You’re ready to kick off your project and onboard a creative learning agency. The goal is to design and develop learning experiences so it’s essential to understand the many contributors who will assist your organization in reaching this milestone.

Project Managers

While working on a training program, the Project Manager will be the liaison between your organization and the creative team. He or she will be your point of contact to provide project updates and answer any questions or concerns. He or she will work with the creative team, conduct daily sprints or weekly meetings to review their work and progress, ensure they are meeting their deadlines, and document any issues they may experience. He or she will typically update the project plan and timeline and make sure there is full transparency in order to have a successful project.

Instructional Designers

A critical player in designing the learning experiences is the Instructional Designer. This person will be conducting the needs analysis and interviewing your team members and learners. They will be researching your organization, your learners, and the content you want to provide. They are responsible for developing a learner persona that summaries the key qualities, pain points, and experience of the group of learners that they are designing for. This player develops the learning strategy and makes the recommendation for the learning solution. They will follow a course mapping process and develop the learning objectives, design documents, and storyboard the content. They will describe their vision for the learning in the storyboard and collaborate with the Subject Matter Experts, the Copy Editors, and Designers for the content.

Copywriters/ Editors

It’s one thing to write the content, but you must also ensure its language is aligned with the organization’s guidelines and that it flows with proper grammar, spelling, and punctuation. This is the role that CopyEditors and sometimes, a Copywriter plays on the team. He or she could write a video script from start to finish or reword module content to incorporate a story or a consistent creative narrative.

UX/ Visual Designers

The vision that the Instructional Designer laid out in the storyboard along with all of the research will be given to an UX Designer with strong visual design skills to create the graphical assets needed for the learning modules. Since the research was conducted and a learner persona was created in the Discovery phase, the UX Designer would typically shorten their process and utilize the existing work to develop a mood board, low fidelity wireframe, high fidelity wireframe, prototype, usability test, and a final design. Testing is conducted to ensure the design is functional and provides the best experience for all types of learners. Since it is an iterative process, user or learner feedback will be gathered after the launch to make changes and create a continual improvement process.

Animators/ Motion Graphic Designers

To appeal to the modern learner and develop engaging learning content, a video might be incorporated into the learning strategy which will require the skills of an Animator or Motion Graphic Designer. Every project doesn’t include video, but most do and the Designer will be able to develop a strategy, design and create the assets, and develop the videos that will be required.

Voice-over Narrators

Voice-over narrators and close captioning are often used to address the auditory learning style and be 508 compliant. The voice-over narrator will utilize the content from the storyboard and make the videos and eLearning courses more personable.

eLearning Developers

After everything is storyboarded and designed, the eLearning Developer will develop the structure of the courses in an authoring tool or web application. It depends on the decided solution for the learning because it could be anything digital, which would require a front-end and back-end developer as well. This is where the vision and all of the assets come to life.

Learning Management System (LMS) Admins/ Technical Consultants

Now that everything is designed and developed, it is imperative that the team works with a Learning Management System Admin or a Technical Consultant to host and track the learning in a software application or on an internal website or app. They will be responsible for gathering all of the assets needed to set up a course and deliver it to the learners.

Partnerships

It is fair to keep in mind that some creative learning agencies might partner with content experts to develop topic-specific training like Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion or commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) software providers to design training programs and implement an online course catalog or a LMS. The partnerships will vary but they exist to enhance the learning experience and better support your organization.

To sum it up

When working with a creative learning agency, your dream team could consist of so many contributors: a Project Manager, Instructional Designer, Copywriter/ Editor, UX/ Visual Designer, Animators/ Motion Graphics Designer, Voice-over Narrator, eLearning Developer, LMS Admin/ Technical Consultant, and other partners with specific expertise. As an extension of your team, a creative learning agency could provide all of the key players you need to produce a successful training program without the hassle of sourcing, hiring, and managing everyone.