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The Role of Instructional Design Today: Otter Voice Meeting Notes

The Role of Instructional Design Today

Shannon Tipton59min

Shannon Tipton

00:03

All right, well welcome everyone to another learning rebels Coffee Chat. I am very excited about today's topic. We have been in the midst of a lot of change in the l&d function specifically around instructional designers, facilitators, virtual facilitating, it seems as though everything around our job as l&d professionals, has seen some sort of change in the last, I would say in the last two or three years, and in some areas, more significant change than others. And this is why I wanted to bring everybody together today. Now, today, we're talking about what does the future hold for while learning and development, our next coffee chat here, in the next in two weeks, I'm going to go ahead and put this link in the chat here is some of you may find this familiar, we did this exercise a couple of years ago, what smart trainers need to know. And I want to do it again. So we're gonna do it again in our next Coffee Chat. And so the link is in there. So you can go ahead and copy that link or go ahead and register for that one. Because it's going to kind of piggyback off of what we're talking about here today. Today, focusing on what does the future hold, and then our next chat, let's actually get down and dirty, and collaboratively, break down the skills that we think that we're going to need in order to be successful in our roles today. So I hope that you join us for that. And then when you go to the events page, you'll notice that I have all of the chats up for the rest of this year. And so I'm very excited by that we've got our next one, which is what smart trainers need to know, we're also going to be talking about learning reinforcement. But in December, we're doing our annual gifts for the trainer in your life, which is a very popular one. We all love getting together and developing those gift lists. And then we're also having our annual Coffee Chat learning rebels Coffee Chat holiday party. So that is all up and ready for you guys to go ahead. Yes. And sign up and join. So matter of fact. Let's see. You should be yes. All right. So you've got all of those links. So now let's start with the big question on the table for you guys. Which is I'm curious. Where do you see your roles evolving? You know what actually what I want to do in the chat right now for me, I would like for you to put your job title What's your job title? Put that in the chat for me. Let's see what we've got. Okay, learning consultant instructional designers training and development managers, Senior Instructional develop senior instructional designer, talent specialist. Talent Development Manager, learning experience designer, Instructional Designer and project manager, Master learning facilitator, okay. All right, and training coordinator, learning consultant instructional design, lead instructional design leader. Well, there's two that are the same. I'm finding it really interesting that I'm not seeing a whole lot of redundancy as far as titles is concerned. We all have different titles, although it could be said that we're all doing similar roles. And it never ceases to amaze me as far as where our titles sit in this in as l&d professionals is that no two titles are the same, it feels like, right? Yes, exactly. Erica, if you can imagine it, it can be a job title. And I think a lot of that has to do with our organizations aren't really sure what they want us to be doing. And so subsequently, they just throw a job title on the wall and hope that it sticks. Right. And I think the conversation today Oh, in the past learning experience architect, right. Yes. A long time ago, I did a survey like this and I came up with 90 different job titles within the l&d profession and that's just crazy. What does that matter for the future of l&d. Why does it matter? You guys tell me, why do you think this this matters? The discrepancies between job titles, job descriptions, etc? Why does that matter? Why is it important that maybe we get some consistency in this?

Douglas

05:26

Our other people supposed to know what it is we do if they if we can't have any kind of, right? What's the what's, what's the difference between an instructional architect and an instructional designer? Right? Yes, they're building instruction. Right?

Shannon Tipton

05:44

So building instruction? Yes, it's it. If your organization doesn't know what you do, and you can't explain what you do on some level, then it's going to be hard to maintain this position in the future. This is what makes it really easy for an organization to put l&d on the chopping block, when it comes time to eliminate positions. Because people are, well, we're not really sure what they do. So if we're not sure what they do, how could they be adding value? And I think that that's a logical conclusion for business leaders to have. And so now, when you think about the future of instructional design, and I'm not here to say that instructional design or l&d in that in that place, is dead, you guys know my feeling about that? It's not instructional design is not dead, instructional design is changing, and how we operate within the parameters of that position are changing. So what do you think, when you think about your position? How has it changed in the last few years? I'd be curious to know that so anybody want to speak up, tell me about how your position has changed.

Douglas

07:07

Shannon Shanna, so I don't know if mine's changed per se. But it's it's been better defined. So little background is the company's net, this company never had an l&d department until about four years ago. They brought me on about two, almost two and a half years ago. So my title had never existed, right? This position, this person never existed, right. So they had a job description. But the being the inaugural human being inhabiting this space? It's all been it's all been definition, right. But every, every minute, it seems to expand, right to the point where it's probably a combination of, I don't know, 18 other job descriptions? Realistically.

