61: Moving from ID to Senior ID with McKenzie Day

hey mackenzie how are you

i am good how are you

i'm doing well thank you for joining me let's jump right in why don't you tell me a little bit about yourself where you started where you are today and anything fun you want to share

yeah so i am an instructional designer in the financial services sector and i just got my first promotion so starting

yea

in two weeks i will be a senior technical instructional designer at a remote softer company my background was actually

i actually

an education so i taught in international schools all over the

a

world and in twenty seventeen i moved to atlanta and became a head of department so i was managing a team of fifteen educators

wow

and in march of twenty twenty when we went virtual i really joyed the digital learning experiences i liked you know up skilling my team

no

setting up all of the

look

courses online working remotely really worked for me and so that was

a

kind of the spark for me to transition to id and i recently um when in a job hunt because my current organization

organization

announced that we would be returning to office in january

m

i was so happy there

happy there

and really loved the work had no plans on leaving but

sure

it kind of lit a fire in my belly that oh i don't think i want

do

to go into an office

yeah

i'm going to use this as an opportunity so knowing that

owing

i was

that

gonna

i was

job hunt i decided if i am going to leave

gonna leave

and look for remote work

no more

i want not only to find

only

a new position that's remote but i want a promotion i want more responsibility

yes

like ideally more

more

higher salary would be great

yeah

but i found you know it doesn't come naturally like people

yeah

aren't just going to hand you more responsibility so i had to really research how do i do this set myself

my

up for success

success

advocate for myself and that's what i'm here to talk about with you today

that's great i love that and i think that your experience is one a lot of people are encountering right now with the return to office narrative and i've heard some

yes

really like your sounds like a very nice transition i've heard some real horror stories of people who move to more remote areas because of cost of living that are now being asked over the office and it's just like

at

up ending families and in things like that it seems it seems pretty dire

oh

but it seems like your situation was a lot less dire than that yes

i'll say my current organization was completely understanding like they get

nice

it that if i if i want to work remote

we promote

then that you know that company can't offer it to me that

sure

they understood that i was going to look for unities elsewhere

that's really good yeah so tell me about kind of how you decided you were ready for this promotion because i think a lot of times we we kind of do that self reflection

ah

and we kind of are like am i ready for more responsibility do i think i can achieve this higher title you know we kind of go through that narrative so tell me what that kind of was like for you and how you determine that you did want to go for a higher role

yeah so i think it's a lot of confidence like just kind of believing in yourself and

yeah

um i put my name

my name

forward

we

for new challenges and

m

explicitly told manager i wanted

i

more

wanted

responsibility

rsponsility

so i really

i

thought

really

about you know what do

what

i want to do next

to

and i know i wanted not only more responsibility but to kind of lean into the technical side and

yeah

so knowing

owing

that

that

um you know i put myself

my

forward for projects that were going to be a lot of software simulations and just kind of

no

dove into learning captivate and took an advanced course

course

on camtasia to

nice

build you videotatorials i started volunteering

on

for those things

those things

just basically by looking at what senior instructional designers do and

yeah

you know start doing those things i actually

i actually

asked some of the senior ideas

rides

in my role like how did you get there

oh

research

perfect

like what's different what are you doing that i don't and a lot of

lot

it is the business side that there they were a lot more knowledgeable about the business and building relationships with those stay holders with business partners and senior leaders and so i started to

i

get placed on some of those projects because i asked for it and i proved myself

yeah

i think i probably

probably

could have

could

just kept coasting doing the

doing

same

the

thing

same thing

you know

sure

for a while but that i'm quite

i'm

ambitious so for me i knew i wanted a new challenge

yeah

and i will admit at first when i was in the room with senior leaders i felt way out of my league

m

but i was very organized

organ

and i always acted professionally

essionally

you know acted like i belonged

i belonged

in the room

in the room

and i pulled it off and then you know after

later

you kind of settle into

all

these new projects with more responsibility you start believing in yourself

yeah yeah and i think it's also really important to remember it as something that i always forgot when i was like walking into a room with senior leaders is that they're like at the core there people too right like and

