Humans, Systems & AI | One of HR Most Influential Thinkers 2025 | Advisor on AI in L&D and Workforce Transformation | Co-author of AI in L&D reports | Speaker on AI in Learning & the Future of Work | Harvard M.Ed.
Faster content is not impact. It’s a means to an end, and that end is time to performance, not volume of output. Don't get me wrong: contextual content, served at the right time, brought to life through good storytelling or supported by thoughtful practice, has its place. Even the most forward-thinking L&D organisations take advantage of content development efficiencies made possible by AI. But content can't be the main thing that L&D does. These days, many people can just ask their AI for support and get it on the spot. Some are even using it to build their own learning plans and personal coaches. Subject matter experts can share what they know in minutes, no learning team required. Is it as polished as a professional design? No. But it’s good enough, faster - and in business, that often beats perfect. With generative AI, the value of content has plummeted, and the value of L&D will too if it ties itself to content. Using AI purely to churn out more of it, faster, is inertia, not the bold L&D strategy we need to seize the moment. Instead, we should move up the value chain: • Use data to see where performance really breaks down and target support where it matters most • Help the business close capability gaps, not just fill content shelves (content ≠ skills!) • Collaborate across functions on strategic business challenges where learning plays a part • Surface good practice that’s already happening and make it easier for people to learn from each other AI can handle a lot of the production work. L&D's job (or opportunity?) is to use the space it creates - for alignment, creativity, and better-quality thinking. To paraphrase David James, L&D needs to solve business problems, not content problems. The efficiency game is straightforward: each efficiency win means ever fewer hours are needed on the job. And if these hours aren't used for something else, they will eventually cost people, too. L&D needs to play the value game instead. --- ♻️ Share this post if you found it useful. 📩 If you're exploring how to best use AI in L&D, that's exactly the kind of work I do with clients. Let's chat! Nodes
As Clay Shirky once wrote, ‘institutions will try to preserve the problem to which they are the solution’. #L&Dteams
Yes absolutely! Value, not volume. When you connect the data, context, and capability, you start closing the performance gaps that really matter - especially in risk and compliance. Not an easy pivot, but a necessary one.
How many thumbs up am I allowed to put on this post? Heres some more 👍 👍 👍 👍 👍 👍 👍 👍 👍 👍 👍 👍 👍 👍 👍 👍 👍 👍 👍 Once again at a learning event this week I heard way too many vendors talking about Faster, cheaper, content creation as the main use case for AI. Those vendors still seem to be stuck in 2023
Yes to this. Its been true all along, but now more than ever. The strategic value of L&D is not content creation, but identifying business needs and determining the best solutions to address them.
Absolutely agree - AI has totally changed the value equation for content. Love your perspective on moving up the value chain!
Absolutely Churning out more content faster and cheaper is just a way to take people away from doing their jobs faster and cheaper. It is no indication of value A couple of companies are already challenging this, and it’s something the GROWTH Model was explicitly designed to affect The industry needs radical change, not just a faster horse.
I just pitched at Google's AI Gatherings in NYC because we have launched a product that moves learner data from one course to another and provides analytics and reporting- with or without an LMS. Orgs can also connect Agents (guard-railed). Currently it works with Adobe Captivate and Articulate SL (testing RIse). It also allows IDs to build in Evaluation (and lots of other fascinating things). I agree so very much with what you are saying, but now with analytics at the slide level that you can extract meaningful insights, IDs and devs can build much more intentionally and not just throw content at people. Still in Beta but it is working!
This is absolutely spot on!
"But it’s good enough, faster - and in business, that often beats perfect." - I'd argue this is not as pretty but actually better especially for technical domains and real depth of skill. The one shift I've seen teams that actually get it right starts with simply asking better questions
Humans, Systems & AI | One of HR Most Influential Thinkers 2025 | Advisor on AI in L&D and Workforce Transformation | Co-author of AI in L&D reports | Speaker on AI in Learning & the Future of Work | Harvard M.Ed.
1wWant to see what's happening with AI in L&D in general? Here are the AI in L&D industry reports I co-authored: https://www.nodes.works/reports