Shannon Tipton

08:06

Right? Right. And I that is so true, if they're always looking for that unicorn person, the person who can do everything from administering their learning management system, all the way to being subject matter experts on chat, GPT, and everything in between, you know, which is unrealistic for any job position, much less hours. But I'm, I'm curious to find out if there's anybody here in the group who was also in Doug's position where you took a job, where you have maybe you're a team of one, or you are the new training person, like there was no training department in your organization until you came on board. Anybody else in that in those shoes? Mia, is it me or Maya? It's Mia. Okay. Yeah, talk to me about that. Mia.

Mia

08:59

Yeah, I think I've and my most recent position, they were just building the talent development team. But in the past, I feel like as the only instructional designer, I remember on in another position on an l&d team, and, but I can tell you, it is it has been quite difficult to convince a higher level leaders of the value of the profession, you know, at this past position, I had I got a, you know, a particular amount of disdain for instructional design, like that takes too long, you know, and so I kind of quieted down on that experience of mine. But But yeah, it's like I don't know I see that a lot on LinkedIn and job that you know, everyone complaining that their, their role isn't valued or they can't you know, have sort of promote that performance based impact, you know, versus the, let's just get out a lot of informational facilitation type of stuff. And, and so I see a lot of that, but I just don't know who can convince upper level leaders of the value. I mean, I know it's part of our job, I just haven't had a lot of success in doing so.

Shannon Tipton

10:25

Well, anyone want to piggyback on that? What are your thoughts around what Mia just shared? Kelly, hi, Kelly. Hi.

Kelly

10:35

I know, it's been so long. I apologize. Okay. Yeah, I was really in the panel here on the comments. And I was like, Yeah, Department of one. But I'm no longer the only instructional designer at my company. Yay, we hired someone and Shannon, I never sent you the, the, the job description, because one of the best instructional designers I know, got laid off. And I was like,

Kelly

11:02

I have a job opening. Good, good. He called me just to commiserate. And I was like,

Kelly

11:13

I have a job. So anyway, that's what happened. And, and so how this relates to that, is that I did a business case, they have so many projects, right, and they have so many activities coming up. And I did business case, and I showed the global vice president, all the projects were that were not gonna get done. Because I was the only instructional designer at the company. And, and that business case was pretty, you know, I used I went and looked and looked at all the data of how long it takes to create training and how many hours and, and I showed them, this, this might get done. If, if you don't hire someone, if you hire some, this will get done. And, and, and, and it was went from what I could possibly do, which is this big. Two, if you hire somebody, we could get this much more done. And, and all the projects are very critical to the company, right? They need us. So I did do a business case, I spent about two days writing the business case, got it down to two pages. But it became very obvious of what wasn't going to happen if I didn't get help. And and quite frankly, I knew Shannon knows this is that I have been working so many hours, that I'm reaching burnout. And I'm like wanting to quit, right. And so their alternative was either get Kelly help, or Kelly's gonna make a decision.

Shannon Tipton

12:50

decision that we don't want her to make you right. Yeah.

Kelly

12:54

Like, and I think we've all been at that point where you're in a job. And it's like how much they will abuse you to the point where you either like say no, or you you change jobs, right?

Shannon Tipton

13:06

Well, I think you bring up something really important here in your in the story in of itself. As far as a future skill set, or the way that the job is changing, is the way that we talk about our job is changing, and has changed and still needs to change. Right? Because as you know, as Mia has identified as the kind of identified as Kelly identified is that organizations don't understand what we do. So how can we better communicate that? And a lot of times we tackle this conversation from an l&d perspective. Right, we use, we use instructional design words, we use l&d words, we use training words, we really don't speak in a way that resonates with the business. And we had a coffee chat about this several months ago, where we talked about how can we build relationships with management? You know, so and that might be on the podcast. If you go back through the podcast, you may find that conversation. And I think it's still another worthy conversation to have because when we think about how how l&d is changing and continues to change. It's how are we presenting ourselves from a business perspective, from a marketing perspective? This is why I think marketing is another area that l&d needs to make a shift to. So when we talk about how does the job look different? I think having a more marketing eye is going to be helpful. And it helps us in a lot of different ways and so to Kelly's point, they might help you get work or not, you know, help might help you get help, you know, and it might help you create that business case that solidifies what you do. So organizations further understand this. As I'm looking in the chat here, I don't know if this would apply, but I'm starting to write a small status piece that will go in the monthly newsletter. Oh, see, I love that choice. I love that. And I think that's all marketing. That's all marketing, when we when we share what we're doing, where we sort of advertise the work that we're planning to do and what we have done. There's nothing wrong in that. So I think it's good to let the organization know the value that you are bringing. Yeah, make good putting deadlifts I don't know what that means. Make good pill pudding and build marketing from there. Okay. proofs in the pudding. proofs in the pudding? Ah, how

Douglas

16:04

did you not get that?