yeah

it's so easy to forget that when you're at work and you're in that professional setting and there's that like organizational structure like bing over your head and some work places are really formal about their senior leadership to so it can be even hard to get access to those people but the other thing to remember too that go what kind of the confidence piece that you said is that there they don't know as much about instructional design as you do in most cases unless you're working with

yeah it's a great iesymbiotic relationship you know

yeah

they they are experts on the business and i bring to

i

the

think

table the learning theory and so keeping that in mind it's more of a partnership

yes exactly yeah that's great and i love what you said that the collaboration in the business acumen is really the differentiator because my p h d research is on instructional design leadership competencies that people need to successfully lead design projects and that was the number

yeah

one thing that i found was maker break for design projects

m

was being able

m

to collaborate successfully and have a consistent and constant review process with your subject matter experts and state holders i love that that's what you found too in your experience because that matches my research that's always good but yeah i mean tell me a little bit about how you kind of started um you net worked internally right so you talked to the people who had the roles that you were going for within your organization did you do networking outside

i did um you know whenever

what

i saw a job opening i liked i looked for connections with the organization

nice

and i think i used to be a part of t p l d is one of the mentors and that

yes

was great way to meet a ton of people and instructional design

absolutely

um so i reached out to you know any connections i had even anyone

he was

in tech that i knew if you hear of anything

here's

let me know any recruiters who i came into contact with like during this job hunt i added them on linked in and started to

i

build

love

relationships

it

there and then actually

actually

what panned out funnily enough

a

was a linked in connection

in connect

um someone i knew

i knew

worked in an organization

organizin

that had this role as senior technical instructional designer that i had my eyes on and

m

so i

so

reached

i

out

reached

to

out

them and we've

and

never

we

even

never

met

even met

person we've only spoken on linked in before

yeah

um and i had

i

answered

had a

some questions about my company for her previously

oh yeah

and so this time i was able to reach out to her and she or some questions about her company

thing

um and

and

she was

she

able

was

to

able

put

to

in a good word with her manager and that's the role i ended up getting

i love

oh

it i love it and that is that's what i really try to tell like new and inspiring instructional

yes

designers is that it's not about reaching out to every random recruiter who's associated with a job add like yes of course you can do that and of course it's great to like you know send them a little note and let them know that you're interested but it's really

yes

the relationships that you foster and grow and like the connections that you make that really make that network it's not about cold calling people or cold messaging recruiters or you know you really have to kind of intentionally start meeting people like you said t p l d which is teaching a path for learning and development is a really great group on linked in where just a lot of aspiring instructional designers and other land folks go to hang out and there's a lot of people who've been

ah

they came from and going back and offering that same help so i think that's really great and i think i think that happens a lot right like i and there's something to be said in this more modern work environment right where you mentioned you never met that person in real life i have so many like people who i would call real life friends that i've only ever met on linked in um and it's just really it's different right we're in a more remote world so you can make friends you can make connections

yeah and i think too it's not just trying to interact with people who are maybe higher up the food chain than you but like you

like

said like paying it forward

yes

so one thing i try to do on linked in is always within t p l d a lot of

lot

teachers that are currently trying to transition to instructional design will ask for advice so

yea

i try a couple of times a week i go in there and just try to answer questions i'll give feedback if people are asking for that and just make sure that

i

i'm paying it forward as well

yeah i've seen like the net working formula there's always like some form of it right where it says like um connect with people who are where you want to be in five years connect with people who are where you are today and then connect with people

m

who are where you were five years

and

ago so that you

yet

can kind of keep that that um like pay it forward but also look forward to your own future

yeah i like that

yeah and i think too like i've seen people post like who wants to be my boss right and it will be like someone who landed a role who like now there's a manager position open where they work you never know when that opportunity can arise to where if you connect with somebody who you've mentor right like if their bosses position opens up they can put in a good word for you like oh this person taught me thing i know right and then you could land a job there as in a higher role you know

yeah i do

you

actually that reminds me i want to add that i have a mentor and it's someone

nice

at my current organization she is amazing we meet every other week and i will say that was a big part of this having

