In addition to manually enrolling users into training, you can use enrolment rules to enable users to enrol themselves into training via a training catalogue (on their learner dashboard).
Enrolment rules dictate which topics or articles are made visible to each user in their catalogue. You can therefore create and manage separate training catalogues for different types of users.
In this article, we discuss how to create and apply self-enrolment rules to make training available in catalogues as well as how to use the 'Run Rule' feature to immediately enrol explorers into training if they match an enrolment rule. After creating a catalogue rule, you can delete it at any time to remove the training from the applicable users' catalogues.
In this separate article, we look at how to create auto-enrolment rules, which automatically enrol new users into training if they match an enrolment rule.
Start by filtering your users
IMPORTANT! By default, topics, articles and pathways DO NOT APPEAR in any training catalogue. You need to first set up a self-enrolment rule to allow a topic, article or pathway to appear in a user's catalogue.
The first step in creating an enrolment rule is to go to the People view in your Admin area and create a search using the filter options which matches your desired rule.
Example: If you wanted all staff to see a topic in their catalogue, you would filter by 'Type equals Staff'.
Example: Let's say you had a custom field for location and you only wanted learners from Sydney to see a certain pathway. You would create a filter of 'Location contains Sydney'.
Example: You have a custom field for 'team' and another for 'role'. If you only wanted managers in the sales team to see a certain article, then your filter would be 'Role contains manager' and 'Team contains sales'.
Note: For information about custom fields, see this article.
After you run the search, you will see all existing people who match that search/rule. This is a good time to check that the users from the search are good representations of the users you want for this rule!
Save your enrolment rule
When you are happy with your search, click the 'Save Rule' button. Then, select the topics, articles or pathways you want to apply the rule to. Your rule will then be added to the selected topics, articles or pathways (visible on the 'Access' tab).
How do explorers view their training catalogue?
Explorers see a Catalogue link on their dashboard.
If any topics, articles or pathways are available for self-enrolment by them, they will appear on their Catalogue page.
Note: If an explorer has already enrolled in topics, articles or pathways which were available for self-enrolment in the catalogue, then they will not see those items in the Catalogue...as they will already be present on their Dashboard.
Manage your enrolment rules
When viewing your topics or articles on the Knowledge page, you can see which topics or articles have a catalogue rule applied by checking the 'Access' column. Topics or articles with one or more catalogue rules will have 'Catalogue Rules' in this column.
You can filter for topics or articles with catalogue rules by clicking the 'All Access' drop-down button and selecting 'Catalogue Rules'.
Furthermore, when you examine a specific topic, article or pathway, you can see if any enrolment rules have been applied on the 'Access' tab, in the 'Manage rules for automated or catalogue enrolments' area.
Topics, articles and pathways can have multiple rules. Each rule can be either:
Automated. This means the rule is checked automatically every two hours and any explorers who match the rule will be enrolled into the topic, article or pathway if they are not already enrolled. Learn more about automated rules in this article.
Catalogue (Enrol). This means the topic, article or pathway will appear in the catalogue of any matching explorers IF that explorer is not already enrolled in that topic, article or pathway. The button the explorer sees will be 'Enrol'.
Catalogue (Buy). This means the topic, article or pathway will appear in the catalogue of any matching explorers IF that explorer is not already enrolled in that topic, article or pathway. The button the explorer sees will be 'Buy'.
Any rule can be BOTH automated and catalogue (although this is largely unnecessary since the automation will enrol the explorer at the next check - within two hours of the rule being established - which will remove it from the catalogue since the explorer will now be enrolled).
A few notes about enrolment rules
Rules are immediately active. You do not need to enable them any further. NB: 'Run Rule' does NOT enable a rule - it immediately enrols matching explorers (see below for how Run Rule works).
An explorer only needs to meet one rule in order for the topic, article or pathway to be visible in their Catalogue.
While the rules are presented in a numbered order (for easy reference), there is no priority to the rules. They all apply equally.
Within the Access panel, you can delete any existing rule if no longer needed.
You cannot edit a rule. If you need to make changes, delete the rule and recreate the search settings for a new rule.
Enrol vs Buy option in the Catalogue
By default, each rule is a 'self-enrolment' rule. This means that explorers see an 'Enrol' button for that topic, article or pathway in their Catalogue and can click to enrol.
However, Admins can edit each rule in the Access panel to choose between 'Enrol' or 'Buy' options. The 'Buy' option allows Admins to enter a URL that would typically link to the external e-commerce page where an explorer could purchase that topic, article or pathway (e.g https://yourstore.com/thistopic/).
If the Buy option is enabled for a rule, then the explorer will see a 'Buy' button instead and can click to be directed to the external URL.
When combined with our Zapier integration, the explorer could purchase the topic and be enrolled via Zapier - returning to your portal to find they are now enrolled in the topic, article or pathway (and it is no longer in their catalogue).
Since the Buy and Enrol options apply per rule, you can have a topic available for self-enrolment for some explorers (staff, subscribing clients) and show 'Buy' for other explorers (customers). See the image above which shows Buy for clients and Enrol for staff, as an example.
If an explorer meets two rules - one for Enrol and one for Buy - we will default to showing the 'Buy' option.
The 'Run Rule' option
Finally, you can also use self-enrolment rules to instantly enrol matching users via the 'Run Rule' link beside each rule.
Clicking Run rule will bring up a screen that shows:
How many people are covered by that rule
How many of those people are already enrolled
How many of those people would be enrolled if the rule was run
Admins can then elect to run the enrolment rule. This will immediately start enrolling matching explorers.
Depending on the number of people who need to be enrolled AND the nature of the enrolment, it may take some time to complete run the rule and complete all enrolments. A progress indicator will show how many enrolments have been processed. Please wait while the enrolment rule is completed
As an indicator, rules involving pathways can take considerably longer than rules involving a single topic/article, since each pathway enrolment may involve a number of topic/article pre-enrolments. A pathway with 10 topics/articles requires a total of 11 enrolments per person (once in the pathway and then for each of the 10 topics/articles).
As part of the enrolment process, enrolment notifications will be emailed to explorers if the enrolment email notification is enabled in the selected pathway, topic or article. This will add additional time to the enrolment process.
Finally, to ensure data consistency, only one enrolment rule can be run at any time in a single organisation. If you try to run a second enrolment rule while the first enrolment rule is running, the second enrolment rule will not run - you will see the first rule still running. This is to avoid duplicate enrolments being created by rules with overlapping filters.
Removing a catalogue rule from a topic, article or pathway
To remove a rule from a topic, article or pathway:
Navigate to the topic, article or pathway and click the 'Access' tab.
Scroll to the section called 'Manage rules for automated or catalogue enrolments'.
Click 'Delete' next to the rule you no longer want to run.
Confirm the rule deletion in the dialog box which appears.
Once confirmed, the rule will no longer apply. No other changes will be made to the topic, article or pathway, or to existing enrolments.