Shannon Tipton

16:05

I don't know that you making me think about making me think I don't want to think that art. Okay. I think there's also an attitude that anybody can do that. So you don't need a professional. So nah. Right. And I think that business case, going back to Kelly's point there that business kids can kind of shine a light on that this is something that not everyone can do. You know what? So we think about the change in learning and development here. Where does this also lead? So where else do we see our jobs evolving?

Kelly

16:50

I'd like to see it evolve in other countries to that we do more of the performance consulting, we get stuck on projects at the end. And like, there's some obvious things that are happening when like software is being designed that it's quite obvious to the instructional designer that this process is broken, even before they we've asked to stepped in, train them train these people in this broken process. It's like, I can't train this. This is an I can't even understand it. Like, like, this is insane. But it should be easy for people. So I think it's hard to get that buy in. I did finally yesterday get somebody to reach out to me about best ways to train people on a critical new project. And this is headway. I mean, this is huge at my company that that that a senior director reached out to me and said, Ah, we should probably talk about now sounds like they're creating the content, which is worrisome, because it's been bad, right? Because they, again, to the comment, anybody can do that, right. But some of the some of the trainings that I've created, I've been able to with Rhys, get training done in five days needs analysis, figure out what, what they need to know, boil it down, run it by a couple people, and get training out and solve the problem. And whenever you can have those quick wins, you build credibility and you credit build value. I, I just don't do storyline anymore, because people just want it yesterday. And so if you can get those quick wins, you can say, well, I probably won't be able to do this, but I can do this and we could probably do it in a week is that it would a week work for you. And, and but you get commitment that they're going to work with you and get you the information. But those quick wins are powerful.

Shannon Tipton

18:53

That's a great point. Such a great point there, Kelly really, and you know, when I think about so my brain is thinking in buckets here. And the bucket that feels like for me is about project management being agile, right? And so how are we helping the business be more agile? You know, so are we going well, okay, well, that's just that's, that's terrible. And it's going to take me six months to do a needs analysis in order to fix it. No one wants to hear that. Even though that's what we're thinking. Nobody wants to hear that. And if we think about this in context with the rest of the business, the rest of the business has to operate on the fly. So I'm sure that marketing enters the year with a marketing plan. But you think that that marketing plan looks the same in December as it did in January? Probably not. Right? So they have to offer operate on the fly, you know, operations has to operate on the fly. So does finance. So why are we any different? So I think all about and when I say project management, the project, here is our training product. So how are we managing that? How are we managing that process? Are we allowing for agile thinking? You know, are we planning for even a small experiment or a small test before we roll something out? You know, how are we? How are we doing that? And I think that that is an important element to think about. Right? And Joyce, getting by and sometimes requires extreme measures, I had to go to work at 2am with three hours notice to help document a process for training. You know, that's us. That's that. But I'm sure that when you when you did that, it was a big win. Right? Because they saw you like you said in your comment, the business saw you and they saw you doing something. So I don't know if you're in an area to speak to that. A Joyce that I would love to hear hear from you to build on what you wrote.

Joyce

21:21

Yeah, so. So the, the issue was like, in a 24 hour planet, you have to kind of be there at the time when you see the action happen. And so it was one of those things, it's like, when they're coming up in the department, they don't know how you function, or what you're supposed to even do to kind of sit and not do any nothing. So when it came to this Training piece, it was like, I could have scheduled it a little bit more conveniently. But I knew that it was going to have to happen at a certain time and most likely augment traditional work hours. So I just gave the supervisor my phone number and said, let me know when it's coming. And he's like, Oh, we're gonna have the downtime. Now we're gonna change over to three hours, can you get here and I lived an hour away. Okay. So the two hour sleeps, I just got there took the pictures, and it was, you know, bit painful. But the good thing is that the juice was worth the squeeze. Because, like I said, the supervisors got to see the train department out on the floor, the people who worked on the floor, the operators got to see a train department on the course. So you started to get the buy in, from, you know, the regular people on the floor seen you come around. And it's, that has been really kind of good piggybacking. I've been finding that I've been getting a lot more help from the operators a lot more help from the supervisors. It's still never passed. But I feel that doing that has been the thing that kind of changed a lot, I'm able to get a lot more acceptance and help for the projects I was working on.

