LMS widgets and user ratings

At the eLearning Network showcase event in July, I attended an interesting presentation on the use of learning communities made by Carole Bower of Futuremedia. Two aspects of the 'Performance Zone' site that Futuremedia created for private health care provider BUPA particularly caught my attention:

• LMS widgets: The site provides each user with a personalised home page that can be customised with all sorts of widgets, including RSS feeds, etc. These widgets draw heavily from the learning management system, but do not require the user to log into the LMS. The widgets allow users to view information about their performance and career development and to customise the user interface in a similar way to iGoogle. What I like about this idea is that it allows data out of the LMS silo so it can be made much more relevant to everyday work. Too often, accessing an LMS is just too much trouble for anything other than booking a formal course. Futuremedia's site includes a PDF case study if you want to see what it looks like.
• Course ratings: I've long advocated that employees should be able to rate content and courses - anonymously if they wish - in the same way you can review books and CDs on Amazon and elsewhere. So, I was pleased to see that the Performance Zone site contains this facility. I gather the client was nervous about this idea and nearly pulled it after a couple of negative comments, but has braved it out and is now happy with the concept. Good for them! User ratings aren't the only useful measure of the effectiveness of content and courses, but they are a good start, and help to ensure the cream rises to the top.

It's nice to see some Web 2.0 concepts applied in a formal corporate context to good effect.