How Learning Leaders Own Their Learning and Career Growth

What does it really take to grow as a learning leader?

In this episode of Learning for Good, I sit down with instructional design expert Dr. Luke Hobson to explore how learning professionals can build confidence, strengthen influence, and develop a clear leadership voice. We reflect on our own career journeys into learning and development and discuss how intentional growth, networking, and relationship-building shape effective leaders.

From instructional design for nonprofits to relationship-building and professional growth, this conversation is packed with practical insights for nonprofit learning and development professionals who want to create meaningful organizational impact. Whether you’re leading training initiatives, managing change, or trying to grow your confidence as a leader, this episode offers actionable ideas you can immediately apply.

▶️ Key Points:

00:00 Dr. Luke Hobson’s Journey into Instructional Design

05:39 Heather’s Path into Learning and Development

08:38 Moving Beyond Content Creation into Organizational Influence

14:47 The Value of Partnering with Your Stakeholders

19:35 How Learning Leaders Invest in Their Own Growth

27:35 Building Confidence and Finding Your Leadership Voice

34:49 Advice for Nonprofit Learning Professionals Who Want to Grow Their Influence

Is Your Learning and Development Career on Autopilot?

Have you ever driven to a familiar destination and arrived with no memory of the trip? You stopped at red lights, made the turns, parked the car — and somehow your mind was somewhere else entirely.

When autopilot happens in your career, you don't get to be intentional about the one you actually want.

In my recent podcast conversation with Dr. Luke Hobson, Luke named it directly. There's a version of the instructional design role (and honestly, a version of the HR and talent development role too) where you're creating, delivering, facilitating, responding, and repeating. You're behind the scenes. Nobody quite knows what you do. And there's no one nudging you toward your next level because you're too busy serving theirs.

We spend so much energy designing growth for other people. Onboarding journeys. Leadership cohorts. Performance coaching. Needs analysis. And yet—if we’re honest—we often let our own professional development run on autopilot. We react to what’s urgent rather than invest in what’s important. We show up as order-takers when we could be showing up as the strategic partners our organizations need.

But we have the power to change that.

What Intentional Career Growth Looks Like in Learning and Development

Neither Luke nor I came into this field through a traditional path. Luke stumbled into instructional design after a colleague named Bruce explained, somewhat unbelievably, that someone actually made the courses students took online. I landed in curriculum development after an English degree left me searching, then fell in love with learning science while volunteering to improve a government contractor's first responder training.

What’s notable isn’t the meandering start; it’s the intentional commitment that followed. We both made a deliberate decision to understand how learning works, to shape a point of view about it, and to grow that voice over time.

For me, clarity came through practice and reflection. I knew the big buckets—instructional design, leadership development, change management—but my perspective sharpened as I got more specific about what actually makes someone successful in an L&D role. My voice got stronger not because I talked more (though I do on the podcast), but because I got clearer on what I actually believed.

For Luke, growth came through friction— specifically through conversations with people he trusted enough to challenge him. He described seeking out colleagues who would play devil’s advocate, push back on his thinking, and help him see angles he’d missed. He’s changed his mind publicly, on his podcast, in front of hundreds of listeners, and he’s framed that not as embarrassment but as evidence that he’s growing.

That reframe matters. When you can say, “I was wrong about that, and here's what I think now,” you’re not losing credibility. You’re modeling exactly what you ask your learners to do.

Are Relationships the Key to Career Success as a Learning Designer?

Luke knows what it feels like to feel invisible at work. In our conversation, he described knowing someone who had a great idea and couldn’t get buy-in because nobody knew who he was. He was, in Luke's words, “screaming into the void” because he hadn’t built the relationships that would give his voice traction.

Sound familiar?

This shows up in nonprofit L&D constantly. You’ve done the needs analysis. You know the solution. You’ve built the training. And still, you’re fighting for a seat at the table, for enough lead time to do the work right, for managers to reinforce what their people learned. Not because your work isn’t good but because the relationships that would amplify that work haven’t been built yet.

Luke’s prescription was disarmingly simple: stop waiting for the right moment and go talk to people.

Not a LinkedIn campaign. Not a formal networking strategy. A compliment. An introduction. A coffee chat. Genuine curiosity about what someone else is doing and how they’re contributing. He shared that he walked up to a senior MIT leader a few months into their tenure and said something to the effect of, “You've only been here a little while, but you’ve already made an impact. I just wanted you to know that.” That person now knows Luke’s name.

These are not manipulative tactics. They’re the foundation of influence, and influence is what allows you to stop taking orders and start shaping strategy as you grow your career.

Growing Your Career without a Public Platform

One of the most grounding moments in this conversation came when Luke pushed back on the idea that professional growth requires a public platform. You don’t need a podcast. You don’t need to post on LinkedIn daily. You don’t need to speak at conferences.

What you do need is to stop waiting for permission.

If you want to show up as a strategic partner in your organization, start acting like one. Learn who actually influences decisions. It’s often not the title you’re thinking of. Build relationships with the managers whose teams you’re training because a well-designed learning experience still fails if the environment doesn’t support behavior change. Get curious about what other departments are trying to accomplish and how your work connects to it.

It starts with you—how you view yourself and the actions you take because of it. You are not the person who builds what others request; you are someone who shapes how the organization learns and grows. That shift—from support function to strategic lever—doesn’t start with a new title. It starts with how you see yourself and what you’re willing to do as a result.

Surrounding Yourself with a Community for Ultimate Growth

A few reflection questions from this episode and for your career: How did you land in this role? What are you doing intentionally to keep growing? And who’s in your corner helping you do it?

If your answer to that last question is “nobody” or “I haven't really thought about it,” that’s the most important signal you have right now.

The best thing about working in learning and development is that we already know what growth looks like. We know it doesn’t happen through passive consumption. We know it requires challenge, reflection, and application. We know it’s fundamentally social. We know it needs to be designed, not left to chance.

And that’s what the Nonprofit L&D Collective does. It convenes people across the sector and provides a space for you to learn and grow together.

If you don’t have a space like that yet, apply for the Collective and let us encourage you as you continue to learn and grow and find your voice.

To learn more about learning and growth for learning leaders, tune into episode 189 of the Learning for Good podcast.

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