Cornerstone onDemand in a Retail Business Environment

Choosing a Learning Management System (LMS) can be a daunting task. As a member of your organization’s LMS selection committee you may end up sifting through dozens of companies that offer eLearning, content management, and talent management solutions.  I have been actively working in the eLearning industry for over 15 years now and have seen the hardships and successes companies have experienced when switching Learning Management Systems.  During this LMS product review, I’m going to provide a high-level overview one of the world’s top LMS solutions: Cornerstone onDemand’s Extended Enterprise. I will also detail it has helped a large retail client, MetroPCS, in three key areas:

1. Custom User Interface
2. Analytical Analysis and Reporting
3. Faster and More Efficient Deployment of eLearning Courses

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About Cornerstone onDemand

Cornerstone onDemand has been in business since 1999. Their longevity can be accredited, in part, to their early innovations in cloud-based technology.  Cornerstone is a pure “software as a service” (SaaS) company, which allows for their clients to always have the most up-to-date versions of their products without the cost and hassle associated with IT departments hosting and supporting 3rd party technologies themselves.  More than just a Learning Management System, Cornerstone offers a “unified talent management system” that covers the full employee life cycle including:

• Recruiting
• On-boarding
• Social Collaboration
• Learning (LMS)
• Performance
• Compensation
• Succession Planning

For the purposes of this article I will focus on their Learning (LMS) capabilities.

Cornerstone onDemand: Retail Case Study

As a custom eLearning development company, we support clients on many different LMS platforms.  Oftentimes we are asked to assist our clients with LMS interface customization, configuration, loading courses, and other LMS administrator tasks.  A fair number of our clients use Cornerstone OnDemand, so I have gained a great deal of personal experience using the system. Based on my roughly 10 years of experience with their technologies, I’m happy to recommend Cornerstone OnDemand as a solution that should be considered by you and your LMS selection committee.  To assist you in your research, the following is a brief overview regarding the benefits enjoyed by one of Cornerstone’s enterprise clients.

MetroPCS has 150 company-owned locations, and about 4,500 independent authorized dealer stores with 16,000 plus retail sales associates, all trained through Metro PCS University (their on-line sales associate training program).

Larry Wecsler, Staff Vice President of Organizational Learning at Metro PCS, said, “The age demographic in our dealer and retail stores are roughly anywhere from maybe 19, 20 maybe to 32 and because of that we have to customize our training specifically to that audience. Training has shifted I think in the last few years, you have to engage the viewer right away; these people are used to seeing video games, watching t.v., movies with quick cuts, it’s an ADD world. We wanted a custom front-end!”

While MetroPCS had a learning management system in place, but it lacked a few key features which Cornerstone LMS offered.

A Custom LMS Interface

In 2011 MetroPCS invested in Cornerstone’s Extended Enterprise LMS solution. Working closely with the Cornerstone team, they built a custom LMS interface for their retail sales associates that provided their associates quick and easy access to the training they need, along with a fun custom design that matched MetroPCS branding.

 

eLearning Tracking and Reporting

Tracking and reporting the retail sales associates’ progress in the training modules was something that MetroPCS’s old LMS was lacking.  Cornerstone onDemand listened to MetroPCS’s needs and went to work to customize the learning management system to fit their unique tracking and reporting requirements. Cornerstone came up with a way to integrate data from a prepared list of all dealer locations and an integral component in the self registration process. These reports are now delivered daily, which is exactly what MetroPCS wanted.

 

 

Faster Training Deployment & Better Results

Thanks to Cornerstone onDemand Extended Enterprise‘s learning management system solution, MetroPCS has been able to train over 16,000 retail sales associates. The system is so efficient that they are able to train all of these associates within hours of launching a new promotion, handset, product, or service.  Since then, MetroPCS has docked record sales numbers, impressing T-Mobile with the speed of delivery into new markets and the speed with which they are able to get their new dealers productive.  MetroPCS has also been able to standardize training across 60 markets, without training people in all 60 markets. Ultimately, T-Mobile has seen the efficiency of Metro University and they have inquired about having a custom training program produced for them as well.

In a public statement Wecsler said, “We have become change agents in the company because of the reporting available through Cornerstone Learning. Our executives can see, on a regional basis, which dealers and which stores are taking training and how that relates to sales. That’s a powerful capability.”

It is no wonder Cornerstone onDemand is the leading learning management system for retail businesses. With an amazing product, coupled with its great customer service, I suspect they will be at the top for many years to come.

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