Hello, my name is Holly Owens and welcome to Ed up edtech the podcast that keeps you. In the know about all the latest edtech happenings. We interview guests from around the globe to give you deeper insights into the Ed tech industry, the field of instructional design, and more, we're proudly a part of America's leading podcast Network the Ed up, experience. It's time to sit back and enjoy. Enjoy the latest episode of Ed up attack.
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guests I have today. I know you've been seeing posts only. Then I've been saying different things about this guest, but today on the show, we have the one and only Tim Slade. Tim Slade, welcome to the show. Yeah. Thank you so much for having me, holly. I'm so Excited to talk to, you have lots of questions that I prepared, but first, I want to give you the opportunity to tell us your story and your journey and all the things about you coming into this e-learning
space. Yeah, so I currently work as a freelance e-learning designer and developer and I'm also the creator of the e-learning designers Academy which I know will talk a little bit more about later, but I've been working in this industry for a little over 15 years now and like most folks can In this industry, I fell into it completely, by accident. I don't have any formal background and any of the stuff that I do I used to catch shoplifters for a living and I have a degree in criminal
justice. And the thing I always tell people is one day, my boss came to me and he said, hey, you're really good at catching shoplifters, which I was, and it said, you should be training others. How to catch shoplifters. They're just so happen to be a training coordinator job for the Store I was working at at their corporate office in the loss, prevention department.
And so I applied for it thinking that it would Advance my loss, prevention career and I managed to get the job and it was through that experience that I was introduced into e-learning and instructional design and that's kind of how I transitioned into this industry, totally by accident. And that's what I've been doing ever since. I love hearing the story, but I also love reading the story. I was like, I had no idea before I read the book.
That that was your story and I was like taking it back. I was like interesting path because you do encounter a lot of and current instructional designers, Lou cops and being one of them whose past wasn't ever going to be instructional design. And now, here we are having this conversation. Yeah, you know, the reason I always tell that story, whenever I have the opportunity is so many people who are new or trying to get into this.
This industry they don't they don't realize that everybody else was in the same boat that they're like that imposter syndrome and the insecurity and feeling like you don't belong. Everyone else in this industry, felt that way at some point and it's because we all were doing something else before we transitioned into this. Yeah, absolutely. And that's sometimes, I still feel like that. No, I was certain points where you're the type of person.
Like we are to, we're always learning, you're like, oh my gosh, I had no idea that it had like a weakness or I need to UPS go in this area so that's yep. That's one of the things I love about this. Community. All right. You're an e-learning Guru as I see it. So I want to know. How do you define e-learning? That's a good question.
I were to go back 15 years ago when I first fell into this industry, you learning would have meant something like a PowerPoint slide with the next button and a quiz at the end of it. And it would have been built in a tool like at the time articulate Studio, which was a
PowerPoint plug-in. And then, eventually storyline and I think for a lot of people in this industry, people who are Newer tend to think of e-learning as something you build in a tool like storyline or Captivate or rise for me when you really think about, you learning as electronic learning and you take a more holistic approach. It's anything that's delivered on a digital device, whether it's YouTube or even listening to a podcast like this could be
considered a form of e-learning. It's any sort of learning experience that's consumed on a digital device. What I always try to promote is that e-learning is really a broad term. That means a lot of different, Types of synchronous asynchronous interactive and
passive experiences 100%. And I love it that you said broad because you know, most of the time, the people the guests that they have on the show and I know the audience to the edtech like ask them to Define edtech and you get a different answer every time it's completely broad but I love asking this question because it gives you Insight it's into the community and insights into what's expected and that type of ecosystem.
So I love asking that question. Yeah, I think with a lot of these Terms whether it's micro learning or e-learning or edtech. We're really good at groupthink in this industry when it comes to those terms. And absolutely. Yeah. I've yet to have somebody really clearly defined the difference between Ed Tech and e-learning, they're all educational
platforms that are digital. So and I kind of you at all as one of the same thing and of course there's categories within that but the big umbrella it's all the same. Yes I agree with you. I totally think that it's a huge umbrella learning and sometimes it's hard for me and I'm kind of going off. Script a little bit here but sure what I think about edtech and instructional technology, those are synonymous to me but some people see them.
