With the Absorb Engage upgrade, you can foster an environment of healthy competition among Learners with the Leaderboard feature. A Leaderboard is a defined date range in which selected Learners compete to accrue the most points, and Learners work their way up the ranks by completing Online Courses, Curricula, Instructor Led Courses (ILCs), and earning Competencies.

This article explains how points are earned, configured, and ranked. To create a Leaderboard, see How to Build a Leaderboard. For an introduction to the wider product, see An Introduction to Absorb Engage.

How Learners Earn Points

Learners can belong to more than one Leaderboard at a time, and each membership tracks its own point total. Points are awarded for the following activities:

• Online Course completion
• ILC completion
• Curricula completion
• Earning a Competency
• Commenting on a Course

Points are only counted toward a Leaderboard when the activity takes place between that Leaderboard's Start Date and End Date. Activity completed outside that window is not included.

Important Notes

Review the following behaviors before you configure points on a live portal:

• If a Learner re-enrolls in a Course (or an Admin retroactively enrolls a Learner), Leaderboard Points will be awarded. For related behavior, see Retroactive Changes in Absorb LMS.
• If a Learner completes an Online Course within a Curriculum, they will receive Leaderboard Points for each, if Leaderboard Points are set.
• Leaderboard Points are date stamped and cannot be retroactively changed (increased or decreased) by updating default point awards by Admins, changing a Course, Competency, etc.
• Be sure to complete any historical data imports in the LMS before configuring Leaderboard Points, unless you want points issued for all past enrollments.
• Deleting an enrollment does not automatically remove the associated Leaderboard points.

Delayed Points

In the context of Leaderboard Points, the LMS uses an internal mechanism referred to as Delayed Points. When a Learner earns Leaderboard Points, those points are first recorded as Delayed Points before being reflected in the visible Leaderboard totals.

During this processing period, typically up to approximately 15 minutes, points may not immediately appear on the Leaderboard. Delayed Points are only visible to the associated Learner and their Administrator, and are subsequently converted into standard Leaderboard Points once processing is complete, at which time the delayed value is reset to zero.

This delay is intentional. Settling points on a schedule prevents rankings from shifting continuously in real time as other Learners complete activity.

Leaderboard Point Values

Point values can be set globally for your portal, or individually on the items that award them. Custom values take precedence over the global defaults.

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Default Leaderboard Values

You can apply global default Leaderboard Point Values in Portal Settings > Defaults > Default Leaderboard Point Values. Unless otherwise specified, earned points will follow the values listed here. For the full list of related options, see Portal Settings Overview.

Custom Leaderboard Values

You also have the option to modify the Leaderboard Point value of individual Courses, Curricula, and Competencies from their Completion section. Comments will always use the Default Leaderboard Value for Comments.

The following articles describe where the Leaderboard Points field appears on each item:

Rankings and Visibility

Rankings are recalculated as points settle, and the standings a Learner sees depend on their membership, their department, and their own position on the board.

How Rankings Are Calculated

Leaderboard standings are ordered by total points, from highest to lowest. When two or more Learners hold the same point total, they are displayed at the same rank number, and the order between them is resolved alphabetically by last name and then by first name.

Who Appears on a Leaderboard

Membership is determined by the Availability rules set on the Leaderboard. If no rules are applied, all active Learners participate. Membership updates automatically as Users, Groups, and Departments change.

Users who are inactive or deleted are excluded from the displayed standings.

What Learners See

Learners access Leaderboards from the Learner Experience, where each Leaderboard shows its name, description, and date range alongside the standings. The following behaviors apply:

• Standings display the top 100 ranked members. A Learner ranked outside the top 100 also sees a personal view of their own rank with the two members above and the two members below them.
• Learners can switch between an Everyone view and a Department view that is limited to members who share their department.
• Once the End Date passes, the Leaderboard is final and no further points are counted.
• If the Learner Social Profile is enabled, Learners can open a peer's profile from the standings. See What is the Learner Social Profile and User Conversations?

Leaderboards can also be surfaced on a Learner Dashboard using a Leaderboards Tile. The Tile can point to one specific Leaderboard, or to the full list of Leaderboards available to that Learner. See Department Templates: Public and Private Dashboards.

Editing Awarded Leaderboard Points

Admins can edit awarded Leaderboard Points as needed in the Admin Experience from the Activity Feed, accessible from the Users Report. Follow these steps:

1. In the Admin Experience, navigate to the Users Report.
2. Click the User you want to edit Leaderboard Points for, then select Activity Feed from the Actions menu on the right-hand side.

3. Add a column for Points, and identify an activity that has awarded Points.
4. Click the line item, then select Edit Activity from the Actions menu on the right-hand side.

5. Edit the awarded Points as needed, and click Save.

For more detail on this report, see Activity Feed Report.

Admin Permissions

Access to Leaderboards in the Admin Experience is controlled by two permissions on the Admin Role:

Admins can only view Leaderboard activity for Users they are permitted to manage. For more on configuring permissions, see Admin Roles and Permissions.

Considerations

Keep the following limitations in mind when planning a Leaderboard program:

• Leaderboards are available in the browser-based Learner Experience only, and are not available in the Absorb mobile app.
• Leaderboards do not repeat automatically. Each Leaderboard covers a single fixed date range, so running a new competition requires creating a new Leaderboard.
• There is no anonymous participation option. Standings display each member's first name, last name, and avatar.
• Rankings are not real time. Points settle on a recurring schedule, so a Learner may see their own pending points before other members do.