Discover Totara 19: New Features and Enhancements Explained

The latest release of Totara 19 brings an array of powerful features designed to enhance learning management and make performance tracking more efficient. With features such as advanced enrolment workflows, certification cloning, AI-driven course tagging, and updated accessibility standards, Totara 19 is tailored for organizations seeking a dynamic, user-friendly platform. This guide provides an in-depth look into each feature of Totara 19, explaining its purpose, benefits, and how it can be applied to maximize the learning experience.

Enhanced Course Enrolment Approval: Efficient Learning Access ControlCourse Enrolment Approval Workflows: Streamlined Access Control for Learning

A cornerstone of Totara 19’s updates is the introduction of the Course Enrolment Approval Workflow. This feature is crucial for organizations that require regulated access to specific learning resources, such as mandatory compliance training or specialized certifications. Rather than allowing open access to all users, the approval workflow lets employees request enrolment, which can then be reviewed and approved or rejected by a designated approver.

How the Approval Workflow Enhances Learning Control

The workflow can be set up to include multiple stages and approvers, allowing for a tiered approval process that mirrors organizational structures. For example, a new employee might need approval from both their direct manager and an HR representative before enrolling in certain courses. This customizable, multi-level approval structure ensures that the right people are enrolled in the right courses, minimizing the risk of unapproved enrolments and ensuring compliance with organizational standards.

This feature in Totara 19 also saves administrative time by automating notifications and status updates within the platform, reducing the need for back-and-forth communication outside of Totara.

Clone Certifications: Faster and Consistent Certification Setup

For organizations that manage extensive certification programs, the Clone Certifications feature is a time-saving tool in Totara 19. Rather than creating new certifications from scratch, administrators can now clone existing ones, preserving the entire structure, including certification and recertification paths, course sets, and notifications.

Benefits of Certification Cloning in Totara 19

By allowing organizations to reuse successful certification setups, the clone feature ensures a high level of consistency and reduces the risk of errors in creating new certifications. This is especially useful for organizations with complex recertification requirements, such as healthcare providers and compliance-driven industries, where training programs need to be regularly updated and standardized.

Inspire Theme: A Modern, User-Centric Interface

Totara 19 introduces the Inspire Theme, a visually appealing, modern theme that emphasizes ease of use. By redesigning the navigation to include a left-hand menu, Inspire offers an intuitive layout that enhances usability for both new and experienced users.

How Inspire Streamlines the Totara User Experience

The Inspire theme not only updates Totara’s aesthetics but also enhances accessibility, which is especially beneficial for organizations with diverse user groups. The cleaner interface allows users to find courses, access reports, and interact with learning resources more effectively, making Totara 19 an even more user-friendly platform.

For companies looking to improve the adoption of their learning management system (LMS), Inspire’s user-centric design is a valuable addition, removing barriers to navigation and encouraging learners to explore and engage with the platform.

AI Course Tag Recommendations: Intelligent Content Organization

With Totara 19’s AI Course Tag Recommendations, the platform takes a significant step toward harnessing artificial intelligence to enhance content structuring. This feature uses AI algorithms to analyze course content and suggest relevant tags, making it easier for administrators to categorize and organize learning resources.

Advantages of AI-Powered Tagging in Totara 19

Efficient tagging helps users find courses more quickly and enhances the searchability of the platform’s resources. For instance, a course on “Data Security” might receive AI-recommended tags such as “Cybersecurity,” “Compliance,” and “Data Management,” helping users locate relevant courses even if they aren’t familiar with specific course titles. As AI-driven recommendations grow more sophisticated, Totara 19 is paving the way for a more intuitive learning experience.

Totara Engage Features Integrated into Totara Learn: Unified Learning and Engagement

One of the most impactful updates in Totara 19 is the integration of Totara Engage features directly into Totara Learn. This change consolidates Totara’s learning and engagement tools, allowing users to access workspaces, content libraries, user-generated content, and personalized course recommendations within a single interface.

Benefits of a Unified Learning Experience

This integration eliminates the need to switch between platforms, making it easier for users to access everything they need in one place. Totara Engage’s collaborative tools promote a culture of knowledge sharing, as users can now contribute and access shared resources directly within Totara Learn. For organizations prioritizing social learning, Totara 19’s unified setup encourages peer-to-peer engagement and knowledge sharing, fostering a more interactive and collaborative learning environment.

Section 508 Accessibility Improvements: Ensuring Inclusive Learning

Accessibility has always been a priority for Totara, and Totara 19 builds on this with Section 508 compliance improvements. These updates make the platform more usable for individuals with disabilities, ensuring that learning is inclusive for all users, including those who rely on screen readers or keyboard-only navigation.

Accessibility as a Core Component of Totara 19

With accessibility compliance becoming increasingly important, Totara 19’s updates ensure that organizations can confidently offer a learning environment that meets modern accessibility standards. This is particularly relevant for educational institutions and government organizations, which often require strict adherence to accessibility regulations. By prioritizing accessibility, Totara demonstrates its commitment to creating a universally inclusive LMS.

