Willemen Group opts for an LMS that integrates with its other systems for ultimate efficiency

Willemen Group is one of Belgium’s largest, family-owned construction groups. They are active in a diverse but complementary range of construction-related activities, either alone or in a consortium, from civil engineering, industrial construction, and residential and utility projects, to road construction. In recent years, they have become increasingly active abroad.

The Challenge

Innovation is an integral value of Willemen Group. Today, they are carrying out a comprehensive digital transformation, meaning they are increasingly using e-learning as a means to train employees. For them, it’s a process rather than a one-off activity.The construction group was looking for good Office 365 training, and also needed a solution to organize that content. That includes being able to offer specific topics to specific target audiences. Ultimately, they were looking for a user-friendly and flexible learning management system that communicates with their other platforms, and that is available anywhere, anytime. The platform also had to allow them to easily create and offer new e-learning modules, in parallel with the Office 365 video tutorials.So, Willemen Group contacted Totara Platinum Partner Neo Learning to set up a platform that would bring it all together.

The Solutio

 To help Willemen Group, Neo Learning first of all automated the user synchronization process. Data from an existing active directory in Microsoft Azure is now synched with the Totara Learn. That means the input of new employees has to be done only once, through the internal HR system. Employees are divided into different audiences based on the department they work in (this information also comes from the Azure database) and their job title. Through a scheduled task that Neo Learning has created, job assignments are automatically generated. Based on that job assignment, users are then also automatically enrolled in specific courses.A feature that is user-friendly from both the learner’s and administrator’s point of view, is the single sign-on functionality. All users simply log in with their Microsoft credentials. They don’t need any additional login or password.  Based on the groupings or audiences that represent the different departments at Willemen Group, L&D employees can easily create reports and follow up on progress. Moreover, the connection between audience type and course type has made the training content hyper relevant.Finally, Neo Learning successfully realized the integration of knowledge and video platform OASE into the Totara Learn system. OASE contains a vast amount of Office 365-related video guides, and Willemen Group is subscribed to its services. As soon as their license expires, the connection between Totara and OASE is automatically suspended. L&D administrators at Willemen Group use course templates to generate lessons and activities, and embed relevant OASE videos.

The Results

The Willemen Group Totara Learn solution currently has more than 2,000 active users who have already completed almost 4000 courses. Those users are enjoying their freedom to learn, and are exploring the multitude of relevant courses on a daily basis.The strong connection with OASE offers them useful content that they embed in a course template, in the blink of an eye. OASE has allowed them to rapidly create targeted training about OneNote, OneDrive and Teams.Like many other companies in 2020, Willemen Group had to accelerate their transition to working from home. The Totara Learn solution has helped them to make that process run smoothly. Meanwhile, the company’s many subdivisions are using the LMS independently to create internal courses on ERP, CAD and other administrative tools. Willemen Group considers this to be an important step in the adoption of the learning platform. Moreover, the flexibility and simplicity of the front- and backend strongly confirm the validity of their choice for the Totara LMS.The next steps in Willemen Group’s Totara journey? First of all, they will include all internal and external training programs into their LMS. Secondly, Willemen Group is currently looking into an upgrade to the Totara Talent Experience Platform, and is exploring the possibilities of the brand-new features.Finally, the Totara Learn solution is able to grow alongside Willemen Group’s future learning needs and goals. They strongly believe in an agile approach, allowing them to continuously generate new ideas and improve existing features. Totara and Neo Learning have proved that they are capable of this high-end flexibility. The future still holds a lot of freedom to innovate in store for Willemen Group.

“Neo Learning was able to achieve solid results in a very short period of time. Taking into account our agile approach, their LMS experts focused on our specific needs, leaving room for future growth and changes. Working with Neo Learning allowed us to rely on one team that has expertise on a conceptual as well as a technical level.”