What New Roles are Emerging in Digital Learning?

During Instinct’s 14 years of recruiting in the Digital Learning sector, despite many profound technological advancements, it would be fair to say that we haven’t seen the development of entirely new job roles within Digital Learning (with the notable exception of Data Analysts and Community Managers coming under the L&D Umbrella for the first time.)

What we have seen, however, is the evolution of these roles and with the advancement of AI and new technologies, this will continue.  I’ve given two examples below.

Instructional Design > Learning Experience Design 

One of the most important shifts in L&D is the evolution of Instructional Design into Learning Experience Design.

Traditional Instructional Design (ID) involves the development of educational materials but often in a systematic way.  Proper Learning Experience Design (LXD) prioritises the Learner's Experience.  It borrows from Design Thinking Principles and involves User-Centred Design.  For more information – look at the 5DI toolkit which is a methodology for Human-Centred Learning Design.  Discovery and Performance Consulting skills are highly important here and these client-facing and consultative skills are some which will be harder to readily replace with Artificial Intelligence.

(However, do beware of the traditional Instructional Designers who just call themselves LXD’s because they like the job title!)

Strategic Learning Positions

The roles of ‘Digital Learning Manager’ and ‘Head of Digital Learning or L&D’ still exist in a very similar guise but the types of technology available continue to shift and this has had a naturally transformative effect on these roles.  Learning Management Systems have been replaced with Learning Experience Platforms:  Content curation tools allow Digital Learning Managers to source and reuse what’s already there: closed AI chatbots trained on the company’s own data and policies will be able to advise employees at the points of need.  However, all these systems need to be procured, deployed and maintained.  This will continue to be the job of the strategic Digital Learning Manager.

As futurist Roy Amara stated, “We tend to overestimate the effect of a technology in the short run and underestimate the effect in the long run”.  Without a doubt, Digital Learning roles are slowly but surely evolving; it will be very interesting to see how the industry looks in another decade!