Create a Document Submission

You can create a document submission to allow learners to add an artifact to prove their skills. The artifact can be a document, report, presentation, or video file. When you create a document submission, you specify instructions to the learner letting them know what is required for them to demonstrate their skill. Optionally, you can provide a template for them to complete and upload.

After you create the document submission, you add it to a channel, journey, assignment, or learning program where the learner can access it. The learner reads the instructions and then uploads their artifact to earn completion credit. You can also require that the submission get approved, but this does not impact the completion.

We recommend that you create a separate document submission item for each container type because if a learner adds an artifact under one container, the document submission item gets completed for all containers and cannot be restarted.

Create a document submission

To create a document submission:

1. From the left navigation bar of the admin interface, choose Content > Content Items. The Manage Content Items page displays.
2. Select Add Custom Content Item.
3. Select Document submission). The Add Custom Content page displays with a stepped workflow.
4. Describe the document submission.
5. After you enter all the details, select one of the following actions:
   • Cancel: Discard all changes.
   • Save as Draft: Save your changes for modification or publication later.

   • Next: Add discovery information: Progress to the next stage to review your settings and publish.

6. Enter the Content discovery details.
7. Select one of the following actions:
   • Cancel: Discard all changes.
   • Save as Draft: Save your changes for modification or publication later.
   • Next: Review and finalize: Progress to the final stage to review your settings and publish.
8. Specify an approval workflow.
9. Select one of the following actions:
   • Cancel: Discard all changes.
   • Save as Draft: Save your changes for modification or publication later.
   • Next: Review and finalize: Progress to the final stage to review your settings and publish.
10. Review the details of your document submission. Select to edit any details if necessary, then choose one of the following actions:
    • Cancel: Discard all changes.
    • Save as Draft: Save your changes for modification or publication later.
    • Next: Publish Content: Publish the document submission to the platform so that you can add it to a channel, journey, assignment or learning program.
11. Select Publish to complete the process. After the document submission item is published, do one of the following so learners can submit an artifact for review. Add the document submission item to a:
    1. Journey: Create journey
    2. Channel: Create channel
    3. Assignment: Create assignment
    4. Learning program: Create learning program

Describe the document submission

Specify the following information in this step:

• Enter a Title for the document submission. This field is required. This is the title the learner sees in the channel, journey, assignment, or learning program.
• Enter a Description. This field is required. Describe what this item is.
• Enter Learner instructions. Specify in detail what the learner should provide when they submit a document. If you do not provide a template, consider adding an outline of what is required, what format you are looking for, components that should be included/excluded, etc.
• Choose an Image. This field is required. This helps the learner distinguish the item from others.
• Images should be in a 16x9 aspect ratio.
• The recommended size for the image is 1920 x 1080px.
• The file size must be 300k or less.
• A .jpg format is preferred, but you can upload .jpg, .png, and .gif files.
• If you do not have a custom image, you can select a royalty-free one from the image gallery or use the default Skillsoft Platform image.
• Select a Content language. This field is required.

  This determines which language a learner must have set as their Skillsoft Platform site language in order to see the link from the platform.

• Optionally add a Template file. This file can be a Microsoft Word or PowerPoint or a PDF format. Sharing a template provides additional guidance to learners of what is expected. Your template must be less than 10 MB.

• If enabled on your site and if you want, you can specify up to five learning objectives. Please note: You can start adding learning objectives now, which AI search will use in the future to help make content recommendations for results from custom skill benchmarks (if you choose to create custom skill benchmarks). Learners do not see learning objectives and they are not considered for search results or Role Advisor recommendations. Select Add learning objective and enter your objective. When writing a learning objective, it is best to:
  • Use clear action verbs, such as identify, analyze, create, describe, etc.
  • Be specific: Detail exactly what the learner should achieve.
  • Align with outcomes: Link objectives to the overall course goals.
  • Make it measurable: Ensure you can assess if the objective has been achieved.
  • Write it from the learner's perspective: Make objectives relevant and meaningful to the learner.
  • Complete this sentence: At the end of this training, you should be able to...
  • Follow an example such as: Analyze three different leadership styles by identifying four key characteristics, strengths, and weaknesses of each and applying it to three leaders at your company within three weeks of completing the training.
• Optionally, specify up to 10 skills that learners will gain by consuming this content. Learners can search on skills and see recommended content matching those skills. To add or edit skills for a content item, you can either select:
  • Quick replace with recommended skills: Use this option to have AI use the title and description to propose matching skills from the Skillsoft skill dictionary. You can edit the recommended list afterward by selecting Edit skills.
  • Edit skills: Use this option to remove and find skills that AI may have missed or mismatched. To remove a skill, select the X next to its name. To add a skill, start typing the name of a skill in the box, then select from the suggested list. The list of suggested skills displays from Skillsoft's robust skill dictionary. You cannot add more than a total of 10 skills.