Shannon Tipton

22:57

Yeah. And that's wonderful. It really is, you know, when we can build that kind of relationship. So it goes back to the future of l&d, a big huge component of that is relationship building. And also, in the case of you going in, and being seen, that's marketing. And that's also product management. So those are three very important areas that you covered by doing that one action. And if we think about it in those terms, so rather than thinking about oh, this is what training does, no, this is what this is how we help the business along, right. And it's, it becomes a very agile approach, which is what businesses need. Now, when we, my company has a think tank program, I love that idea. So Denise, can you talk about that?

Denise

23:56

Sure. Hi, everybody. Um, hi. And he the thing take program is an opportunity for the frontline workers to submit suggestions to simplify processes. So of course, they're the ones that are working in the systems and they come up with well, it would be easier if we didn't have to do this, or we could do this, but my team brought up today, and there's a there's a monetary reward associated with their suggestion being implemented. And my team brought up today that that's what they do all the time. It has, you know, trainers when, when we're being asked to document a new process, or put together a training event or a video or something to explain something new that it's being rolled out. We're always asking those provocative questions that force people the space to give us more descriptive answers. So are we think tanks in and of ourselves?

Shannon Tipton

24:50

Yes. I love that. And you know what, and again, my head is just thinking about these different sorts of business buckets that the skills go into. And what you're talking about there is about future readiness. So how can we be future fit for our organizations, and taking steps like that help you help you progress. It also helps you add value. Now there was an article, and I'm gonna put it in the chat here, Josh Bernsen. But he wrote this a couple of years back or a few years back, actually, let's see 2020. Time flies, a new model for corporate training in adaptive learning organizations. And what he talks about is organizations that are adaptive, and have a culture of learning, but also have adaptive training departments or l&d departments look like at. And I thought that this was really beneficial to help us really get our mind's eye on where we need to be going. And, yes, that was three years ago, and a lot has changed in three years. Because I would also add, you know, there's this whole other technical area that we need to get our eyes on. And when we think about business, and we think about technology, oftentimes, our view of technology is things like articulate, or rise, or even now, chat, GPT, or any other generative AI type of tool. But when I'm thinking tech, I'm thinking generally, do we know how to Hessed technology? Do we know how to vet technology? Do we even know what certain technologies are supposed to do? How they're supposed to help us? Right. So really just having so maybe what it is, rather than business acumen, we need business acumen, the whole conversation for a different day. But it's tech acumen. So is that a future, something that we need to be thinking about when we're having these conversations with leadership, because leadership may very well come to you wanting to know what is this all about? Or conversely, if they aren't coming to you, you can go to them and say, This is what this is all about. And this is how it can help our business. Right. And so when you have think tanks, like what, what Denise was talking about there, those think tanks could also be your steering committee. Right, they could be a little PAC committee, for you, to help you see where the business is going in the future. And then you can provide them with the tools or the pathway to make sure that, you know, they get to where they need to go. So there's a few things that are happening when you have a think tank program, or if you have a steering committee type of program, right. So that's just something else to think about. And then also, I'm also going to post this, which came from red thread. So I don't know how many of you are familiar with red thread research, which is it's kind of expensive to be a member there. But they do give out some free stuff. And the free stuff is really valuable. So here's something that they put out that you guys can have access to, which is future proofing, ID. So what they've done is they've broken out all of these different skills that we need to have, and which ones we're really good at, and which ones really the ones that we need to keep our eyes on. So this would be great, free work, if you will for the next Coffee Chat, where we talk about building on these skills. Let's see what is I'm looking at the chat here from Maureen. One of the biggest insults was when a training i put together received praise as the best training somebody ever had. It was a lipstick on a pig kind of project. Well, right. Maureen,

Douglas

29:33

I wanted to circle back to your comment. why did why would you take that as an insult?

Maureen

29:40

Apart it was because I had worked on all these meaningful things. And I mean, we but the we're this project came about was that the head of the organization said there was an article on The New York Times about blah, blah, blah, what are we doing about that? And everybody says, oh, we need training, we need training. And so it was like this reactive like we had to get something right away. If you Because this, so it was like, Hold on us, you know. So it was just an IT. It was it was also that it was done in the three weeks. And in that three weeks I also was had a week's vacation planned, mind you. So it was like it. But actually what I learned from it was that I also negotiated what was possible in that timeframe, versus doing it as a like a full training, but it just, it just wasn't sold to me given like other things that had been created that had shelf life and everything over time that it just felt like really so like couple quiz questions after a, you know, and actually, the only reason they're quiz questions and some objectives around things was that was the only way they were going to get training, the training departments resources to help them with it.

Shannon Tipton

30:48

Otherwise interesting. Yeah.

Douglas

30:50

But, but but I would take that as a win. Right?