having

someone

one

that i could ask

i

like dumb questions

yes

and maybe you know i'm too embarrassed to ask them publicly but with a mentor we have a solid relationship we've been chatting for here now

here

i can ask her anything

thank

so that

yes

that was super helpful just having someone

one

to bounce ideas off of and support me like talk through

yeah

all these different opportunities and options also just

so

her knowledge you know being further

m

along in her career was

m

super helpful so having a mentor relationship played a big part i would say in my career advancement

yeah i love that and so what i what i'm hearing a lot of is that you really kind of took the reins here you took a lot of steps like you were like okay i need to

oh

talk to people who are in the role i want to be in i need to learn the tools better i need to network with more people i need to talk to my mentor like you really kind of created this plan for yourself how did you decide that these were all the different things that you needed to do

that's a good question

yeah

m gosh i think the amount of information is overwhelming so yeah

yes

you do have to make a choice like where am i going to focus um so for me

for me

i knew

knew

i wanted

that i

to

wanted

up

to

skill but i was not going to waste time up skilling on just anything in

i

l n d

sure

um i knew i wanted to go into teck when i was making this move i want either technical instructional design role or an instructional design role in

oh

tech um

yeah

and so that's that's really where i

we

focused i signed up for code academy so i learned the basics of htmlcssand job script

m

um i did advanced courses on both storyline and camtesia and i have been regularly entering the learning hero's challenges all year

love it

um i

i

re did a lot

did

of them portfolio pieces my work samples that i was presenting to the world

yes

so i created like newer technical pieces that showed off these new skills and the

i

write

love it

ups as while i added a lot of detail and that i will say paid off because in interviews

uh

with two different companies i was asked to walk them through a portfolio piece um

m

and they wanted

they

to

wanted

see

to

a portfolio

see

piece that's going to reflect the work i would do for them so i

yes

was able to say like oh yeah here's a product training video i created

create

for a customer education program

perfect

um and that was not on my portfolio six weeks ago so that that i knew

i knew

that i needed to present strong application materials that showed

yes

off all these new skills yeah basically since august i have been trying to learn as much as possible about

about

like the land field career paths so i listened

m

to a lot of podcast years included

m

i read books

i

on agile project management

nice

and i think kind of the last step was just re doing

doing

all of

all

my application materials to reflect

yeah

this

no i think that's important because i don't know if you're like me you look back even couple years like it's been a few years since i've applied for an instructional designer practitioner role so like my stuff is all like a few years old at this time and even now still i look back at it and i'm like gosh if i ever need

uh

to like show somebody my portfolio

h

i need to do some work

yeah

yeah

i'm constantly like tinkering pulling stuff off of their like

yes

i think when it started i probably had like fifteen work samples and now i'm down to

okay

here's three really good ones

love it

yeah

i love

yah

it and i think that's

h

so important to from my hiring manager perspective because i just don't

m

have time to go through fifteen portfolio projects as much i would love to like we i think this last time i just hired for an instructional design role we had like two hundred applicants and you kind of do that initial initial pass through there were like fifteen to twenty solid people i was like i could interview any of these but i had to narrow it down even further to like it was six or seven and so like you really have to like that's so much time spent in just looking at people's portfolio

yeah

get a few really strong samples that you can two as well but also that showcase what you've been doing not just like where you were at the beginning um if i had my first ever story line project on my portfolio i would be like laughed out of field for sure

yeah

but

my

you

initial

know

flagship projects i've taken those all down

yes see

yeah

see you learn and you get better and you're like okay this isn't good enough any more and that's okay like it got your foot in the door but it's important to show that you've you've kept growing so yeah i think that's great and i want to talk i definitely want to make sure we have time to talk about like the actual application interview process itself so tell me

hm

bit about that

so at first i was applying

oh

to anything that i saw

i saw

as a step up which included

m

senior idea roles but then also land manager roles

h

and after about a week of that i'll say this i was very choosy so my thing the whole