Enter your Content discovery details.

These details are visible to learners and determine how your content is classified in the platform.

• The modality (practice) and Content type (document submission) are pre-selected because you chose document submission.
• Select a Content source from the list or enter a new value. We suggest you use the type ahead feature to avoid replicating an existing entry.

  Content Source is who owns the intellectual property; it is not the platform where the item resides, such as YouTube or SharePoint. Skillsoft uses source to distinguish brands and partner content like Wintellect and GoFluent. If you have the permission to manage content types and source values enabled, you can add new values to this field. If that permission is not enabled, you must pick from existing values for this field.

  By default, the value specified in Organization name is associated as a content source for your custom content, dynamic content, journeys, and live courses. You do not need to specify the Organization name in this field in order for learners to use the Organization name as a Content source filter on the search results page, but you must specify something as described above.

• Enter a Estimated effort, which is the average amount of time your learner can expect to use to complete the document.
• Select the type of device for which the content is optimized.

When learners attempt to access this content on a device not selected here (an unsupported device), a message directs them to access the content on the selected (supported) devices.

When you add a link from YouTube, the default selection is all devices.

• In the Determine learner availability section, you specify whether you want to publish the item so learners can immediately discover it through search. Check the box, Make content instantly accessible to learners in search if you are in a testing and review state of your content or if you are just planning to assign the content and do not want learners to be able to browse to it through a channel or journey.

• If you selected to make content available in search, you must specify in the Target content to audience(s) section, which learners can see the content.

  • By default, the content is available to the All user audience. You can change to a specific group of people if you select, Edit audience. Choose a particular audience if you want only a few people to review it before you make it available to a wider audience.
  • Search or browse for the desired audiences and select them.
  • To save your audience selection, select Done.

    If you choose not to select the Make content immediately available to learners in search option, you first publish the content to the Skillsoft Platform server, then your must add it to a custom channel or journey and publish that before learners will be able to access it.

    As a best practice, we recommend that you add your content item to a custom channel or journey within the library hierarchical structure. This ensures learners can both browse and search for it and helps you track your curation. If you are using this method, ensure your custom channel or custom journey is set up before you begin creating your content

• Optionally, expand Additional content discovery details section to select or enter:
  • Expertise level: Select a level that users should have to understand this content. You choices are Beginner, Intermediate, Expert, and Everyone.
  • Technology title: If you are supporting many items around one type of technology, enter that here, for example, Microsoft Excel or Google Docs.
  • Technology version: If you are supporting many items around a particular type of technology with multiple supported versions, enter that version here, for example, Microsoft Excel 365.
  • Additional search terms: The platform uses terms from the title and description when searching, but you can add additional terms in this field to aid learners in finding your content while keeping you title and descriptions brief.
  • Optionally, enter an External ID. This is a unique identifier you can use to search for your custom content in Skillsoft Platform Admin. The external ID does not display to learners in any search results or content cards.

Approval

You can choose how the learners submission is approved. Your options are:

• No approval required: Select this option if no one needs to approve the content submitted by the learner.
• Approval required: Select this option if you want an admin with permission to approve the content submitted by the learner.
• Approval and evaluation required: Select this option if you want an admin with permission to evaluate what the learner submitted and provide a score and comments. The admin can also approve or reject the submission. When you select this option, you must then specify how an admin will evaluate the item:
  • Numerical score: Select this option to allow admins to enter a numerical score from 0 to n. Specify the maximum score allowed (n) and the minimum passing score allowed.
  • Grade: Select this option to allow admins to enter a grade level instead of a numerical score. You can specify up to five grade levels and define them based on your organization culture and norms. Skillsoft provides five default grade letter with names and descriptions. You can remove or modify them:
    • Grade letter: Typically this is A, B, C, D, F. You can use whatever letter you want.
    • Grade name: Label what the letter stands for. Some examples of grade names might include Excellent or Outstanding, Average, or Needs improvement.
    • Grade description: This describes what the grade letter and name mean. This helps admin make the right evaluation and learners know how they did.

If you choose to use an admin approved option, users with the role of site admin can see and review all learner submissions from the Approvals page. In addition, you can customize other roles to allow users with that role to approve submitted items. Users with a scoped role such as a learning admin or manager, can only access submissions for learners in audiences that they own.

When you select an admin approved option, learners receive a completion as soon as they upload their file. The approval process is separate. Admins with permissions must review and decide whether to approve an item. They do this from the Approvals page.