Recommended Learning

Recommended Learning is a Recommendations Engine that helps learners discover relevant Learning Activities and Certification Programs. Recommendations are calculated from a combination of learner interests, manager suggestions, and administrator-defined defaults, so each learner sees a personalized list of activities that supports their learning portfolio.

Understanding how recommendations are generated

The Recommendations Engine matches Learners to relevant Learning Activities using Topics of Interest, and builds each learner's recommendation list from the following sources:

• Learner Interests – Learners select Topics of Interest on their profile, and are recommended Activities linked to those topics.
• Manager Recommendations – Managers recommend specific Activities to the users they manage, from the catalog or the Team screen.
• Default Recommendations – Administrators can configure an Activity to be recommended to all Learners by default.
• Certification Program Recommendations – When a Learner completes an Activity linked to a Certification Program, the associated Certification Program is automatically recommended to them.

Super Administrators control how heavily each of these sources factors into the recommendation calculation. For example, if manager recommendations should carry more weight than learner interests or default activities, the weighting for Manager Recommendations can be increased relative to the others.

Enabling the Recommendations Engine

To enable Recommended Learning, do the following:

1. Go to System Administration > System Settings.
2. Click the Recommendations tab.
3. Toggle on Enable Recommendations Engine.
4. Set the weighting for Learner Interests, Manager Recommendations, Default Recommendations, and Certification Program Recommendations to reflect how much each source should influence a Learner's recommendation list.
5. Click Save.

Topics of Interest

Topics of Interest connect Learners to relevant Activities. Before Learners can select their interests, Super Administrators must set up the available Topics.

Once Topics are created, they can be linked to Learning Activities, and an Activity can be linked to multiple relevant Topics. See the Interests tab in Creating an Online Activity and Advanced Options for Learning Activities for how to assign Topics of Interest to an Activity.

On their profile, Learners select the Topics that interest them. A Learner can select up to 5 Topics of Interest.

Manager Recommendations

Managers can recommend Learning Activities to the users they manage directly from the catalog or from the Manager's Team Screen.

A dedicated screen lets managers:

• View every Activity they have recommended to each of their managed Learners.
• See whether a recommended Learner has enrolled in or completed the Activity.
• Remove a previously recommended Activity from a Learner's recommendation list.

Understanding the Learner Experience

Learners can view their personalized recommendation list in the following places:

• The Recommended Learning widget and Recommended Learning stream on the Learning Center. See Learning Widgets and Learning Streams for how to configure and position these on the Landing Page.
• A link to the Learner's recommendations list, which can optionally be added to the congratulations pop-up shown at the end of online activities.
• The Getting Started screen, which now highlights Recommended Learning as a feature.

A batch notification is also available to alert Learners when new items are added to their recommendation list. This notification is turned off by default and must be configured by a Super Administrator before use. See Batch Notifications for details.