RGCU’s New Platform – From Moodle to Totara

What is Totara?

If you have spoken with people from RGCU this past year, you may have heard the word Totara in one context or another. Totara is the name of the new Learning Management System (LMS) for the RGCU.

An LMS is designed to help manage, document, track, report, automate and deliver educational courses, training programmes, materials, and learning and development programmes. It is essential for any learning and development department in a large organisation. When used properly, an LMS does not only host eLearning content but can also manage virtual and face-to-face training. The Roca Group has already been using an LMS called Moodle but that is now changing.

Why are we changing from Moodle to Totara?

It may surprise you to know that Totara is based on Moodle, although the two differ substantially. The key difference between Moodle and Totara is in the built-in functionality for target users. Moodle was originally developed for and is predominantly used by educational institutions, whereas Totara is designed for use in corporations, government and other large-scale organisations. Going forward and thanks to closer collaboration with our international business units, Totara will enable us to provide skills, knowledge and tools more effectively to everyone in the Roca Group to perform their roles in alignment with our strategic goals.

Some of the main new features coming with Totara are:

• Import and synchronisation of our HR database with Totara users.
• Use of organisational hierarchy:
  • Gives managers an overview of their team members’ training progress
  • Automatic enrolment, based on business unit(s), department(s) and position.
• Creation of programmes, which can include multiple courses, creating pre-determined learning paths, as opposed to enrolment into individual courses.
• Event scheduling, providing easy scheduling and tracking of virtual and face-to-face training events.
• Customisable dashboards for different user groups in the platform.
• Course catalogue with new customised categories and filters, tailored to our organisational structure
• Advanced reporting functionalities.

Who is Totara for?

Totara will cover the entire Roca Group. Initially, RGCU will be managing the platform, but soon it will also be used for our brand tenants – Roca Academy and LAUFEN Academy, as well as for specialist training such as Roca Advance Team in Spain – to provide training to customers and other external partners.

Further on, in line with RGCU’s plans for expansion, Totara will be available to all business units of the Roca Group for organising and managing local training. This integration will allow for automated global reporting of training, which is currently done manually, with a considerable administrative burden. Training on the use and administration of Totara will be provided when we are ready to expand its use globally.

What will change for the user?

In the day-to-day use, not much will change for users. The layout of the dashboard and course catalogue have been designed to be similar to the RGCU Moodle and the courses themselves have not changed. The biggest differences will be the gradual emergence of “Programmes”, and the new course categories and filters in the catalogue.

Will this be a smooth transition?

That’s the million-dollar-question! While we would like to answer this with a resounding “Yes!”, experience shows that large-scale projects like these often provide unforeseen challenges. Together with our consulting partner, Actua Solutions, and in close collaboration with the Roca Group IT department, everything is looking good for the transition in early 2023. We are planning for the change to go smoothly but will be ready to work on solutions to any unexpected challenges.

We look forward to the new era of learning and development in RGCU with the help of the new tool Totara. We would like to thank you in advance for your collaboration.