that's

process

good

took about six weeks i applied to one

okay

job a day and

yeah

i would pick out one that looked really good to me and i realized ter a week

we

for manager

a

roles i've been ahead of department like i have people management skills

yeah

i have run criculum and teaching and learning programs but i just

i

realize

just

that's not not what i want to do right now like right

sure

i really believe in serving your time in the trenches so to speak

yes

i want to be doing the work i want to be really good at these tools and

yeah

then maybe in a couple of years think about moving up to a manager role so

sure

the first thing was just deciding like i am only going

only

to go for senior

no

or lead instructional design roles

love it

um or maybe even

a

an i d role that includes project management project

sure

product ownership something like that yeah so i narrowed it down

it it down

and was really i think in the end i applied to around twenty five maybe thirty max positions

okay

over the course of those six weeks and

and

ended up hearing back from five companies

i

i had

nice

a couple offers and i found the

on

interviews

the view

they

yeah

i don't know that they were more challenging than when i was applying for my first instructional design role maybe they were a little less terrifying actually because now i have a year of experience in the field

yes

i feel like my examples are a lot more

lor

relevant but you do have to know

have

your stuff you can't really fake

real

it with the interview you know being asked to walk through portfolio items

yeah

fact that i did put my heart and soul into these and built them from scratch based on skills that i had worked

it's

on

fun

um

oh

i could speak to them you know they wanted

they

to

wanted

know in

to know

a senior idea role what or some current industry industry trends that you're interested in

love it

the questions were more challenging and

yeah

yeah i found

no

i had to really prepare

are

strong anecdotes for that senior instructional design role so the types of stories that i

reason

was bringing up in interviews were a little bit different i really talked about

talked about

times that i oversaw a whole project not just contributed to it but i was

yes

like running things um times that i was interacting with senior leaders really bringing in you know practices and learning theory and contributing to teams like how did i

how

elevate

did

the

ee

whole team not just my work but what did i contribute to a whole project team so yeah the

yeah

types anecdotes that i was practicing were quite different from a year ago

i do

but i just i

i

had

just

a couple

had

o

a

stories

couple

in my pocket i rehearsed them

i

over and over again and the interviews happened like i feel like i could

i

speak quite naturally to my experiences

yeah that's a really great point and i often tell people to do that regardless of the level that they're interviewing for just to write down some bullet points of like things that they're proud of that they've done on the job right like just different situations that they've been in or projects or just like start to think about those and collect those because it's really easy to forget when you're in the moment yeah and if you just have like that list of like here are all my

yeah yeah for every interview

every

i'll say this i rocked up with notes like i have a note book and i referred

love it

to my notes and i think that's okay yeah

yes yeah i was just chatting with a friend recently who was like well if i take notes like how can i hide them or like where should i put them and i was like just have them in front of you like you know what are what's the person going to do are they're going to yell at you for having a notebook to refer to during an interview like it shows that you've prepared it shows that you're trying to

ah

like you really care about this and that you've put thought and time into it you know

yep

i love that so in terms of you said you had two offers how did you make a decision

uh uh so they yeah i guess the offers

the

were quite similar in that they were both remote tech companies

hm

with a lot of

oh

technical instructional design both of them the work sounded great the team sounded great it did

it

come

did

down to well at first it was the package and honestly the offer

sure

was quite similar for both i that was another thing i had to really research was how to negotiate and talk compensation and benefits and

yes

um not playing them against each other but how do

sure

i work with two different offers now like

yeah

how yeah even if

and

base

it

salary is different you know you also want to look at the

oh

whole package

right

um it really came down to feeling like the best fit with the company

i like

both

that

teams i interviewed with were great the role we're great the package was great and the organization

organition

that i'm going to be starting with on october thirty first

yes

it just had stellar reviews on glass store

m m

um m i've had experiences in the past not where i am now but previously as a teacher working

sure

in super toxic environments and

yeah

that's not something i could ever repeat again so i'm quite

i'm

weary

quite

like reading reviews get any sense of you know that there's any sort of

yeah

taxi city within a workplace that's a huge

yeah

red flag for me so yeah the organization

organ

i went with just had stella reviews like through and through on glass door knowing someone who already worked there only had good things to say um that was key also like one

like

of the

one

things i asked in the final interview which was a panel interview with the whole team

yeah

how are you all managed like how is

oh

what commonitored how is your work load distributed what's work life balance like what's the management style of your leader