Maureen

30:54

Well, ultimately, it was a win. And I also was like, okay, you know, what, it's not about what I think is important. It's about what the business thought was important, because it was relevant. It was timely. It wasn't about like, you know, engagement and learner interactivity. It was just what they needed just in time and so, yeah.

Douglas

31:13

Correct. And it comes in stages, right? When's the last time? Sports reference for y'all? When's the last time you saw a pole vaulter go from two foot to eight foot? Right? They go up in increments, and any increment forward is still forward.

Shannon Tipton

31:30

Right? And if you're barigye,

Douglas

31:33

and and if you've built a new bar, right, that now they've changed their expectations of well, great, then you can build on that. Oh, you only gave me two weeks. And then if you thought that was good, give me a bit longer, a little more early notice when we can build something even more prophetic for you?

Maureen

31:52

Yeah, I think it was also the fear that they were going to think like, then from then on forward, everything should only take three weeks. So it's like that.

Douglas

32:01

Understood, right? Yeah, there's, there's there's many sides to every coin. But I would take that, and again, what we're just talking about, about marketing, and it's like, here's an example. You guys love that. But what more can we do? That's not just fun and exciting, right? Because you create engagement. But how can we make people learn better? Right? If we incorporate the same thing, in everything that we do moving forward, which is going to take more time to get that to get to that level?

Shannon Tipton

32:33

I agree with you. I agree with you that and I see where you're coming from Maureen, you know, you put all this and we've all been there, right? You put all of this blood sweat and tears into other programs that are sustainable, Evergreen, valuable, right. And you know, they're really good because it's got a branching scenario in it, where it's got a roleplay thing. It's got it's got rubrics, it's got all the things in it. And then they come back and they say, Oh, this little five minute Ladder Safety Man, best thing ever. And you're like, what the literal? Right? And, and I understand the frustration behind that. And, and I think it's wise of you just to sort of compartmentalize that. It's like, okay, this is that's a that's a personal feeling that I'm having. But understand, as Douglas said that it's a quick win for all of us, where they, they might have that epiphany of value. You know, and nor do we want all of our things to be you know, like that. But I love that analogy diagnosis, those Bay, it's the it's the baby steps instead of going higher, right?

Maureen

33:43

Yeah. And I go back to another comment in there that I can't see you now who is but but it was in response to me that you started presenting them with options of what could be done within a certain timeframe, and then say, if we had, here's what can be done, and here's why this may be a better option down the road. So it may have been you Doug or me, Jason. But yeah,

Shannon Tipton

34:08

we were all thinking it. Yeah, I think it was right.

Maureen

34:13

Yeah, but I wanted to whoever had said it, so

Shannon Tipton

34:19

we'll get more in a big Virtual hug.

Douglas

34:24

Where's where's my red flag? Can

Maureen

34:28

I ask for the replay is Jason

Shannon Tipton

34:33

was Jason There we go. All right, Jason. Good.

Maureen

34:36

Anya has her hand up.

Shannon Tipton

34:38

Erica has her hand up. Okay. Erica,

Maureen

34:40

she did have her hand.

Erica

34:42

I did and I'm not really sure I'm I'm not trying to believe her stay within the elements of the negative wanting to always move a conversation to solutions. And I appreciate what you said Doug, and I guess at least from an individual contributors perspective, To, they don't want to have an ongoing conversation, they, they want to say this is how we've conceived it, make it like this. And then they go ahead and say, now we're done. And I think that's why a lot of us get frustrated, why if we just look at Addie, the E is like, probably the abandoned, we are not given the opportunity to then go back reevaluate, iterate with the client to see like, oh, what might then be if we do employ something like Jason had mentioned, as far as like, here are three options, you know, the quickest, the quick, the not as quick or however we present it to them based on where we may have been brought into the conversation to even be able to present options. I don't see that there's ever you know, and it's something I know, Shannon, you're gonna say we were brought up multiple times, you know, the things that ended up dying on the vine, because that he is left alone, or we're not able to get the data that we want to know whether or not that training actually moved the needle. And a lot of the times to Maureen's point, and I felt your pain, just in strictly deep inside memory, that the thing that they want, is, a lot of times not the thing that's really going to solve their issue and dealing with that pain in the the immediate right now. But they're so they already have their blinders on. They've already done all of the work that they think that they've need to do, and they're like, no, no, no, no, this is what I'm telling you. I want so make that happen. And and that's hard than to say how can I be a collaborative in this approach? And, and have the opportunity to have those iterative conversations like Doug was talking about, when maybe the the parameters are not set up in that manner? So that that's a hard pain point to constantly, you know, think through?