As two, different things structural technology can be used in the classroom or outside of the classroom, but Ed Tech in but also be used inside the classroom, but on the peripheral, they're kind of synonymous but people see them as two distinctly different things. I was just thinking about that. When you're talking about umbrella that you learning, I would agree with you. I view them as synonymous as well. We get more specific with the term.
You know, are we talking about learning management systems? Or learning experience platforms. That's where we start seeing differentiations. But these terms in general, they can mean many different things depending on who you ask. Yeah, absolutely. We can have a whole another podcast episode about semantics, and denotations, and connotations in the e-learning world. Sure, we'll save that for
another day. So, I found it interesting that when I read your book and also, I know that you talked about this quite a bit, why the most of e-learning fails and why it sucks. Why is it crab? Like it is Is in 10. I can tell you just from experiencing the corporate instructional designer role. Now, I'm totally on your side about this. I'm like most of it. Does suck in it fails, and it's crap, like, the winners don't learn. So why do you believe this and how do we fix it?
Yeah, I do believe that most corporate e-learning is crap. Tell you the history of why? I say that every time I go get a haircut, the person cutting my hair inevitably, they're wanting to start a conversation and so they'll ask what do you do for a living? And I used to say I mean e-learning designer and of course that didn't translate, or I'd say I'm an instructional designer, none of that would
translate. And so, one day, I told the person cutting my hair and like, you know, when you start a new job and you have to sit at the computer and you have to go through those courses to tell you, not to touch your co-workers inappropriately and they immediately know exactly what I'm talking. Yeah, that's the light bulbs go off. Uh-huh. And I go. Yeah. I designed those and then I realized that's not the right thing to say because then they Immediately you're dead to them
at that point. So now I tell people I help companies design better versions of those courses but there's this visceral reaction with people who don't work in this industry, when you say CBT or online training or computer-based course, and it's because they've had to sit through these really awful poorly designed learning experiences that are more about checking off a box.
Then it is about learning something new, and I think for a lot of people and a lot of organizations, they've translated that into Two people hate e-learning and I don't think that people hate e-learning. I mean people love YouTube. We go to YouTube all the time when we love Tick-Tock. I'm right. That's all right person, that's all that's all e-learning but
people hate is bad e-learning. So I think most corporate training sucks and I think as instructional designers and learning professionals the sooner we can all realize that we've probably been doing our Learners and organizations a disservice with some of the and I'm using air quotes here training we've been creating the the Sooner we can get to designing things that are effective and we can design e-learning that is engaging and effective and valuable.
It just means not simply converting power point slides into a course. And next button and a job is Bored Bored. Totally, I've experienced that I'm like, are we all have how you know, the teacher and me is a screaming on the inside when I hear that come out of somebody's
mouth. Yeah, yeah. So I think I think what you're saying here is we fix it by evaluating what we did wrong in previous iterations or figure out ways in which were impactful to the learner and make it meaningful to the learner because you know, it's through change behavior that people will learn, that's what they learn.
So you have to make your e-learning like that and speaking of great resources and things to look at when you're doing this, tell us a bit about all these different and Devers you are involved in. You do so much out on the Community. You have a very learning designers Community, you have your book, you have the academy. First of all, how do you do all this and second of all tell us
about them. Yeah, so before I started freelancing full time, I used to manage a large instructional design team at a major technology company. And when I first was hired into that role, the team, we were primarily focused at the time on e-learning design and development for the organization. And none of these people had any experience. Designing or developing e-learning.
And so I spent the first six months of my time at this company, upskilling everyone on my process and after I finish doing that I realized oh I think I have a book here. It was a combination or the culmination of everything that I had taught myself but till that point in my career.
And so the first thing that I spent like nine months writing, the e-learning designers handbook, that's my primary book and it was meant to be a resource to provide Not just Theory. There's you know there's so much Theory out there which is important. But understanding the theory is only as good as your ability to apply it practically in the work environment and so I wanted.
