Why Your LMS is Killing Employee Engagement (And What to Do About It)
The brutal truth L&D leaders (but really their tech compliance teams) don't want to admit: Your learning management system isn't managing learning—it's managing compliance. And your employees know the difference.
Picture this: It's Monday morning, and Sarah from Marketing gets the dreaded email notification. "Reminder: Complete your required communication skills training by Friday." She sighs, opens another browser tab, and prepares for 45 minutes of clicking through slides, watching talking heads explain concepts she could Google in five minutes, and answering multiple-choice questions designed by someone who clearly hasn't had a real conversation in years.
Poor Sarah. Give her something fun to look forward to!
Sound familiar? If you're an L&D leader, this scenario is playing out across your organization right now. And every time it does, you're not just wasting time—you're actively damaging employee engagement with learning itself. (And listen, you may be the one advocating for better solutions, so here is some fodder to bring into those conversations!)
The LMS Engagement Crisis
Here's what most L&D platforms want to obfuscate from their buyers: engagement rates for traditional LMS content hover around 15-20%. That means 80% of your workforce is mentally checking out the moment they log into your learning platform.
But the problem runs deeper than low completion rates. Traditional LMS platforms are built on a fundamental misunderstanding of how adults actually learn and change behavior. They assume that:
Information transfer equals skill development
Compliance equals competence
Clicking "complete" equals comprehension
One-size-fits-all content works for diverse learners
None of these assumptions hold up under scrutiny.
Why Your Brain Rebels Against Traditional E-Learning
The human brain is wired for story, emotion, and connection. We've evolved to learn through observation, imitation, and social interaction. Yet most LMS content strips away everything that makes learning memorable:
No emotional connection. When was the last time an e-learning module made you feel something? Emotion is the gateway to memory, but most corporate training is emotionally sterile.
No human context. Real skills develop through watching others navigate complex situations. Stock photo interactions and cartoon avatars don't cut it. Bad acting doesn’t help either.
No reflection space. The best learning happens in the pause between experience and application. LMS platforms rush learners from concept to quiz without time to process.
No peer learning. We learn best from watching peers succeed and struggle. Individual completion tracking kills collaborative discovery.
The Hidden Costs of Disengagement
When employees disengage from learning, the impact ripples throughout your organization:
Reduced skill transfer. Employees complete training but don't change behavior. Your investment in leadership development shows no measurable improvement in management effectiveness.
Learned helplessness around growth. When every learning experience feels like drudgery, employees stop seeking development opportunities. Your high-potential talent looks elsewhere for growth.
Cultural stagnation. Organizations that treat learning as a checkbox exercise create cultures that resist change and innovation.
Wasted resources. You're spending thousands per employee on content that doesn't stick. Meanwhile, your managers are still making the same communication mistakes, your teams still struggle with collaboration, and your culture initiatives fall flat.
What Actually Works: Learning Through Shared Experience
The most effective learning experiences share three characteristics that traditional LMS platforms struggle to deliver:
Emotional resonance. People remember stories that make them feel something. Whether it's recognition, surprise, or even discomfort, emotion creates neural pathways that pure information cannot.
Authentic scenarios. Adults learn best when they can see themselves in the situation. Humans facing real challenges provide the context that makes abstract concepts concrete - think of it as “dilemma testing.”
Facilitated reflection. The magic happens not in the content consumption but in the personal and interpersonal reflection, ideally with discussion afterward. When learners can connect what they've observed to their own experiences, behavior change becomes possible.
The Film Forward Alternative
This is where experiential learning platforms like Film Forward are revolutionizing workplace development. Instead of asking employees to suffer through another PowerPoint presentation on communication skills, imagine this scenario:
Sarah receives a different kind of notification: "Your team's monthly learning session is live." She is excited to login for a 15-minute viewing of a carefully curated award-winning short film that explores important challenges and dynamics with nuance and authenticity. The characters face real dilemmas with no easy answers.
After viewing, Sarah spends 20 minutes in quiet reflection and on personal and interpersonal actions where she engages her teammates in expanding the learning.
Then every few months we scale the learning more broadly to teams in facilitated discussion, connecting what they observed to their own workplace challenges. They share perspectives, debate approaches, and leave with practical insights they can apply immediately.
The difference? Sarah actually wants to attend. She learns not just from the content but from her colleagues' insights. She remembers the experience because it engaged her emotionally and intellectually, and she is accountable to the learning because every module requires interpersonal and team activities.
Making the Shift: Practical Steps for L&D Leaders
Start small, think big. You don't need to overhaul your entire learning ecosystem overnight. Identify one area where engagement is particularly low and pilot an experiential approach.
Measure what matters. Stop tracking completion rates and start measuring behavior change. We survey participants about observable improvements in their teams/teammates. Track real business metrics tied to the skills you're developing.
Embrace facilitation. The best learning platforms don't just deliver content—they enable conversation. Train your L&D team to facilitate meaningful discussions that help learners connect experience to application.
Get comfortable with discomfort. Authentic learning experiences sometimes create productive tension. That's not a bug—it's a feature. Real growth happens at the edge of our comfort zones.
The Future of Workplace Learning
Your LMS isn't inherently evil. It serves a purpose for compliance training and information distribution. But if you're using it as your primary tool for developing leadership, communication, and other complex human skills, you're setting yourself up for failure.
The organizations that will thrive in the coming decade are those that recognize learning as a fundamentally human, social, and emotional process. They're moving beyond information transfer to experience creation.
Your employees are hungry for growth, meaning, and connection. They want to develop skills that matter. They want learning experiences that respect their intelligence and engage their humanity.
The question isn't whether you can afford to invest in more engaging learning approaches. The question is whether you can afford not to.
Ready to transform your approach to workplace learning? Book a demo with us!
