I am an Instructional Designer - This is My Story

Inspired by Cammy Bean’s post.

Caution: Long post. Is wordy and may be boring at places. But this is the story of my professional life. Life is boring at times. But it is always interesting when you write about life after 10 years.
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What did I want to be when I grew up? Honestly…. so many things!

I wanted to be a rock star, a musician, a dancer, a painter, a writer, an editor, and a teacher…all at different ages of my life and sometimes all of these rolled into one! But never did I imagine that I would be an ‘Instructional Designer’.

One of the big reasons for my lack of imagination is that I did not know that a career like this existed! And to add to my limited view of career choices, in my country, we did not have any courses then (and do not even have now) that allow you to graduate in instructional design. Our lack of vision continues…but more on that at another time.

My first encounter with content writing and editing was at school where I edited the school magazine for 2 years. I submitted many of my own poems for the magazine to compensate for the lack of participation from others. This meant that I had to write poems at a regular frequency and soon developed an appreciation for the ‘written word’ and writing in general. My home was always full of books owing to my father’s interest in reading. My interest in books and all things that help us ‘learn’ started early. Books became my friends.

After school, the difficult period began. Since I did not want to be a doctor, engineer, or a lawyer (what my parents thought I should be) or be a botany, zoology, or microbiology graduate (typical ‘girly’ subjects then), I decided to do something vocational. I joined Bachelor of Home Sciences (another girly course – for the obvious reasons –though my reasons were different). I am still surprised I joined the course – what with my utter lack of homeliness and no interest to be ‘homely’ either! I was a bright student and one with the toppers but I think I studied yet completely ignored the first two years (all about science and home). My carrot in this course was a chance to specialise in Community Resource Management in my final year. I waited for 2 years to ‘breathe again’ in my third and final year. The third year was all about consumerism, mass media, and management of resources – mind, time, and money. That is how close I ever went to formally learning about how to communicate with the public at large. I loved it!

My brush with management and the growing curiosity about the resource of ‘mind’ led me to enrol in a 2-year Post Graduate Management course. I went on to specialise in Marketing and Human Resource Management. With all my management studies and an increased confidence and practical view of life, fortunately (I can say that now), I landed my first job that of a content writer and within the first 6 months moved on to become a manager of content writers! Why I applied for the post is another mystery. The ad said they wanted writers without informing much about the kind of writing etc. I knew I could write so I applied. Rest is history – literally!

I learnt about instructional design on the job. I had the right environment - some wonderful mentors and being fortunate to be working in the largest training company. Along with working on client projects, very early in my career, I was asked to conduct instructional design-related training for budding writers joining our team, our division, and then our company. I started as a substitute trainer for some of the trainers who were not available at the time of the training. Slowly, the trainers did not need to be available anymore. I found my calling and took to training like a fish takes to water.

I think I learnt everything I know by:
- being asked to train others
- being given ‘challenging’ projects
- the trust and faith that my supervisors had in me

To feel less vulnerable, I opened my communication channels with my mentors trying to discuss the best way possible and finding the best possible solution.
To overcome the fear of being asked a difficult question by new hires or experienced folks, I read voraciously and built my own understanding of instructional design and all things related.
To avoid making mistakes others had made, I was always over-prepared and over-anxious.
To always be sure of everything I said to others, I tried things myself before making others learn it.

So it was all about learning and doing and making mistakes and learning! Soon, 10 years passed and here I was –doing needs analysis, curriculum analysis and design, course analysis and design, development, and training delivery without any fancy degrees on my card but by enjoying several positions in the area. By the way, my first ‘job’ lasted 10 years… with the same company. I did get a chance to pack a lot of experience and take up several positions in instructional design and learning.

Here I am now. I am walking a different path and have become an independent learning specialist. My work and approach remains the same. I am still learning and doing. I am making mistakes and experience continues to be my biggest teacher. Books are still my best friends. I read far more today. I blog, I tweet, I network. Instructional design and learning is my expertise and training delivery is my forte. I continue to be over-prepared and over-anxious! I think it helps! :)

The Big Question - What I Learned About Learning in 2009

December’s Big Question at the Learning Circuits blog is “What did you learn about learning in 2009”.

This year has been interesting and eventful for me. I have had many new things to learn and some things to unlearn. If I had to identify one key take-away, it would have to be my own learning about social learning and networking. I realized the power of this by joining twitter and building my own Personal Learning Environment (PLE). Twitter has opened a new platform for me where I am meeting with and interacting with people on all things learning using only a few words. Here, the quality of your conversations matter more than the number of words you use! I have also been more active on LinkedIn realizing its true value and potential in connecting me to groups and people who feel as passionately about learning as I do.

This year, I also got a good opportunity to reflect on things that I had learnt earlier. I studied some of the theories related to instructional design and learning and shared my views and the practical implications of the same. With every passing day, I valued learning and training even more and realized the 'present continuous' nature of learning. I blogged about applying models of learning, training evaluation, need for learning objectives, value of training, and the importance of reflection itself!

Last but not the least, after 10 years of a successful corporate career, I decided to start a new journey of my work as an independent learning consultant. It has been amazing so far. I have developed a deep relationship with my new clients and I hope to offer even greater value to my clients next year. I am excited, as I am sure there will be many interesting turns on this new path in 2010. This has been one of the big changes for me this year and I am sure it will continue to offer me a new platform for my learning in 2010!


I would like to thank my readers who continue to read and encourage me in my learning initiatives. I hope to build our relationship even stronger as we step into this New Year.

The Value of Training - Perception is Reality

One of the most popular models of training evaluation has been proposed by Donald Kirkpatrick. In simplified terms, as per this model, training can be evaluated at four levels - 1-Reaction, 2- Learning, 3- Behaviour, and 4-Results. Many training evaluation forms and feedback surveys have been designed based on this model. While levels - 1-Reaction and 2- Learning are relatively easier to measure, as we move along the higher levels of evaluation, things do get difficult. Recently, a fifth level is being suggested: 5-ROI (Return on Investment). ROI expects measurable results - dollar value, volumes, percentages, growth etc. All of this is good.

However, increasingly, I see the focus of measurement and evaluation of training from the organizational perspective alienating the training and its evaluation from the learner's point of view. So, as a learner, how do I evaluate whether the training worked for me? Yes, sure I can give good feedback, pass the post-assessment with A's but does that mean I learnt and found the training useful enough to be applied on the job?

The way I look at it, as a learner, I need to perceive the training as a valuable input towards my professional/career growth. A way to evaluate the training intervention is to evaluate how far do I think the training can help me - my own perception of the value of training. For example, by what percentage do I think I can improve my performance after applying the training on the job? Another way to look at this could be a before/after perception of value. In a scenario, where an organization is bringing in new processes/changes, learners can be asked to evaluate the perceived value of the new process. After a suitable training intervention about the new processes, learners can be asked to re-evaluate the perceived value of the new processes to evaluate the training. If the organization is able to establish the value of the training and therefore, a higher perceived value of the new processes, half the job of applying the new processes by the learner community is done.

The ROI for me as a learner is whether the time spent on the training was a worthwhile investment in my career. It is the return of my own investment of time and energy spent on the training.

Yes, all this is not as measurable as the dollar value of reduced costs of operation after a successful training. However, identifying and evaluating the value of training from the learner's perspective will probably go a long way in establishing the real value of training.

Perception may be more subtle than a figure with multiple zeros, but its power is far greater. After all, perception is reality, they say!