Yeah, so I wanted to provide really practical down-to-earth tips advice processes on how to design and develop e-learning and so it started with the book and then I started freelancing full-time in 2019 and I quit that job. I wanted to continue to expand that offering in different That's beyond the book. And so, I had done some courses with LinkedIn learning and through that experience, I really kind of cut my teeth on. How do you create kind of an online course from that perspective?
Like a video-based course, teaching, people stuff. And so I used my experiences from that, that's ultimately what became the e-learning designers Academy which has now evolved even further into our free community and we do online courses and cohort programs. And so it all started with me trying to upskill a team of Nani learning designers, Well, designers into e learning and instructional design, and it's kind of just snowballed ever since.
What an incredible journey and so many different things that have come out of that. And I want people to pay attention, when you said initially, you train people about your process. Yeah. How you are going to do things like intake and development in the different phases and stages of e-learning.
Instructional design developing like a course, I love that because people don't realize like you can't come into a meeting with a smiie and expect them to understand exactly how this Whole thing is going to work, you really have to lay it out for them. Yeah and that goes back to the point about the theory to your point. You can't walk into a meeting with a stakeholder in a subject matter expert and your business partners. And just think that your understanding of the theory is
going to get stuff. Done so much of what we do is instructional designers, in my opinion. And my experience is so much more than just Theory, it's project management, stakeholder management. And then using the tools and the visual design and there's also much that goes into when we're Talking about me learning. There's so much that goes into it Beyond. Just the theory. Yes, the theory is the foundation of everything that we do, but like, actually get it
done, there's a lot more. Absolutely. You know, when I talk to teachers that are coming into the field and they're like, I have no idea what a d is. I'm like, you do a day every day. When you develop your lessons, that's a d, you're putting into play, for analyzing, your learner's are doing the needs assessment. You're developing something that you want some sort of change Behavior around.
You're designing, it, you're putting Get out there, you implement it and then you evaluate it based off of either, what an assessment or you're getting feedback from the students, how they enjoyed it. That's a d, you're doing it. This is up in the different and the different way. Exactly. So yeah, definitely loves it. That comment around the theories and how you can't just say, oh, I'm using adding our Museum Sam or you know, I'm using Merrill's principles. I don't say that.
I'm just doing it, right? Exactly. Yeah. All right, for the people in the audience who are new to this industry, Tree or this ecosystem of e-learning and everything that it encompasses. What are the top three pieces of advice you would offer for the newbies that are jumping into this field? With ice, bring sweet 11, start creating e-learning, content,
faster easier. And with more pleasure I spring, sweet has everything you need to fall in love with your authoring tools for creating beautiful interactive courses. I Spring Library with ready to go design assets. Treat yourself to less stress, less complexity more drive, more possibilities and more love for your work. Try, I spring sweet 11 for free. Oh gosh, um, I know, I know it's like pick three, just three, I guess.
My number one thing would be in this applies, whether you're doing e-learning or not as focus on not what people need to know. But what people need to do in a workplace setting, which is mostly what corporate lnd is, people don't need to know anything, they need to do things on the job. Yes. And so focus on doing first and that extends, not just To what you're doing by yourself as an
instructional designer. But even when you're interacting with your stakeholders and your smi's, don't talk about knowing things talk about doing things, I would say my number 2 tip would be be willing to talk your stakeholders and subject matter experts out of training and it seems counterintuitive to talk people out of. I love this tip needing to be there, but I think to be truly objective, we have to be willing
to admit. The training is not the answer, so often trainings, not the answer and being willing to push back and talk them out of training and ask Mark Britt, he works for the learning Guild and he posted something on Twitter the other day. I can't, I'm going to butcher what he said, but he said one of his favorite questions to ask his stakeholders or smees is what if training wasn't an option, what would you do? And just that little thought,
experiment, makes you question. How else can we solve the performance issue? And maybe you realize that trainings. Needed at all. And then I think my third and final tip would be that kind of going back to our previous little conversation.
About the theory is that recognize that specifically e-learning development is just as much instructional design and learning theory as it is multimedia, development, graphic, design visual design knowing how to edit audio and video and bring the other Graphics or edit photos, and create your own Graphics or edit Graphics.
