L&D Must Change

What if becoming a better facilitator has less to do with learning another technique and more to do with understanding who you are in the room? Jess and Moe Poirier explore why facilitator development needs to move beyond content delivery and mechanics toward presence, adaptability, and human connection. They unpack Moe's five facilitation personas, how each meets a different learner need, and why exceptional facilitators know how to flex between them while still showing up authentically. They also explore the difference between performing as a facilitator and being truly present. Jess and Moe Discuss Why facilitation should move from transactional delivery to transformational experiences The five facilitation personas: Sensei, Drill Sergeant, Superhero, Confidant, and Jester How each persona responds to a different need in the learning environment Why facilitators naturally default to some personas more than others How to recognize what learners need and flex your approach in the moment The difference between facilitator performance and authentic presence Why facilitator development should include more than techniques and content mastery About Moe Poirier Moe Poirier is a facilitator, coach, and founding partner of Shift Facilitation, where he has spent more than 25 years helping trainers, leaders, and teams become more effective facilitators. Originally trained as an engineer, Moe has built his career around the belief that great facilitation goes far beyond simply knowing the content or mastering a set of techniques. It's about presence, adaptability, and understanding the unique strengths you bring into the room. He is the author of the new book, The Five Personas of Facilitation: Elevating Your Unique Training Delivery Strengths & Style, which introduces five distinct facilitation personas and helps trainers and facilitators better understand their natural tendencies, build on their strengths, and adapt their approach to what learners need in the moment. Find and Connect with Moe Poirier LinkedIn Company and work: www.shiftfacilitation.com The Five Facilitator Personas: www.fivepersonas.com Book: The Five Personas of Facilitation: Elevate Your Training Delivery Strengths and Style Sign up. Join the Community. Bonus tools & resources: www.fivepersonas.com/practice-circle Find and Connect with Jess Almlie LinkedIn Website: www.jessalmlie.com Book: L&D Order Taker No More! Become a Strategic Business Partner L&D Strategic Business Partner Team Assessment and Team Development Roadmap Contact Jess

What if trying to isolate L&D's impact is the wrong measurement goal? Kevin M. Yates, the L&D Detective, challenges the idea that training alone can explain changes in workplace performance. Jess and Kevin explore a performance-first approach that looks at L&D as one contributor within a larger performance ecosystem. They also discuss how to use business KPIs, navigate stakeholder resistance, and shift from proving training worked to investigating what actually influenced performance. Jess and Kevin Discuss Why isolating L&D's impact can create unrealistic expectations about what training can achieve How workplace performance is shaped by multiple factors, not L&D alone What Kevin means by investigating L&D's affect within the performance ecosystem Why L&D should focus on contribution rather than claiming sole credit for business outcomes How a performance-first mindset changes the way L&D responds to training requests Why learning analytics and business performance data tell very different stories How to use existing business KPIs to understand whether performance is moving Why relationships with KPI owners are essential for better measurement How to ask performance-focused questions without becoming a roadblock for stakeholders Why Kevin is moving away from the word "impact" Two questions L&D can ask immediately to redirect the conversation toward performance About Kevin M Yates Kevin M. Yates is known in the global training, learning, and talent development community as the L&D Detective®. He investigates how L&D as a function and training and development as an experience contributes to organization goals within the workplace performance ecosystem. Kevin uses facts, clues, and evidence to uncover what is influencing human performance and organizational results, recognizing that meaningful performance is rarely driven by one solution or contributor alone. He has applied his measurement and performance expertise in roles with world-renowned brands including Grant Thornton, McDonald's, and Meta (Facebook). He is also president and founder of Meals in the Meantime, a nonprofit organization addressing food insecurity in the Chicagoland south suburbs with mobile pop-up food pantries. Find and Connect with Kevin M Yates L&D Detective Kit: https://lddetective.com/ Kevin's Website: https://kevinmyates.com/ LinkedIn Meals in the Meantime: https://mealsinthemeantime.org/ Find and Connect with Jess Almlie LinkedIn Website: www.jessalmlie.com Book: L&D Order Taker No More! Become a Strategic Business Partner L&D Strategic Business Partner Team Assessment and Team Development Roadmap Contact Jess