Shannon Tipton

37:04

Yes. And I'll go back and I all, from my marketing hat for a second, is, there's always going to be those little things that mean something, and there's always big things that also mean something, and which ones are we talking about? And I think we can take notice of that. So let me give you an example here is let's say, we put together a leadership development program. And it's frickin awesome. Okay. Every it's it goes all the way across the board. People love it, there's applicability in it, you see people taking actionable steps based off of it, and you see, behaviors change. Okay, so it ticks all the boxes. Are we talking about it? Are we talking about it? Are we alerting the organization that this really wonderful, great thing happened over here. And the and then also kind of weaving in this is what it took to make it happen, right? A lot of times we put out these things, and they're successful. And then we sit back, and then we go on to the next thing. And we forget to shed a light on the things that we did well, so that the organization go, Well, yeah, you know what, that that actually was really cool. Because we all know that it's always the bad things that get the voice. Right. So you read the reviews, you know, you're looking at all those terrible one star reviews. And it's like, oh, you know, you don't look at the ones that said, Oh, this was super fabulous. We pay attention to the one star reviews. And it's the same thing with us the same thing with anything. So what are the steps? What steps are we taking to bring forward the good things that we do, and the way in which we do them? And that's the same you before you know, the little ladder safety program. You know, are we talking about? Are we talking about anything that we do? I think this is part of future readiness for us. So this is a significant part of the job that continues to evolve. And I've been preaching the marketing thing for literally years. And now I'm seeing it become more and more important as a part of what we do. If we don't talk about it, no one else will. And this is where you get buy in from leaders and I saw the comment here. Let's see it was back. Here doo doo doo. Okay, yes. From Denise. red thread article said that the highest percentage of future skills is leadership. When so frequently, we don't have a seat at the table. And and this is very true. Depending on your job role within the organization, you may not have a seat at the table. But what are other ways that we can show these leadership skills? I'm going to open this up to you what what are other ways that we as l&d professionals, who may not necessarily have a seat at the table, demonstrate leadership skills to the organization?

Kelly

40:38

I have a suggestion.

Shannon Tipton

40:39

Okay. Kelly, I, I,

Kelly

40:41

I do want to talk about whether it made the change. And so I'm now consistently asking when people want training, how do we know it worked? And how will you know, it worked? And, and I'm asking that every time now. And and if they said, Well, I, I'm not sure. And I said, Well, you know, when you're running reports, would you be able to see it in your reports? Would you? Would you be able to see that they didn't, right? And, and or they're using the system? And so are trying to figure out about talking about how do we know it works, and at least getting them to think about that. I said, it wouldn't be terrible if we did this training. And they kept all doing the same thing. I mean, that takes a lot of money and effort and time. And gosh, I'd hate to be in that position as a manager, that I'm expecting a change and no change happens. Right? So how do we how do we measure whether it worked or not? Now, I am frequently asked to do training that has nothing to do with performance change. It's only for audit purposes, you know, to show the auditor that we did it. And I have now come to terms with that, that there is training, compliance training, quality training, that you just say, Okay, I'll do it with no expectation. They're not doing it to actually change behavior. It's a sad thing, because with quality, if you did, you could really improve quality, but they are coming in their business, that what they want to do is just do the checkmark. So okay, I can do that former compliance person, we can do the checkbox. But when it comes to sales, now that I'm in commercial, I'm really because time is money in sales. So now, now saying, how do we know that they're doing it? Right? How do we know that they took the training? How do we know that they understood it? How do we know? I'm asking those questions now? And, and so that's trying to get them to think about it now. Still haven't been? I've been somewhat successful. And I've got people on board that want to do this, like in in in the commercial. But getting everybody on board, we're still not there yet. But at least I'm asking the questions.

Shannon Tipton

43:12

And that is so important that goes into another bucket. So here's a whole other different bucket when we think about future readiness for l&d. That's all about data analytics, data analytics. There we go. Right. And it might not necessarily, I'm not talking about the data, the deep, ugly data, that we're all just like, well, oh, hell, no, please, please. No. Right. It's just the simple stuff. It could be anecdotal, like what Kelly is is doing here, which is really important. Don't Don't sleep on anecdotal. But it could also be, to your point, Kelly, back when I was working in corporate, and looking helping with sales training, my questions to the sales team were, what are your revenue goals? What are your sales goals? Is it to increase sales? 10% per person, per quarter, or year on year? What does that look like? And so this way, when training came out, I could go back to them and say, did we see arise? did? Are they meeting their revenue goals, or they're meeting their sales goals? And while we may be able to say it's not 100% training that did that, we could say we contributed. Right, we can say we contributed, and that's the important bit. So how are we having those in Congress? How are we having those conversations and how are we using data to our advantage? And that is a great way of showing leadership skills. To being able to talk about data. We don't necessarily have to have a seat at the table. You And I'm here to tell you, it may be hashtag unpopular view, you may not want a seat at that table. Right? You just may want to influence the world that you're in. And that's okay. But how do you do that? How do you influence the world that you are in? Right? And so what other examples do you guys have for me where we can show business relationship skills or leadership skills or consulting skills without having that seat at the table? And I Lakeisha, I like what you're saying there, you require your direct leadership to take the training? Oh, that's always a good one. Because then you say, Well, you guys asked for this. And it's incredibly boring, and you're incredibly bored by it. But this is what you asked for. If you can make those changes, that's always really effective.

