Certifications have been a significant feature for LemonadeLXP! At their core, they are the de-facto mechanism to group Courses and Steps into a period within which the learner must complete them (which cascades into a wealth of available reporting).
Regular certifications invite you to create a 'cohort' of learners based on groups to which requisite certificates apply. For example, if we must ensure that everyone completes the security awareness courses for regulatory compliance purposes every six months, standard Certifications are best.
Sometimes, unfortunately, that type of container doesn't work. Notable events should also be able to trigger a need to train or prepare a user within a limited timeframe.
Consider the new hire, who needs to prove their understanding of a security policy before they can access company data. They certainly can't have six months to complete this, and the timing of their onboarding is unlikely to coincide with our other regulatory/renewal Certifications.
Enter Dynamic Certifications. Put simply, these are time-limited, non-renewing certifications that can start anytime, but must be completed within a fixed number of days (after they start).
Very few pieces of data govern dynamic Certifications:
Countdown Limit: the amount of days the learner has to complete the Certification after it is assigned.
Course Requirements: the courseware that must be completed.
Minimum Passing Grade: the grade required for each graded step to pass the Certification.
All other configuration components are ignored!
You can assign Dynamic Certifications to a learner in two ways:
Manually, via the Learner Enrollment panel.
Using Triggers, for example, when someone joins or when they are added to a group. This can be a powerful trigger when combined with SAML claims.
When you assign a 30-day Certification to a learner via one of these means, its due date is calculated as "now plus 30 days".
Configuring Dynamic Certifications
Dynamic certifications are configured from the same Certifications area, under Automate > Certifications. Check the 'Dynamic Certification' checkbox on the first panel, and proceed to configure Countdown Limit, Course Requirements and Minimum Passing Grade (that's it).
Be certain to configure counterpart events that will assign this certification after it is configured, or, your rely on manual assignment.
Changing Dynamic Certifications
Once a Certification is saved as dynamic, it cannot be converted to a regular certification (or vice versa).
Changing requirements to an active Dynamic Certification will trigger recompilation, only for currently active periods associated to that Certification.
Dynamic certifications cannot recur (since they are bound to a single event).
If you change the Countdown Limit for a Certification, the right edge of all related active periods will change, but its left edge (time started) will not. Inactive (past) dynamic certification periods will remain unchanged.
Manual Intervention
If you remove a manual certification assignment, the original period is deleted. You can use this mechanism of removing, and re-adding, to reset the "countdown" time period for any learner.