That's a big part of it. And I think one of the big points I make towards the end of the book and I've made this before, is that e-learning is a tool for Visual Communications. It's a piece of potentially interactive multimedia, and if a course, doesn't look good. If you're not using the opportunity to use your slide, your screens to show your learner's what you're trying to say. And if it's not intuitive and easy to use and it doesn't
matter. How instructionally sounded owes all those other things that have to support its Effectiveness from an instructional design standpoint because of the nature. Sure of what it is. A piece of interactive digital multimedia, if that makes any sense. Yes it does.
And I'm so happy that you listed that as number three because there's a lot of conversations I hear from people they think, because if they are a guru in some of these areas that's going to give them the job or that's all they need. I try to deter people from thinking the technology is the only thing you need because it's not. It's the supporting Foundation upon, which you are doing these things. Great advice. Absolutely. Wonderful advice for people who
are new into the field. And along with that, you have all these great resources, the wonderful book and you have places for people to go. But as yourself, where do you go to learn where your favorite resources for me when I need to learn something new? Honestly? YouTube is probably my go-to spot. Google it and find a YouTube video that teaches me how to do it. Yep.
Catherine Lombardo Z. She's another person in our industry, who's been Instructional design for ever and ever and ever and she's an author and thought leader and all this great stuff. And one of the things when I worked at a previous company, we hired her as a consultant and one of the things that she helped me understand is that as people they get more extensive in their their level of expertise of a particular thing, their need for formal training.
Reduces it becomes more about resources and your network and all of that stuff. And so, one of the things I've learned about myself is that as being a deeper level of expertise in a given thing, It becomes less about your need for formal training and more about Connections and network and
resources. And so for me I learned a lot from my network of people or when I go to a conference it's more about seeing other people in the industry and connecting and learning from them and seeing what they're doing and and when I just need to learn something quick and easy it's usually YouTube. I love it so simple yet. So impactful. Yeah, that YouTube is something else. I'll tell you and I could have a whole conversation around how college is going to become.
I like you too, but we'll save that for another day, honestly. It's just it's amazing. Judges will become obsolete because of YouTube me. Yes, exactly. That's what I meant to say. Yeah, it's just crazy that I can't wait to see. Like, I tell people all the time, I can't wait to become the dinosaur in the room because I want to see what these next Generations are going to do. I cannot wait. It's going to be so exciting, sit back, think more and more people are going to be going
against the grain. If you will of what people like you and me, were gold is what you're supposed. To do supposed to go to college and I'm supposed to get a bunch of debt and then go get a corporate job. And I think a lot of kids, nowadays are going to go against that and make their own way and learn things more practically rather than going to college and spending thousands of dollars.
If there was a great story that I'll say this real quickly, there's a great story can remember where I saw it. But there was this kid, he was like 19 years old, and he wanted to learn about coding. And, you know, a lot of colleges you can just walk in and go sit in a classroom and listen to a professor, right? And never paint and he went and learned how to code by going to these college classes and sitting in the back pretending to be a student.
Of course he never earned a degree or any credit hours, but he learned what he needed to be able to go get a job, you know, for free first time, that's crazy to us being so ingrained in the how we were raised. But to me, I love that. Why not the ethics of that are questionable? Yeah, I remember, I remember I went and saw you know, when my friends had college classes, I just go sit with them.
And then the classroom and learn about whatever and the professor didn't care, you know, I don't know. So yeah, I mean, those big lecture Halls, how do you know that? There's somebody who's not supposed to be there. How do you know, you're not like attendance, like, 300 people sometimes in those rooms. Absolutely, but I love that store. I know, there's a story like Ed surgery or somebody came out with recently about the students that don't want to go to
college. And they're talking about the Avenues are taking like, whether that's your trade schools, are there going directly into the workforce After High School? Because they've gone to a special Academy or something, where they learned the skills. The trade and they just can go right into it. I love those alternative options, you know, as a teacher I had so many students who I tried to tell them about college and then I realized like that
was a losing battle. They don't want to go to college, they want to do other things and they have other creative mindsets to do those other things. Normally, the point them, the resources for that. Yeah. And I mean, I feel like at least my generation growing up in the 90s and then graduating in the early 2000s from high school, you know, there was so much pressure about college. And getting a degree and all of that is not to get weird about it.
