Dell Microsoft Global Academy

Context

I inherited an accreditation platform set up on WordPress and LearnDash by my predecessor and never launched. I took it live in that form first, then ran it for a year, long enough for user volume and the client's security requirements to outgrow the stack.

Audience

Dell sales staff worldwide, who need to keep pace with continuous technology updates.

Decisions

I ran the vendor evaluation myself: market research, hands-on product testing, supplier conversations, and L&D trade events. Options were scored against two fixed constraints: the allocated budget, and two integrations the programme already depended on, Algolia for contextual search and Credly for badge accreditation. MapleLMS met both, and its architecture could carry the user categorisation the client needed. Most alternatives could not.

Build

The migration rebuilt every user record so that no accreditation already earned was lost. The harder work was the categorisation model: four macro-regions, plus tens of regional and role-based sub-categories — a structure that had never been formally defined, not by the client and not by their incumbent contractor. I derived it, then delivered it twice: as a cascading self-registration form where each selection filtered the next, and as permission-scoped reporting so every regional manager saw their own scope and nothing beyond it. That took months of working sessions with MapleLMS's engineering team, which I led.

After launch

I ran the platform until I left. Releases and accreditation content, standard and custom reporting produced for the client's data team, and first-line support through a ticketing system built inside the LMS, escalating to the vendor where needed. I worked with Dell's cybersecurity team on vulnerability remediation, SSL provisioning and privacy documentation, built the custom interface and widgets in HTML and CSS, and produced the onboarding video training for users and managers.

Outcome

50 to 90 countries. Over 10,000 accreditations issued. Around 7,000 registered users at departure, roughly 3,000 active in the final year, growing by about 1,000 active users annually since launch. Still running when I handed it over.

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