can automatically share data with employees you’ve asked for feedback on as part of an appraisal process for example.

ethical tone questionnaire

Start reporting on the metrics that matter

LMS reports offer valuable insights into learner progress, engagement, and overall course performance, enabling L&D administrators to make data-driven decisions to optimise the learning experience.

From course completion reports to learner engagement reports and compliance reports, these tools are critical in helping organisations track progress, identify areas for improvement, and maintain regulatory standards.

If you’re interested in learning more about how LMS reports can benefit your organisation, book a demo to see our product in action.

Our team of experts can walk you through the different reports and demonstrate how they can help you enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of your training programmes.