Noerr increased course completions by 300% by switching to Totara Learn

As one of the leading European law firms, Noerr is also internationally renowned, with offices in eleven countries and a global network of top-ranked “best friends” law firms. Noerr stands for excellence and an entrepreneurial approach.

With highly experienced teams of highly capable members, Noerr devises and implements solutions for the most complex and sophisticated legal challenges.

The Challenge

The prior LMS was no longer able to support the additional requirements that arose from the departments of Knowledge Management and Human Resources. Up to that point, online training was managed with an open-source software without any learning plans, and HR software interface. Face-to-face training was managed in different formats, such as Excel files and with Persis (Noerr’s HR software). Noerr was looking for a platform where its employees could find everything regarding additional instruction from E-Learning to face-to-face training, all in one place.

Another challenge was to address the different audience groups in the company. As a law firm, Noerr uses special software for case management and internal processes, needing to teach a lot of compliance rules. Thus every new employee has to finish an onboarding program that combines IT, compliance and law-specific knowledge. And every lawyer goes through a qualification program with multiple steps, depending on their career level.

The Solution

The first key to our solution is integration on different levels:

• The integration of the human resource management system, Persis, with Totara enables the automated matching of employees and their roles. The user’s learning history, including completed courses, is automatically generated and saved in Persis.
• The integration of Active Directory and Totara delivers a seamless user experience between intranet and LMS and also enables direct access. Only users who are authenticated in the Active Directory and are set as active in Persis can access the system.
• The integration of a web conference solution (WebEx) enables virtual classrooms.

The second key to our solution is audience management for easy access:

• Different onboarding and learning programs dedicate courses to the different audience groups. All key audience groups are created by rules taken directly from dynamic HR data.
• The extended face-to-face functionality allows complete seminar management, including travel information and automated enrollment to seminar sessions.
• An audience-based notification system sets up on the Totara audience management and adds a notification system to invite any audience group (system-wide).
• An individually programmed course catalog and search page gives users an overview of all ongoing courses and sessions, while removing (or hiding) expired seminars. The user can filter according to specific features.

The third key to our solution is an improved UX design:

• The template is realized as a responsive design adopted to the Noerr corporate identity.
• Slider and teaser elements enable the different departments to communicate their most important learning activities to the users.
• An individual course overview shows all course categories.
• An individual course catalog enables easy overview of on- and offline courses, including seminar sessions.

The Results

• The number of completed courses increased by 300%
• Previously, no international e-learning was provided. Thanks to integration of international employees via the HR system, over 25 new international courses could be established.
• The Onboarding Program for new employees gained a success score of 100%.
• In an internal survey, 98% of learners and managers gave positive feedback about the improvements in both learning organization and quality.

“Knowledge is power. If you don’t have it, you can find on our eCampus.” – Tobias Kugler, Rechtsanwalt, Practice Group Digital Business, Practice Group Automotive & New Mobility

“The well prepared learning units make it possible to obtain the required knowledge and information in a short time, so that these can be integrated directly and profitably into your daily work.” – Dr. Felix Konold, Rechtsanwalt, Practice Group Litigation, Arbitration & ADR

“With eCampus we are reaching the next level of learning: what I need, when I need it – (almost) everywhere.” – Lorenz Kiefer, Head of HR