yeah

so asking the right questions helped me set out what was going to be a good fit or me like i probably would not work well with a micro manager

yeah

i really value flexibility autonomy trust and so yeah i

yeah

use those panel interviews with current employees to really figure out what's going to be the right fit for me

yea

um also lots of practicing like saying out loud what i want salary wise and just kind of

i

sticking

love

to

that

it like i actually wrote down a script and just practice saying it over and over again so by time

the

i got on the phone with the recruiter

with

to talk like no i'm

no

for me to feel comfortable taking this role i would really

i

need

really

this number um

i

and

love

here's

that

why i think i deserve it that was something i just had to practice and drill over and over again

again

because that does not come naturally

yeah i think that that doesn't come naturally to a lot of people and especially women and you know there's a lot of statistics out there that women are much less likely to negotiate at and to self

ah

advocate

i

and to really ask for what they feel they're really worth and so i'm so glad that you did that and i would encourage everyone who's listening to do the same thing and i think it's so great

i

that two things

i

that you turned the panel interview

ah

into a mutually beneficial thing because the panel

the

interview a lot of times is that they're trying to see if you're going to be a good fit on the team that you're going to be a good fit at the company but it's also opportunity to do the same thing is this company is this team a good fit for me and so i think finding out like you said the culture is really important to you the you know some well it's not as important right so you really do have to figure out what's the most important thing for you in a role

i

be supportive and non toxic and to really have like a good good val you system so it's important that i identify what those things are for you and then find out what the questions are that you can ask in those interviews to figure out if it's a good fit and i just love that when everything else was considered what it came down to for you was company culture and i think that in the fields of land and in the in just the professional workplace in general we're starting to see that more and

it's really important to me that employees are treated well and like i have been involved in d and i task forces at my last three organizations so

yeah

that's something that's really important to me um

yes

you know company culture like is it inclusive it's not enouh to

m

just be diverse like

yeah

you can have a super diverse work place but if you don't know how to handle that that

yes

could turn out really bad

oh

so i think having a

having

chance to talk with current employees and try to figure out like do you feel valued do they treat you well it's fair to ask those questions before making a decision

absolutely a hundred per cent and you should ask those questions not only is it fair to but you definitely should because the worst thing is to start and be like two weeks in and realize that like yeah well this is really not the kind of environment i want to be working in but now you're stuck right

yeah

or you

and

have

it's

to

hard

start

to

all over

yeah my current organization is so great like it is really a

yeah

positive uplifting workplace i am leaving only because of the remote opportunities that are out there like

yeah

me not wanting

yeah

to work in a cubicle that's really it like i i love my current team my managers

man

are amazing i've grown so much like they are so generous

yeah

with professional development and for me to leave it had to be a really positive workplace that draws me away

yeah and i also think that's a really important commentary on a lot of companies who are are making that decision to bring people back into the office is to consider what you would lose you do that right consider the talent because obviously

yeah

you did have a really good relationship and you were taking on a lot more responsibility because you did want that promotion like and whether it was at the company that you were at or at a new company you were working towards that either way and so you know we call that in in the business world in h r a regrettable loss right when somebody leaves is it a regrettable loss like is that somebody who we would have liked to keep and i think that companies who are pushing this back to the first

yeah i'm sure you know by making the decision to bring people back in the office there's going to be quite a few of those

yeah absolutely all right so my last question for you is if you could pick only one resource for everyone who's looking to up skill and get to that senior i d role what would it be and why

okay so this is not really

oh

about idea

okay sure

but for me for this particular job transition i knew i was trying to level up to the next step on this career path her money podcast was super

nice

helpful so her money it's

money

with genchatski and yes

yes

she covers the basics of personal finance

so i

like saving and investing through this feminist lens but she also gets a lot into careers talking about good management the gender pay gap how to negotiate um you know

yeah

that a recent episode i just listened to is ambition not a dirty word

yes

that really spoke to me so yeah the her money podcast is great for cultivating that belief in yourself that you can advance your career

i love to hear it well thank you so much mackenzie good luck on your first day at your new role and thanks for being on the podcast today

thanks for having me