3 Things to Look for When Hiring Your Next L&D Candidate
I see a lot of L&D job descriptions and they usually include things like communication skills, project management skills, knowledge of learning design principles, and more. And while these are skills that you certainly do use as an L&D pro, what actually helps you hit the ground running?
In this episode, I’m sharing three not-so-obvious skills or characteristics that actually make people successful in L&D roles.
Listen to the episode or scroll down to read the blog post ↓
Key Points:
02:25 Typical L&D job descriptions
03:15 Three characteristics that make people successful in L&D roles
08:23 How to discover these characteristics in the interview process
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3 Things to Look for When Hiring Your Next L&D Candidate
If you have been around for a while, you probably know that I am a nonprofit L&D consultant, but I also worked internally at a national nonprofit for about eight years.
I remember constantly being in conversations with my coworkers when we were hiring, and we used to say, “Just give me a good thinker. Somebody who can think well.”
When you're hiring, it's easy to create this kind of laundry list of all the things that you want in your candidates.
We want instructional design experience.
We want knowledge of adult learning theory.
We want a rock star portfolio.
We want project management skills and collaboration skills.
And the list just goes on and on - but most of these things can be developed on the job.
I share nonprofit L&D jobs every week.
I share one to two in my email newsletter, which anybody can sign up for. And then I share five additional in my private community, which is specifically for nonprofit and association training pros.
So I see a lot of job descriptions every single week, and typically they include things like 3 to 5 years of relevant experience creating training materials, communication skills, project management skills, knowledge of learning design principles, experience collaborating in cross-functional teams, and usually some sort of list of technology solutions that they want you to know.
There's nothing wrong with any of those things. I think they're great to have on a job description. They are skills that you use as an L&D pro.
But I want us to think outside the box today. What are those not-so-obvious skills and characteristics that actually make people successful in L&D roles?
In this blog post, we’re covering the following:
1) Problem-Solving: An Essential Skill for L&D Candidates
A lot of what we do in L&D is actually problem-solving.
PROBLEM: Your organization needs to solve a performance issue.
SOLUTION: You create a job aid for staff to reference and then improve their performance.
PROBLEM: Your organization needs to scale a program.
SOLUTION: You create a virtual training to help staff practice the skills they need for this program.
PROBLEM: Your organization needs to prepare leaders for the future.
SOLUTION: You create a leadership development program.
PROBLEM: Your organization needs to support new first-time managers who they know are overwhelmed and struggling.
SOLUTION: You provide coaches during that time of transition.
There are a lot of these “problems” or what I prefer to see as opportunities that L&D can help solve.
And, there are a lot of possible solutions. Just now I named four different solutions:
A job aid
A virtual training
A leadership development program
Coaching
Four completely different solutions. And that barely scratches the surface of the options that we can access to solve problems.
L&D staff have to be able to identify the problem and its root cause and then figure out which solution or set of solutions is the best way to solve that problem.
We're problem solvers.
And how do we do this? We have to be curious.
That's why you might see problem-solving skills listed in a job description. So we want to see those problem-solving skills. We want to be curious
2) Empathy: An L&D Skill That Will Help You Create Better Learning Solutions
The second thing to look for in your next hire in L&D is empathy - this one is huge for me.
L&D staff need to be able to empathize with their internal partners.
These are the people that are most often coming to you because they have a problem and they may feel some kind of way trying to figure out the right solution to that problem. So we need to be able to empathize with them.
We also need to be able to empathize with the learners.
The people the solution is for. In the case of nonprofits, we're often training staff, volunteers, customers, and even members.
Empathy is what allows us to understand the problem on a deeper level. It's what allows us to determine which solution will best meet those needs.
We have to empathize with what people are experiencing and what people will experience.
Is your L&D project driving a change?
Here's a hint, it usually is. And people don't always feel good about change, so we have to be able to empathize with them.
What is the change?
How is that different than what they're doing now?
How will people feel about that change?
How do you want them to feel?
And what might prevent them from making that change?
Sometimes it's not just a skill. There might be something else that is preventing them from making that change. And so we have to empathize with their situation. We have to empathize with where they're coming from so that we can create these better solutions.
3) A Commitment to Learning and Trying New Things: The Way to Grow in L&D
I always joke that my best lessons come from parenting and CrossFit, two things that are completely unrelated to my job as an L&D consultant.
As a parent, I'm constantly facing new situations, new challenges, and new accomplishments. And I have to figure out how to navigate all of these things. I'm constantly learning. I'm constantly adapting. I'm constantly failing and I'm constantly growing.
The same is true for CrossFit. I'm never done getting stronger or faster or more fit. You hit a PR and the next time you do that lift, you want to do more. You're constantly stretching yourself beyond what you think you're capable of. And that's where the growth happens.
So that's why my third not-so-obvious thing to look for in L&D candidates is a commitment to learning and trying new things.
When we put ourselves in situations where we don't have the answer, we don't have the experience to rely on, and we're forced to try and maybe fail and then continue trying, that's where we grow.
We can take those lessons and apply them on the job to our own role in L&D and also to the solutions and experiences we create for our learners. So I want to see a commitment to learning and to try new things.
4) How to Discover These L&D Skills in the Interview Process
Now, I use all of these skills and characteristics in my work with my nonprofit clients, but they just seem less obvious than what I typically see in job postings.
I do occasionally see problem-solving, but rarely have I seen it listed as curiosity. Rarely have I seen empathy. Rarely have I seen this commitment to learning and trying new things.
And maybe that's okay.
Maybe you won't list these in your job description and your job posting, but you can certainly ask behavior-based interview questions to discover these characteristics and skills in the interview process.
Tell me about a time you were a beginner. What was that like? What was that experience like? Prompt the conversation. And let it flow.
This is how you find a great L&D job candidate.
To hear the full conversation I had on the Learning for Good Podcast, scroll all the way up and tune into episode 101.
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