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In this episode of The Adoption Curve, I sit down with Heidi Kirby, Founder of the Useful L&D Community, to discuss how learning professionals can escape the order-taking trap and become strategic business partners inside their organizations.

Heidi reveals why “completion is a useless metric” and explains how to use everyday data to prove impact—even without a dashboard. We also dive into evidence-based instructional design, like Mayer’s Multimedia Principles, that you can implement immediately to improve training retention and reduce cognitive overload.

If you're a learning strategist, customer education leader, or instructional designer looking to increase your internal visibility and deliver measurable value, this conversation provides the exact steps you need.

💡 FREE RESOURCE: The 5-Step Strategic Pushback Framework - book.iorad.com/adoption-curve-episode-9

SOCIALS:

👨‍💻 Connect with Sean - https://www.linkedin.com/in/sean-adams-sales/

👨‍💻 Connect with Heidi - https://www.linkedin.com/in/heidikriz/

🌍 IORAD website - https://www.iorad.com

⏰ TIMESTAMPS

00:00: From NASA to community founder: Heidi’s L&D journey

03:09: How to be seen as strategic (before you get the title)

06:15: Avoiding the “order taker” trap in L&D

08:25: Tactfully pushing back on bad learning requests11:45: Using "invisible data" to measure learning ROI

14:50: How customer education can drive down support costs

18:44: Evidence-based design with Mayer’s Multimedia Principles

24:14: Why course completion ≠ success in training

26:49: Teaching only the 20% people actually use

33:00: How to measure confidence, autonomy, and true adoption

34:29: Cross-functional buy-in for successful tech rollouts

38:31: Why L&D pros should network—without needing a reason

#LearningAndDevelopment #TechAdoption #InstructionalDesign #TrainingEffectiveness #EmployeeEnablement #CustomerEducation