Totara Goal Tasks and Linked Courses: Aligning Learning with Goals

Totara 19 introduces Goal Tasks and Linked Courses, a feature that connects specific courses with goal-related tasks. This integration allows managers and employees to link actionable learning activities to individual goals, providing a structured approach to career development.

How Goal Tasks Enhance Personal Development

For example, if an employee’s goal is to become proficient in data analytics, they can link courses on topics like Python programming or data visualization directly to that goal. This alignment of learning resources with goal-setting encourages employees to take a proactive approach to their professional growth and enables managers to better support their team’s career development objectives.

Comments on Totara Goals: Enhancing Communication Around Progress

In Totara 19, goal-setting becomes more interactive with the new Comments feature. Managers and team members can now leave comments on specific goals, allowing for real-time feedback and updates. This feature helps improve communication and accountability, especially in remote or distributed teams where face-to-face meetings may be less frequent.

Improving Feedback Loops in Goal Management

By enabling a dialogue around each goal, Totara 19 helps organizations create a transparent, supportive environment. Comments are integrated with Totara’s centralized notifications, so users receive timely updates, making it easier for employees and managers to stay on the same page regarding progress and expectations.

Totara Goals Transition Mode: A Smoother Path to Enhanced Goal Management

For organizations transitioning to Totara’s updated goal management system, the Transition Mode offers flexibility and continuity. This mode allows users to enable Totara’s new goals system while maintaining access to legacy goals, ensuring a seamless transition.

The Value of Transition Mode for Change Management

This feature is ideal for organizations with well-established goal frameworks, as it minimizes disruption while they migrate to Totara 19’s enhanced goals features. The Transition Mode feature reflects Totara’s understanding of change management challenges, offering a gentle path to adopting new tools and workflows.

Goal Reporting: Data-Driven Insights for Strategic Learning

With the introduction of Goal Reporting in Totara 19, managers and administrators gain access to in-depth data on learning goals, tasks, and linked courses. This reporting capability provides insights into goal completion rates, course utilization, and task progress, enabling organizations to make data-driven decisions that align learning with strategic goals.

Leveraging Goal Reporting for Organizational Impact

Goal Reporting allows organizations to identify high-impact learning resources and optimize their learning programs to better meet organizational needs. For instance, by analyzing which courses are most frequently linked to goals, administrators can prioritize the development or update of these courses, ensuring they remain relevant and effective.

Manager View of Team’s Goals: Supporting Team Development

Totara 19 enhances team management with a new Manager View of Team’s Goals. This feature allows managers to see the goals of each team member in a single interface, making it easier to provide guidance and track progress.

Enabling Managers to Support Career Growth

With greater visibility into their team’s goals, managers can more effectively support their team members, facilitating discussions around career development, goal-setting, and progress. This feature aligns well with Totara’s commitment to comprehensive performance management, helping organizations foster a culture of growth and accountability.

Totara Goal UI Improvements: Streamlined Goal Management

Totara 19’s Goal UI Improvements enhance the visual layout and functionality of goal cards, making it easier for users to sort, filter, and view their progress. Goal cards now display the number of comments, progress indicators, and completion status, providing a clear overview at a glance.

Why UI Improvements Matter in Goal Management

For both managers and employees, these UI improvements make goal management in Totara 19 more intuitive. The enhanced design reduces time spent on navigation and supports users in staying organized, ensuring that goal tracking is as efficient as possible.

Performance Activity UI Improvements: Simplified Activity Configuration

Totara 19’s Performance Activity UI Improvements are designed to simplify the setup and monitoring of performance activities. A new header layout redistributed settings, and an updated Content tab make performance configuration more intuitive.

Enhancing Usability in Performance Management

These updates reflect Totara’s user-centred design approach, ensuring that administrators can easily configure performance activities without needing extensive platform knowledge. The streamlined interface supports effective performance management, empowering organizations to track and enhance employee performance with minimal administrative burden.

New Performance Activity Reporting Capabilities: Improved Data for Large-Scale Reporting

In Totara 19, two new capabilities, mod/perform:report_on_staff_responses and mod/perform:manage_staff_participation, expand reporting options for performance activities. These capabilities are particularly beneficial for organizations with high-volume reporting needs.

The Importance of Performance Activity Reporting

With these new reporting capabilities, Totara 19 enables a detailed understanding of employee participation and performance activity outcomes. This data allows organizations to refine their performance management processes, supporting data-driven improvements in employee development.

Conclusion

Totara 19 represents a significant step forward in learning and performance management, with innovative features that address the needs of modern organizations. Whether it’s streamlining enrolment processes, enhancing accessibility, or supporting goal management, Totara 19 is designed to provide a seamless, powerful learning experience that fosters employee growth and organizational success.

If you’re ready to see how Totara 19 can transform your learning management strategy, contact Markanyx™, your trusted Canadian Totara partner. With over a decade of experience in Totara solutions, Markanyx™ offers expert guidance to help you leverage Totara’s features and achieve your learning and development goals. Contact the Markanyx™ team for an assessment of your LMS and upgrade to the latest version.