We often focus on AI for efficiency gains. But for the 61 million American adults (or 1 in 4) with a disability, AI offers something far more vital: the ability to participate fully. Those who are differently abled represent “the world’s largest minority,” and they, along with underserved populations, face systemic barriers. This report moves beyond the hype to show how AI is transforming these obstacles into inclusive, accessible experiences for everyone. 

Key Takeaways:

• The business of inclusion is booming, with the U.S. AI in accessibility market reaching $1.43 Billion and projected to grow at a 24.4% CAGR, driven largely by Natural Language Processing (NLP). 

• AI serves as a crucial bridge for diverse groups, delivering personalized solutions for physical and cognitive disabilities as well as providing equity for underserved, low-income, and rural populations. 

• The future of accessibility requires vigilance and human oversight to combat data bias and a current lack of representation in AI design, which only 7% of surveyed users feel is adequate. 

Download your free copy to explore the future of inclusive technology and its immense market potential. 

The post AI & Accessibility appeared first on Learning Guild.

The modern workplace has changed forever. Traditional job titles and static descriptions are no longer sufficient to meet the dynamic needs of business. The future of work is not defined by roles, but by agile, transferable skills. 

Is your L&D strategy equipped to navigate this skills-first revolution?

This eBook provides the definitive guide for practitioners to move beyond outdated models and become the strategic driver of workforce adaptability and growth. The shift is happening right now to the broader challenge of identifying durable skills for jobs that don’t exist yet. 

This eBook is your roadmap for seizing this opportunity, providing L&D with the strategies to: 

• Identify and develop the skills your organization will need tomorrow, not just today. 

• Get clear, actionable definitions for key concepts: Skills Mobility, Skill Stacking, Hard vs. Soft Skills, and Durable Skills. 

• Discover how L&D can leverage skills audits and AI-powered skills ontologies to align internal talent with critical business needs. 

What You Will Learn Inside 

1. Focus on application-based learning over theory to address individual needs and skill gaps. 

2. Conduct skills audits and use a mix of formal, informal, and AI-driven inference from HR data to pinpoint existing strengths and deficits. 

3. Teach employees to articulate their own skills, build better profiles, and navigate internal talent marketplaces. 

4. Intentionally build foundational skills (like collaboration and problem-solving) into all instructional design. 

5. Use AI for predictive analytics and personalized learning, but maintain human interaction for critical “soft” skill development. 

The post Skills Matching: What Is L&D’s Role?  appeared first on Learning Guild.

Are you an L&D practitioner who feels like you’re constantly playing catch-up with AI? Do you want to move beyond just using AI tools to truly understanding and explaining them to others? 

This AI Literacy Checklist is designed specifically for you. It’s not about becoming a coder or a machine learning expert, but about developing the essential knowledge and critical skills needed to confidently navigate the rapidly changing world of AI. 

The checklist is broken down into four key sections: 

• Technical Knowledge: Understand the fundamental concepts of AI, from large language models to neural networks, so you can speak the language of technology. 
• Critical Appraisal: Learn to evaluate AI ethically, identify potential biases, and assess the reliability of AI-generated content. 
• Practical Application: Discover how to recognize and use AI in your daily personal and professional life. 
• L&D Application: Explore how AI can impact learning and development, from personalized learning paths to predictive analytics. 

Why Is AI Literacy So Important for L&D? 

As L&D practitioners, our role is evolving. We’re not just creating training content; we’re becoming translators. We need to understand AI well enough to explain its benefits and limitations to our teams, managers, and senior leaders. We need to be able to champion good solutions, put the brakes on poor ones, and help others use AI responsibly. 

This checklist will help you assess your current understanding and identify what you still need to learn. It’s a foundational tool to help you move from being just a user of AI to an informed and confident advisor. 

The post The AI Literacy Checklist: Self-Assessment and Reflection appeared first on Learning Guild.

In today’s increasingly digital learning environment, accessibility isn’t just a “nice-to-have” – it’s a fundamental requirement. Ensuring all learners, regardless of their abilities, have equal access to your virtual classrooms is essential for creating truly impactful and equitable learning experiences. 

Why is Accessibility in Virtual Classrooms So Important? 

1. Accessibility removes barriers, allowing everyone to participate fully. 
2. Inclusive design fosters a sense of belonging, leading to higher engagement and better learning outcomes. 
3. Shows your organization’s dedication to diversity, equity, and inclusion. 
4. Compliance with accessibility standards is crucial to prevent potential legal issues. 
5. Accessible design benefits everyone, not just those with disabilities. 

But simply having accessibility features isn’t enough. You need to know how to use them effectively. 

