LMS: the e-learning revolution. Interview with Claudio Erba (Docebo)

Today’s we will focus on LMS: Learning Management System. We discover the world of e-learning with expert Claudio Erba, CEO and Founder of Docebo S.p.A.

1. Introduce yourself to the readers of our blog.

I do not like to “personalise” too much of my role, I prefer to talk about Docebo: more than 120 people, five offices on three continents, + 60% average growth over the past three years, 1050 customers in 90 countries. We have developed a Learning Management System (LMS) that adopts the 70/20/10 model (Informal, Coaching and Formal Learning) as a guideline and we sell it to the large-scale media market.
My roles include Product Leadership – Research and Development, Customers, Marketing and the various operating units. So I have the privilege of having, at the same time, a detailed and global vision, depending on tactical problems or strategic initiatives.

2. What are the main trends for you in e-learning?

In this second decade of the century we are witnessing an incredible acceleration of technology. Industry operators are not only challenged to identify emerging technologies and integrate them into their products, but above all to understand that formal training is a small part of training opportunities in the company. Formal training will lose the totalising focus it has now, as the PC will lose its centrality in favor of smartphones. Coaching, training on the job, social learning, employee generated training, artificial intelligence, chatbot, increased reality and virtuality are part of the emerging innovations.
3. Can e-learning can be a substitute for training in the classroom?
E-learning companies have always focused on formal training as part of the 70/20/10 paradigm, which in fact only represents 10% of the way a person learns. The remaining 70% is informal / learning by doing and 20% is coaching. The mistake has always been to make the parallel between formal classroom training and online training. The real question is, however, how e-learning technologies can support formal, informal, and coaching training in order to follow people in all of their learning opportunities.

4. Data states that after only six months, 1/3 of newcomers are looking for a new job. How can training during onboarding improve this figure, reducing turnover?

I do not think that onboarding training alone can make a difference in terms of talent retention. Rather, it must be integrated into an organic and progressive training path, alongside professional challenges and a solid coaching path. This is how the company becomes interesting and able to hold the best talent on the market.

5. What difference did you experience in implementing your e-learning platform in multinationals or SMEs?

We currently have 1050 customers, many of them are enterprise customers and some are small businesses. We consider the adoption of an e-learning system as a long-term project, so staying with Docebo for our customers is the prime indicator of a project’s success. In this respect, I can certainly say that the abandonment rates of an e-learning project in SMEs are far higher than those of large companies.

6. Would you tell us a case of success regarding the implementation of your system in a company?

There are lots of examples: a large Italian association that forms 35,000 associates scattered throughout the country; a project in which we provided 2000 Chinese resellers of an American software house a system of distributed courses through the Chinese firewall; a luxury Italian company that trains all the world’s store managers through Docebo; a big media company that sells courses to 3.5 million users worldwide … I could really go on forever.

7. What book or resource would you recommend to our readers for their professional development?

In a digital world, characterised by a continuous flow of information, suggesting a specific resource is really limiting. Personally, I map all the online resources that I find important through a feed reader (Feedly) and then I take the time to study the new articles that come out.