It is always said that learner profile is a very crucial element to designing the right kind of training for the right kind of audience,however I am yet to see a good sample /example of a detailed Learner profile .The question arises as to what is the best way to start writing learner profiles and more so how is a learner profile written for an organisation that has a very high rate of attrition and the learner profile is extremely dynamic,any ideas anyone ?

Indeed the concept of the learner profile is quite essential to an organization... but a learner profile is not something you put together like lego... it should represent the "knowledge map" of your learner. Without getting into details... one of the reasons for SCORM 2004 is to find standard ways of presenting content so that we can also standardize the representation of a learner's performance.

What we intend to see in a learner profile is his progression throughout the course, his performance broken down by module, his precise skill gaps etc... so that an organization can use this information to create their business impact!

eLearning systems that measure time to completion... and number of users that logged in are not measuring the right compponents...

Ohh, and now I am sure you see why learner profiles are dynamic.

How do you intend to use the profile?

I agree learner profiles are dynamic and change from course to course depends on the requirements of the learner,the business need and the skill/knowledge areas that an individual requires at a given time.
Using a learning management system as a monitoring tool is very basic.Providing a learner space to the learners of an organistaion such that the space reflects his/her growth in various areas is altogether a diffrent ball game.
It would mean usnderstanding the learner preferences and learning styles of the learner within an organisation.
The idea of building a learner profile that is a collective representative of the type of learner within an organisation is what I am looking at....
My guess is that this would indeed mean surveys and interviews with the various learners and then collecting the data into a report that would give the learner preferences and styles of majority of learners within the organisation....

Ohh I see, you are trying to find the "typical" profile of a learner...

I could think of two methods... survey, or historical data.