I suspect that if you asked any of us to name one or two things around our house or apartment that we would like to enhance, most of us would easily be able to do so: increasing the counter space in the kitchen, adding charging stations for devices in the living room, or modernizing light switches to enable voice assistant control, to name a few. These are things that are not crucial for comfortable living, but such updates could definitely improve your home and your quality of life.

 The same might be said of institutions using standardized SaaS solutions today: The features your organization needs are included, they work well, and your processes are efficient. You could say that, for the most part, the overall house is a “home”.

But just like the home metaphor, I suspect that if I asked the users of these systems to name one or two things that could be tailored to their institution’s specific preferences or unique requirements to make use of the platform even more convenient, most users could think of a few.

In the Blackboard® learning management system (LMS), for example, maybe proctors need to see student profile images directly on the testing page so as to verify who is taking the test. Perhaps unique rules and workflows need to be added to the grade flow to accommodate specific policies, such as who can approve what grades. Maybe instructors would benefit from seeing analytical insights into their students directly in their course pages rather than navigating to another page for those insights. Or maybe an institution wants to provide access to a third-party AI chatbot to help students perform better in a course.

Of course, we always invite submissions to the Anthology Idea Exchange, where every product idea and feature request is reviewed as part of our ongoing innovation process. But what about for those more personalized enhancements that would make a time-saving difference for that one process at your institution, but might not be applicable to others? Or those unique add-ons that bring that extra shine to your users’ experience with your brand?

The good news is that it is possible to set up these sorts of enhancements within the platform. This is where a solid network of technical experts that works in tandem with the Product Development organization can really make a difference, and we have just such a team with Anthology Services. These experts can listen to your requirements and identify ways the product can be adapted to meet these requests.  They are experts in the product’s functionality and technical integration points and can configure and implement solutions. The team can build these enhancements and do so in ways that, if related features were to be added to the core product in a future update, you could easily switch to using those and move on from your customized solution if appropriate.

So maybe today, much like in the home metaphor, you might be considering enhancements to your LMS instance; adaptations that reflect your institution’s unique needs. Leveraging Anthology’s services team ensures expert-driven modifications to the LMS, customized reporting, and seamless integration with third-party vendors—freeing up your internal team to focus on mission-critical priorities and strategic initiatives.

Ready to learn more? Check out everything Anthology Services has to offer today.