As the decade closes, I would be remiss not to reflect on how my career has evolved over the last 10 years. I have been an instructional designer for the majority of this decade, thanks in no small part to the immense amount of resources available in the learning and development field.
Parsing through the list of blogs, books, and Podcasts is no easy feat. I, by no means, have a grasp on every resource out there. However, like many of you, I stumbled into this occupation and I need as many resources as possible to keep my skills sharp and relevant. To be completely honest, Train Like a Champion was the first L&D blog I ever subscribed to. I had no idea at the time I would later contribute to it. The novelty of that may never wear off.
There have been a lot of influences over the last decade, and to keep the list manageable, I narrowed it down to 10. Without further ado, I would like to share with you 10 resources that have influenced me over the last 10 years.
Ten Noteworthy L&D Resources
Tim Slade’s Blog
Tim Slade seems to be everywhere. He is a regular on the ATD blog, all over my twitter and LinkedIn feed, and he still produces content on his own blog that is relevant.
Bianca Woods
When Bianca Woods from the eLearning Guild isn’t putting on awesome conferences or facilitating Friday afternoon conversations on twitter, she writes a blog and it is full of gems.
Learn Geek
JD Dillon might be the most familiar face at L&D conferences. He brings a lot of levity to his view on our industry, and his posts, as well as conference presentations, are entertaining.
Mel’s Learning Lab
Mel Milloway is a learning experience designer for Amazon who writes a blog I find amusing, informative, and very relatable. While it focuses heavy on eLearning, I suggest anyone in our industry read it.
Mike Taylor’s Blog
Mike Taylor’s blog is unique in that it is somewhere in-between a pure L&D blog and curation of content that you should be aware of to stay on the bleeding edge of our industry.
Seth’s Blog
Seth Godin writes a blog every day. Each and every morning I wake up to a quote, pithy maximum, or story from Seth via email giving me something to ponder. They are not always L&D related, but his insights are valuable.
Debunker Club
There is so much junk science out there about adult learning theory, attention spans, learning styles and more. How do you know what is real and what isn’t? The Debunker club has your back. If you want to be a respected person in our industry, you should start here.
eLearning Heroes
My favorite eLearning development community on the web hands-down is eLearning Heroes. Their weekly challenges give me an opportunity to see how developers are pushing the limits of StoryLine and helps drum up creativity when I am at a loss.
Accidental Trainer Podcast
The Accidental Trainer Podcast by ATD just started in October and I manage to binge of these like a Netflix series. Definitely worth the listen.
IDIODC
Instructional Designers in offices drinking coffee is a mouth full, thank goodness for abbreviations! Every week, Brent and Chris stream conversations about a topic relevant to our industry. Recordings are made of every broadcast in case you are busy during the original airing.
There are obviously a lot more. What is on your list?