Maureen

45:59

Go ahead. And this is a very specific example. But you know, I tend to create performance support, or enablement pages. And, you know, the last onboarding program I developed, you know, giving those very clear cut instructions. What I was able to show was that for the talent team, who got all the questions when they couldn't figure out what to do, I was able to show that their workload, they got less questions, you know, the, the HR coordinator got less questions from new hires, and the HRBPs got less questions from managers on how to do the performance review, because they had somewhere performance support to go and it was laid out for them very clearly. And, and so you know, kind of reducing people's workload, you know, may, you may kind of know what's happening. And I don't know that you could definitely get a number on that. But to be able to kind of get the, you know, somebody's giving that testimonial can help. I think that's just one example though.

Shannon Tipton

47:14

I like it when they're just those little, you know, the stars, give your give your courses, the stars, let them rate it by one star, five stars, four stars, right. And then that becomes information that you can extrapolate and use. And anytime you're putting yourself in a position to be able to gain information and then use that information becomes really helpful. Right, and, and here's, here's my, my other thought on this, as I'm thinking out loud, is I think having those leadership skills in non leadership positions is critical. Here's what I also think is critical, not just the leader skill, leadership skills, but this skill to be helpful. Right. Are we being helpful? And if we're being helpful to the organization, then they're going to see us in a different light. Right? And it goes to you know, what you said there Douglas always asking questions. You know, it's, you know, the ABC role of sales always be closing or the ABC role in the Apple world. Always be charging. It's the always ask questions. And you're in the elevator with someone, ask questions. When you're in the hallway, ask questions. When you're at lunch, ask questions. Don't wait for those formal meetings. Find those times where you can be intrinsically helpful.

Douglas

48:59

And genuine,

Shannon Tipton

49:01

genuine, yes. Genuinely helpful. Absolutely. Because they can sense that right. They got their bullshit meter up, you know, and that it's like, they don't mean that. And they can sense it. Business leaders can sense that they are business leaders for nothing, they know that. So it's, you know, be helpful genuinely right. I'm my pause is I am reading Denise's comment here. Often my desire to have a seat at the table grows from the frustration of being handed a training order at the 11th hour when we had the ability to be part of the solution sooner. Oh, my and I think let's see there are 16 people with us right now. All 16 of us could say yes. We have all been there. It's an i i can hear the frustrate. Question in your comment? I can hear the frustration in your comment. And I think it's Go ahead.

Denise

50:07

I had to react to your comment that I agree that having a seat at the table isn't always the most comfortable place to be. But I think that it allows us the, you know, unless we have this latitude that we really can't showcase what we can bring, we fall into that order taking role. And I guess that's I'm frustrated, because I'm finding myself there right now.

Shannon Tipton

50:33

Get it cool to get it? Absolutely. Um, my comments stems from a lot of times, when I hear conversations happening in conferences, etc. And I hear a lot of times people bringing up well, I don't do this, because I don't have a seat at the table. Because nobody's listening to me, I wasn't able to get into the project sooner, subsequently, this happened. I think that's easy. For some, not every not every situation, but for some situations, that's an easy route. For why we didn't do the thing we needed to do. You know, and I think having conversations with the, with your manager, or with other stakeholders or with leaders, is the hard thing to learn to do. And it's hard to try to insert yourself. And I And it's particularly hard for women, sometimes, because once we start inserting ourselves, we get called aggressive, you know, but and but I but I want to see past that. I want us to be in a place where we feel comfortable, being able to have important conversations when important conversations need to occur. And that's what I say, even if you're, I tell you, I was the queen of the hallway conversation. People be walking past my office, and I would be out from behind my desk, and I would be walking with him down the hallway. Tell me what's happening in your world, what's happening in your world? How's everything going? How's that? I'm sure people took the long way to avoid my office after a certain period of time. You know, so I think that there are other ways to find ourselves in without necessarily being at the table. But it would certainly be beneficial if we were, but not all the times can we be there. And like I said, sometimes we really don't want to be there. And sometimes those seats at the table are untenable. Those chairs are broken. So sometimes I don't want to see at that particular table.