But it's just a social construct, you know what I mean? And I think a lot of people are realizing. I know this, I mean my degree in criminal justice, I transitioned into training and development, the year, I graduated with my criminal justice degree. I've never used that thing and it cost me an arm and a leg. And if I can go back in time, I would totally have not done that. I know. And I completely agree with you. So ingrained in me as well and I'm from the same generation and
I'm like, what was I thinking? Like, what was I doing? Because what you were told to thing, you know? Yes. But your that's exactly age, you know. Yes. Thank you Boomers and gen xers, parents. Yeah. Thank you so much that all to you for all the drama. Yeah. That could be a separate podcast as yes. Absolutely. We have to find somebody who's involved in the psychology of like Millennials and all of, you know, there's any holes, whatever Generation.
All right, so you've done a lot of great things. You've been in the industry for quite a bit. Is there anything? Thing coming up for you or there any new Endeavors on the horizon and books or otherwise that you have coming up that you're willing to share and tell us
about yeah sure. So I had a friend of me asking for a friend of mine asked if I was going to write a third edition of my book and they didn't occur to me and then I started thinking I'm like oh yeah I think I could write a third edition so I might do that but I don't know if that'll be next year. I'm working on a bunch of new course content for the e-learning designers Academy which will go live next year. So yeah. Keeping busy with that stuff and by next year, you mean this
year. Yeah, fine 23. Yeah, I know, I know, yeah, he's gonna take a good month or two before we start. I know I'm gonna see ya. I'm gonna write 2022 on all my stuff in my little notes for quite a while. Well, that's good to hear. I'm definitely gonna be first in line for the new book and the you learning academy. I know gets rave reviews, I can only imagine the content that you're developing, and how Stellar it is. It should happen. Yes, its yes. It shouldn't be good.
So my final two questions that I ask on the show. It's really it's like it's two in one and then a third. So is there anything that we missed? Our is there anything else you'd like to share with the audience and get out your crystal ball? And tell us what the future? Be learning looks like. So what do you miss and what is the future of e-learning? Gosh, I don't know if we missed anything, we went something else.
A lot of different directions. You know what, here's what I say when I get asked the question about like what do you think the future of lndia's? And I regard that question the same as when you're in an interview and they go where do you see yourself in five years? And my answer is always like hell if I know I really don't know I don't have a crystal
ball. I could have never predicted myself in this industry so I try not to predict it because you never know what new technology is going to pop up or buzzword that's going to totally revolutionize or change the
industry. And so I am one of those people who just rides the wave wherever it takes us and adapt as I need to. But I guess I don't know if I were to say one thing, I guess what I'd say is everyone's talking about AR and VR but I think yes, we're always out from that being he to, I feel the same way. I feel like it's been a buzz for a while, right? Yeah, it's just the technology is not cheap enough impractical. I don't know if our industry has figured out. Exactly. The Right.
Use case for AR and Are you know what? I'm going to say? Hell, if I know, I don't know. Yeah. All right. That's a great answer. I absolutely love it. I have no idea where this thing is going and I'm going to get my surfboard and ride this wave and see what happens. I love it exact 100%, it's easier. I mean, I'm looking forward to seeing what happens. I'm like you, I can make predictions but I really have no idea. What's next. I mean, it's almost like five years in this world, you know?
I mean, like nothing was predictable. So Actly and I totally feel that way proposed pandemic. I'm like, oh my gosh, I can't believe what's happening and how instructional designers and e-learning developers. All these people have come to the Forefront. Like people actually know who we are, we're not just sitting behind a desk or not some hermit in some office area. We are people who know things and we can do things. It's fantastic, I love it. Yeah, for sure.
Well Tim I can't thank you enough for your time and coming on the show and sharing all the things. And having this conversation with me, it's been really enlightening and really fun as well. Yeah. Thank you. You so much for having me. Of course and happy New Year. Yes you've just experienced an another amazing episode of Ed up. Ed Tech. Be sure to visit our website at Ed up edtech.com to get all the updates on the latest edtech kapiti. See you next time.