That’s why we’ve created the “Virtual Classroom Accessibility: A Checklist for Success.” 

This checklist will help you: 

• Audit your virtual classroom platform: Identify essential accessibility tools and features. 

• Assess your own expertise: Determine your comfort level and proficiency in using these tools. 

• Enhance your skills: Gain a deeper understanding of how to create inclusive virtual learning experiences. 

• Become an accessibility champion: Position yourself as a leader in creating equitable learning environments.  

Take the first step towards creating truly accessible and impactful virtual learning experiences. 

The post Virtual Classroom Accessibility: A Checklist for Success appeared first on Learning Guild.

In this report, Jane Bozarth explores the role of humans in leveraging emerging technologies, particularly AI, for inclusive learning. While acknowledging AI’s potential to enhance collaboration, engagement, and interactivity, it emphasizes that human designers and facilitators are crucial for successful implementation. The report argues that humans, not just AI, are responsible for shaping applications and even teaching the machines. It concludes that despite the exciting AI-powered future, human agency remains key.   

“Aligning experiences with capabilities and providing tailored paths unique to individuals promote a sense of ownership and empowerment, which in turn can help promote motivation, engagement, and persistence.”  

This report walks us through how several emerging technologies have helped make learning more accessible, including:  

• Artificial Intelligence (AI)  

• Machine Learning  

• Gamification & Serious Games  

• 3D Printing  

• Cloud Computing  

• Mobile Learning Apps  

• Internet of Things (IoT)  

• And more  

Important considerations like data security, privacy, and the ethics of personalized instruction, while relevant, were outside the scope of this report. Readers interested in learning more about these concerns are encouraged to access our November 2023 research report, “Learning Analytics: Ethics & Trust”.

The post Emerging Technologies for Inclusive Learning appeared first on Learning Guild.

In today’s fast-paced business world, organizations need to adapt quickly, and one of the best ways to do so is by fostering a culture of continuous learning. But how do you support employee development beyond the traditional training programs? The answer lies in informal learning. 

What is Informal Learning?

Informal learning is often self-directed, collaborative, and often spontaneous. It’s driven by employees’ interests and real-world experiences, as opposed to rigid, scheduled training programs. Informal learning encourages exploration, networking, and knowledge-sharing among colleagues, empowering your workforce to take ownership of their professional growth. 

Why Should You Care About Informal Learning? 

• Boosts Engagement & Innovation: Informal learning fosters creativity, problem-solving, and collaboration, resulting in a more engaged and innovative workforce. 

• Improves Knowledge Transfer: By encouraging peer-to-peer learning and mentorship, informal learning helps preserve institutional knowledge and enhances team performance. 

• Cost-Effective: Informal learning accelerates skill development and reduces the need for costly, formal training programs. 

• Supports Lifelong Learning: Promotes a culture of continuous improvement, helping employees stay ahead in an ever-changing work environment. 

What’s Inside the eBook? 

Cultivating a Culture of Informal Learning dives deep into the concept of informal learning and offers actionable insights for integrating it into your organization. Here’s what you’ll learn:  

1. Key Benefits: How informal learning can increase retention, engagement, and satisfaction for both employees and the organization. 

1. Practical Strategies: From mentoring programs to job shadowing and peer-to-peer knowledge sharing, we share proven methods to implement informal learning effectively. 

1. Real-World Examples: Learn from leading companies like GE, Meta, and IBM, who have successfully embraced informal learning strategies. 

1. Overcoming Challenges: Address the challenges of informal learning and learn how to overcome them with the right structure and support. 

The post Cultivate a Culture of Informal Learning appeared first on Learning Guild.

One of the things I enjoy most about Miller’s approach is her understanding that in struggling to get this right we are often dealing with guidelines rather than carved-in-stone rules, shifting as technology changes. Despite the extensive standards, we still sometimes work in murky areas: She acknowledges that interpretation of the standards is sometimes subjective. I always value practical and pragmatic over theoretical and conjecture and especially appreciate Miller’s L&D focus on improving learning experiences—including those that go beyond “courses”—rather than just generating web content.

In addition to her discussion of standards, Miller shines when discussing disability. Case studies and statistics support the cases she makes—ethical, legal, business, and learning—for digital accessibility. Too, she shines light on designing for different access needs—cognitive, speech, hearing, vision, and motor and assistive technologies.

