Introduction

Observation Checklists are an easy-to-use tool integrated in your learning platform, enabling you to observe and document how your learners and team members perform their tasks in a quick-to-configure checklist format. You as a Superadmin can easily create observation checklists in multiple formats (e.g. single choice, multiple choice, dropdown, and other response types) for users to complete for themselves or for other users in the platform or for managers to complete for their team members.

Furthermore, you can also add observation checklists as training material into a course, by importing into a course (of any course type) the checklists already created on the Observation Checklists management page. This article outlines how to import a checklist into a course as training material.

Remember that the same checklist can be both (and simultaneously) scheduled using the Observation Checklists management page and also be added as training material in a course from the Course Management, as explained in the following sections of this article.

Use case scenarios

The Observation Checklists feature opens various opportunities, such as:

• Monitoring and ensuring that users work in compliance with requirements or processes.
• Quickly checking on how users perform specific work tasks.
• Monitoring the status of user progress related to certain tasks inside or outside of the learning platform.
• Ensuring that your learners are following what they’ve learned beyond formal training.

By including observation checklists in your courses, you as a Superadmin will be able to fully monitor the learners’ progress via checklists completed by an observer that can also be another person and not the learner enrolled in the course, and to tie it to the completion of a specific course.

Importing observation checklists as training material

In order to add an observation checklist as training material for your course, log in to the platform as a Superadmin and access the Admin Menu from the gear icon in the top right corner of the platform. In the E-Learning section, select the Course Management item. Look for the course for which you would like to import the observation checklist as training material and click on its description, then move to the Training Material tab. From here, select the Add Training Material button, then select Observation Checklist from the dropdown menu.

You can import the checklists already created by you as a Superadmin or by a Power User using the Observation Checklists management page, but you cannot create new checklists from the Course Management page. If you want to create or manage your checklist, reach the Observation Checklists page from the Admin Menu.

The Import checklist right panel will open. Start by choosing one of the available checklists (that are the ones created on the checklists management page), then press Next and set who will be the checklist observer (the person who will fill out the checklist), the checklist approval, and the completion options.

When configuring the checklist that you are importing as training material, you’ll go through the observer and the approval sections, that are the same as the ones you found in the second step - Observation and Approval - of the checklist configuration when scheduling your checklist on the Observation Checklists management page. For any further information on how to configure these two sections, please refer to the Second Step: Set the Checklist Observer and the Checklist Approval section of the checklists management article.

Also note that when importing a checklist, you won’t need to configure again which users will be checked (first step of the configuration on the Observation Checklists management page), because they are the learners enrolled in the course you are adding the checklist as training material.

Once configured the checklist observer and decided if the checklist needs to be approved by another person, set the completion options, that is the completion criteria of the checklist training material inside of the course.

If you choose the Upon Conclusion option, the checklist training material is marked as complete when the checklist reaches the Completed status (the observer has finished responding to the items in the checklist and pressed the Send Checklist button). Remember that, if the checklist requires the approval step, it will be considered as Completed only after the approval has been done.

If you choose the Upon Sending option, the checklist training material is marked as complete when the checklist is sent to the observer to be filled out. Set this option if you want to allow the learner to continue with the course, especially when the observer is another person, because the learner does not need to wait for the observer to complete the checklist to be able to continue with the course.

When you have finished configuring the completion options, press Import.

You can now change the checklist’s title by typing a new one in the corresponding field. In fact, the checklist training material title can be different from the title of the checklist itself. Below, you can also add a description of the checklist training material. Then, move to the Additional Info tab to add a short description, tags and a thumbnail.

Adding tags to your training material improves its searchability in your platform’s global search. If the auto-tagging feature is enabled in your platform, some tags may be automatically generated based on the content of your material, as understood by your platform using artificial intelligence (note that this only works for English, Spanish, French, German, Italian and Portuguese content). You can edit or remove tags at any time, with a limit of 15 tags per training material and of 32 characters per tag. For security reasons, the platform artificial intelligence does not access private content (that is, content requiring authentication to be accessed) and can thus automatically generate tags only for public content. When uploading private content, we suggest you add tags manually. The accepted file types for auto-tagging in your learning platform are:

Then, set a thumbnail. You can choose from a selection of pre-loaded thumbnails, or upload your own.

Once you have finished, press Save Changes to create the training material, which now appears in the list of training materials on the course’s Training Material tab. You can switch to learner view by using the Learner View button in the action bar at the top of the Training Material tab. In the learner view, you can see how your new training material appears to your users.

Learners’ assignment of checklist training material

The checklist training material will be assigned to the person who will need to complete it (the observer) only when the user enrolled in the course is able to open that training material in the course, not before. The learner will see this date as the creation date on the checklists preview page in the course player. The assignment takes place exactly when the learner can access the checklist (for a course where you set prerequisites, after having completed the prerequisites for the training material). This logic has been implemented to prevent managers from receiving (and being overwhelmed by) a massive number of checklists that, however, are not ready to be completed.

Your learner may warn you that when reaching the checklist training material in a course, he/she displays a message in the player saying that the training material cannot be created and that the checklist is not available. This happens because the checklist involves a user (who can also be a manager) in charge of the observation or of the approval who in the meanwhile (after you configured the checklist training material) has been removed from the platform. As a Superadmin, you can fix this by editing the checklist settings from the course page as explained in the following chapter of this article, and replacing the user who is no longer in the platform with another existing user.

Also pay attention to deactivated users, because if a deactivated user is in charge of the observation or approval, the checklist is assigned anyways.

Managing the settings of checklist training material

Once the training material has been added to the course, you can manage the additional settings. Press the menu icon at the right end of the training material’s row, then select Settings.

In the pop-up box, decide if the training material is visible or hidden, the publishing time frame, and if it is an end object marker. More information on the training material settings and prerequisites.

If you hide the checklist training material or set a publication time frame which does not include current or future dates, and the checklist has not yet been assigned to any users, the checklist will not be assigned to users (observers) for completion and hence it will not be counted towards course completion. However, if the checklist has already been assigned to one or more users (the observer already received the notification informing him/her that he/she needs to complete the checklist), even if you as the Superadmin hide the checklist, or set a publication time frame not including current or future dates, the user still needs to complete the checklist, which will be counted towards course completion.

When finished, press Save Changes.

Once you import a checklist as training material in a course, if you update the checklist title, description, tags, or thumbnail from the Observation checklist menu, the changes will not be reflected in the imported training material. To update them, press the menu icon at the right end of the training material’s row, then select Edit.

If you edit the checklist questions or structure from the Observation checklist menu, or the checklist settings (observer, approval and completion options) using the Checklist settings option (from the menu icon at the right end of the training material’s row) the changes will only apply to learners who have not yet started the course. Learners who have already begun the course will continue to see the original checklist.

If you need to edit the settings (observer, approval and completion options) for the checklist you imported as a course’s training material, press the menu icon at the right end of the training material’s row, then select Checklist Settings. Please note that checklists already assigned to users will not be affected by a change in settings.

Power Users' limitations in managing checklists

Power Users with granted permissions can create and manage their own checklists and manage the checklists assigned to the users managed by them, but they are not able to manage and edit checklists involving users that they do not manage.

For example, if an observation checklist involves a user (as checklist observer, or as the user in charge of approving the checklist) that a Power User does not have the permissions to manage, the Power User is not allowed to manage any of the options and settings of that checklist.

Following the same logic, if a Power User manages a course where a checklist training material has been added, but the checklist is assigned to a user not managed by the Power User, the Power User cannot duplicate the checklist when duplicating the course.