Jason

52:51

Shannon, I don't want to throw a wrench at what you just said. But you know, right now, the reality for most of us, and that's probably why we're talking about what is the future of our roles. We don't have those hallways anymore. That's true. I'm looking around like most of us are sitting in in our houses. That's true. You know, I go into the office every day, but there's maybe four people here. And they're not. They're all within my department itself.

Shannon Tipton

53:22

That is so true. Your thank you for bringing that. Thank you for bringing that up. I'm working in an older paradigm here. Yeah, it's so how do we do that?

Jason

53:34

without, without seeming like or pestering people over teams or whatever?

Shannon Tipton

53:41

And I think are there meetings you can invite yourself to maybe, I don't know, perhaps,

Jason

53:47

if you have this converse, I had that conversation with with my leader recently, which is going to be more consultative and bring more solutions said, well, I need to know what's going on. I don't necessarily need to be in every meeting. But it'd be nice to know what meetings are happening.

Shannon Tipton

54:03

Right? True. I think that's a whole Oh, my gosh, we can have a good conversation about that during the next chat. Which is how to the skill of working in a hybrid environment, not just ourselves, but working with others and connecting with others. You know, in that hybrid environment, how do we get better at that? How do we get better at having hallway conversations when we're not in the hallway? I think that's a wonderful point. Thank you for bringing that up. Yeah. And Eric, I've been told that I'm not allowed to interact with the client. That's a whole different bag of worms. You know, that. We don't have the time to get into and I love this meow. Learn how to slide into their DMS. There you go. That's a good one. Yeah. How do we use the tools more effectively? I love this. This is a great conversation. And I'm sad to see that we're at the top of the hour because I think this was really Really great. And hopefully, my goal here was to take your thoughts and to help you put them into future readiness buckets. Right. So when we think about not just the job of instructional design, or learning and development generalists, or specialists or architects or what have you, it's the what are the buckets that help us see the future, you know, like leadership, like business partnership, like managing relationships, or being more, having more tech acumen, right data analytics, those are the buckets that I see l&d fitting into or needing to have full as we move into the future. And that's why I wanted to have this conversation with you. Because I think we're all in the same boat. We're just calling it different things. So now that we've actually put more business like labels, project management, more business, like labels on some of the things we do, maybe we can be more prepared to work with the business in a more consultative fashion. As we continue moving forward. And that was the goal today, hopefully, you feel that we've hit that goal. So that being said, I want to alert you to the next learn something new the next learning something new in November, is with a date, I could never pronounce her name. Forgive me. A dia. Yeah, the DN Nuruddin. Oh, my gosh. And she is talking to us about storytelling, you know how to turn stories into learning. And I'm really looking forward to that, I put that link into the chat for you. Here we go. And also, don't forget about the learning rebels community and the community where we take these conversations, and we take them to a whole different level. And I would love to see some of you in our community. Good Heather, you have her book, it's a great book. And she's going to be working as working with us through those steps that are actually in her book. So I hope that everybody takes advantage of the learn something new coming up in November is going to be a great time. And again, I hope to see you at our next Coffee Chat where we are going to be working through the skills now that we talked about the future, what skills are we going to need to have in order to make this all happen? So on that note, I hope you guys have a lovely weekend. anybody doing anything fun? Me? I'm recuperating from the wedding last weekend. Anybody else doing anything?

Denise

57:46

I'm going to definitely learn next week.

Shannon Tipton

57:48

You're going to learn Oh, I go into debt. Learn finally. Oh, good for you. You'll see in there, right?

Denise

57:54

Yes. Yes.

Shannon Tipton

57:56

That's so much fun. I hope you guys connect. I'm definitely stopping by the booth. All right. And works in the works in the risk booth during these things. Awesome. Anybody else? Who think Erica said she was going to Yeah, oh, yes, that's right. You did say that. You guys have fun without me. I will not be there. There would be take some good pictures and some nice video and share some information with me. Thank you, Justine. Good to have you here with us. It's good for everyone. I thankful for everyone who shows up to these chats. These are always really wonderful experiences for me, and I hope they are for you. So everybody have a really great weekend. Take some time. Take care of you. Yes, that's right. Okay. Thank you, Kelly. Good to see you again.

Kelly

58:51

Good to see you too.

Shannon Tipton

58:53

Congratulations.

Kelly

58:54

I know I got help.

Shannon Tipton

58:56

You got help. That's always

Kelly

59:01

okay. Thanks a lot.

Shannon Tipton

59:02

Bye. All right. Bye.

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