What if AI transformation isn't really a technology challenge at all? Jess talks with OneDigital executives Mike Sullivan and Vinay Gidwaney about why they see AI as a talent, leadership, and workforce transformation challenge, and why L&D should be at the center of it, leading the transformation. They explore what it means to treat AI as talent, redesign work around human and AI strengths, activate leaders for new ways of working, and move L&D beyond content creation into a much more strategic role.   Jess, Mike, and Vinay Discuss Why AI transformation is fundamentally a talent and behavior change challenge, not simply a technology rollout What changes when organizations begin thinking about AI as talent Why giving employees access to AI is not enough to create meaningful adoption or business impact How leaders can accelerate AI adoption and behavior change across their teams Why the future workforce is a blended workforce of humans and AI How leaders can distinguish between reducible work that AI may handle and irreducible work that depends on human judgment, creativity, empathy, and experience Why organizations may need to stop tweaking existing job descriptions and instead completely rethink how work gets done The emerging leadership responsibility to manage both human talent and AI talent How L&D can help managers unbundle work, rethink roles, and redesign teams for an AI-enabled future Why people, not AI itself, may become an organization's greatest source of competitive advantage How L&D's role in capturing, codifying, and spreading organizational intelligence becomes even more valuable in an AI-enabled workplace What L&D professionals can do now to move from spectators of AI transformation to active leaders shaping what comes next   About Mike Sullivan Mike Sullivan has spent more than four decades at the intersection of business strategy, mergers & acquisitions and all facets of an evolving American workplace. He has seen firsthand what separates companies that thrive from those that stall. As Co-Founder and Chief Growth Officer of OneDigital, he has helped build one of the most dynamic insurance and financial services firms in the country, guiding its expansion through acquisition, partnership, and entry into new markets. Outside OneDigital, he is an active investor and board member across a broad set of firms and industry verticals.    About Vinay Gidwaney As Chief Product Officer (CPO) at OneDigital, Vinay Gidwaney is passionate about creating opportunities for employees and families to make better decisions around their finances through OneDigital's integrated offerings. He leads a strong team of technology experts and developers who deliver the latest in innovative products and solutions to OneDigital's customer base.   Find and Connect with Mike and Vinay Mike Sullivan LinkedIn Vinay Gidwaney LinkedIn Book: Workforce Intelligence: The PEOPLE-FIRST Playbook for Leading Your Company Through AI TRANSFORMATION   Find and Connect with Jess Almlie LinkedIn Website: www.jessalmlie.com Book: L&D Order Taker No More! Become a Strategic Business Partner L&D Strategic Business Partner Team Assessment and Team Development Roadmap Contact Jess

Leadership development has become far too complicated. In this episode, Jess and Matt Gjertsen strip away the jargon and return to the fundamentals busy managers can actually use. They explore the Minimum Viable Manager mindset, three core skills every leader needs, and why iteration matters more than perfection. You'll also hear how L&D can help employees navigate the career change into management, make feedback a daily habit, and combine high-impact in-person experiences with digital learning to create lasting behavior change. Jess and Matt Discuss Why leadership development has become unnecessarily complicated How first principles thinking can simplify manager development The Minimum Viable Manager mindset and the power of iteration Three essential manager skills: building trust, setting expectations, and giving feedback How a clear definition of done prevents the delegation doom loop Why managers should ask for feedback before giving it Why becoming a manager is a career change, not a promotion How L&D can help employees decide whether management is right for them Why in-person learning still matters for behavior change How to reframe leadership development as a facilitated conversation About Matt Gjertsen Matt Gjertsen is the founder of BUILT, a leadership-development company focused on helping technical professionals become exceptional people leaders. A graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy, Matt spent nine years as an instructor pilot before leading training and development at SpaceX. With two decades of experience developing high-performing teams, he now helps organizations strengthen their managers, improve performance, and prepare leaders to solve complex challenges. Find and Connect with Matt Gjertsen LinkedIn Website: BUILT Leaders Book: Minimum Viable Manager Find and Connect with Jess Almlie   LinkedIn Website: www.jessalmlie.com Book: L&D Order Taker No More! Become a Strategic Business Partner L&D Strategic Business Partner Team Assessment and Team Development Roadmap Contact Jess

Our learning design could be better if we understood how the brain is taking in and processing what we share. It would help us to know what's effective, and what's having the opposite effect. In this episode, Jess sits down with learning scientist Lauren Waldman to explore why neuroscience should be a foundational skill for every L&D professional. They discuss how memory really works, why most training never reaches long-term memory, how cognitive overload undermines learning, and practical ways to design experiences that work with the brain instead of against it. Jess and Lauren discuss Why every L&D professional should understand how the brain learns The difference between content delivery and the biological process of learning How working memory limits affect learning design Why repetition and retrieval are essential for long-term memory How cognitive overload prevents learners from retaining information Practical ways to reduce distractions and guide learner attention Designing learning that supports focus instead of competing for it Using neuroscience to confidently push back on stakeholder requests that hinder learning A simple design question every L&D team should ask before building training About Lauren Waldman Lauren Waldman is a learning scientist, founder of Learning Pirate, and one of the leading voices bringing neuroscience into the world of learning and development. With advanced neuroscience studies from Harvard, Duke, Johns Hopkins, and the University of Michigan, she helps organizations design learning experiences that align with how the brain actually learns. Lauren is a sought-after keynote speaker known for challenging conventional thinking and making brain science practical, engaging, and impossible to ignore.  Find and Connect with Lauren Waldman LinkedIn Learning Pirate Website: https://www.learningpirate.com/ Find and Connect with Jess Almlie LinkedIn Website: www.jessalmlie.com Book: L&D Order Taker No More! Become a Strategic Business Partner L&D Strategic Business Partner Team Assessment and Team Development Roadmap Contact Jess Additional Links from This Episode L&D Must Change Episode 22: Designing and Measuring on Purpose with Chris Taylor L&D Must Change Episode 45: Ensure Learning is Worth the Expense with Melanie Martinelli