The book is, on the one hand, highly technical, offering in-depth specifics around WCAG 2.2 levels A and AA, as well as a look at the best-but-perhaps-not-always-achievable AAA level, and includes detail particular to popular authoring tools like Storyline and Captivate. But her deep understanding of disability elevates this work beyond a technical manual, opening a valuable window into why we should care about this in the first place. Her interest is especially poignant in this new edition, as Miller shares insight from her own journey since being diagnosed as dyslexic. This empathy extends to her readers as well. If there is a single quality attached to Miller’s work—a tone, if you will—it is the sense that she sincerely wants to help. Her purpose is not just to enforce rules but, as she says, to assist practitioners in untangling the complexities of guidelines and becoming “more confident.”

Miller again does a wonderful job demystifying and simplifying the daunting standards for designing web-based content and conveying the idea that we need to move toward building accessible content as our default, not exception. We will continue reaching for this goal with every new tool and technology; with her help, we can step up to it. As she puts it, “Accessibility is a journey, not a destination.”

Image credit: Kobus Louw

The post Book Review: Designing Accessible Learning Content appeared first on Learning Guild.

Learner Personas: First, find the facts

While instructional designers have probably always worked from some notion of their target audience in terms of personalities and beliefs, the idea of more intentional development and use grew out of ideas from both marketing and Universal Design (UX). They can be a useful tool for learner analysis and consequent design of learning experiences and, as I discuss at more length in the report, this helps to address a gap I have found in much of the research I’ve reported on these past few years. That’s designers working from assumption and stakeholder and SME-provided “facts” about learners that may be more fictional than real. (My own favorite, from  years ago in state government: The SME from the Safety office who said with great confidence, “Blind people will never need this training.” The target audience included our school for the blind, staffed by faculty who were blind.) As I’ve written elsewhere we’ve found that designers sometimes don’t know how or where to find more data, even from places like the LMS, and perhaps don’t know how to use the data they do find. 

Learner Personas: Still relevant?
The report attempts to answer a couple of questions: What are the whats, whys, hows, and good practices for developing and using learner personas? And in the age of analytics, Big Data, and AI, are they still relevant? To this latter question authors say yes, for a variety of reasons. Preeminent personas researcher, the University of Vaasa’s (Finland) Joni Salminen (et al.) offers ways advances with data solve some of the historical problems with creating personas: 
– Use of analytics speeds up the process of data gathering from months previously required by ethnographies and surveys. 
– The ability to infer behavioral data (such as video viewing habits) rather than gather self-reported information provides information less susceptible to bias. 
– Data can be drawn from the whole user base, eliminating the issue of representativeness of the sample; they say: “Using online analytics data potentially solves the trade-off of relying on either qualitatively rich but non-verifiable data or using numbers that are accurate but lose the immersion of another human being” (p.55). 
Available data help overcome the “file drawer effect” of personas remaining static once they are developed.

Additionally, advances in data help minimize the subjectivity of prediction, which an algorithm can manage as a numerical problem.

For a nice overview of the ways designers in even small organizations can make better use of technology and data to inform development and use of personas, see Danielle Wallace’s recent article Transform Training with AI-Powered Learner Personas. 

Learner Personas: A powerful addition to the designer’s toolkit

Learner personas can be a powerful addition to the designer’s toolkit. Viewing them as data-based tools supported with data analytics, machine learning algorithms and generative AI can extend our ability to enact skillful work. For more on what the research says, along with recommendations for practice, real-world cases, and suggestions for additional reading please see The Learning Guild’s July 2024 research report Learner Personas: The Human in the Experience.

Reference: 
Salminen, J., Jansen, B. J., An, J., Kwak, H., & Jung, S. G. (2018). Are personas done? Evaluating their usefulness in the age of digital analytics. Persona Studies, 4(2), 47-65.

The post Learner Personas: Bridging the Gap Between Data and Design appeared first on Learning Guild.

This free research report explores the power of learner personas – detailed profiles that go beyond demographics to understand your learners’ motivations, challenges, and learning preferences. 

Here’s what you’ll learn: 

• Why basic learner analysis falls short: It’s not just about age and location! 

• How learner personas can transform your instructional design: Craft targeted learning experiences that resonate with your audience 

• Real-world examples and practical tips: Get started using learner personas effectively 

• The latest research on learner personas: Stay ahead of the curve and address potential challenges 

Stop wasting time and resources on generic learning. Download this report and start creating truly engaging learning experiences today!

The post Learner Personas: The Human in the Experience appeared first on Learning Guild.

Here’s what you’ll discover: 

• The mobile learning advantage: Learn how smartphones and tablets can make learning solutions more accessible, affordable, and engaging. 

• Guidelines for mobile learning: Discover expert-curated tips and strategies to create effective mobile learning content. 

• A variety of mobile-friendly formats: Craft engaging eBooks, instructional videos, games, podcasts, and more – all optimized for mobile devices. 

The post Designing for Devices: Good Solutions & Good Practices appeared first on Learning Guild.