Success Stories: From Teacher to Trainer with Jennifer Neydon

Luis Malbas  
Hello, everybody, welcome to the training learning and development community. Thanks for joining us today, Thursday, August 11. And we're here with another another episode in our new series, success stories. This one in specifically is about teacher to trainer, and our guest today is Jennifer Natan is did I pronounce that right? I didn't even ask you beforehand.

Jennifer Neydon  
It's Neydon (Nigh-done).

Luis Malbas  
yeah, Jennifer and I have spoken before we actually talked about doing, I just needed some feedback on producing a hybrid event. And so Jennifer has been active in the training learning and development community for I think probably like the last year I believe it was last year that we spoke, and almost two decades as a teacher, now turned into trainer working for a sidecar and is working on finishing up her Master's at the University of Central Florida. We're going to talk to Jennifer about her journey so far. I'm so relatively new in the instructional design space. But we've already been chatting back in the greenroom about sort of her her background in education. It's just really a fascinating story. I do want to mention first like one of the reasons why we're doing this series is because we have an event at the end of the month. It's called transitioning to learning and development. I call it T to LD, you can go to T to ld.com. If you want to get more information, it's a free event. Producing it with a bunch of volunteers that have come in Jennifer is one of them that is helping us build this thing out. And speakers so far we have are just absolutely fantastic. Very excited about it. Hopefully, we're getting the program filled out. It shouldn't be done any any day now. And it's going to be great. So register for that it's free. If you're somebody that is transitioning to l&d, not necessarily even a teacher, I know a lot of marketers that do it a lot of folks from from UX UI from different parts of an organization are looking into becoming instructional designers, this is a great event to to learn more about what that takes. And so with this series in particular, this is helping maybe to LDC folks understand what it takes to be an instructional designer or what that what that path might be like so. So yeah, we're going to talk to Jennifer about that. Now. Let me just say, give a shout out to get Saul to Karen to Jennifer Stacy, Amanda, thanks for for joining us this this morning. And so with that, let's get into some of these credit questions, Jennifer. So let's do it. I just want to start out you were an edge you were in the elementary school system for almost almost 20 years, right? I think it was 17, or something like that. Tell us about that. Why did you decide you wanted to be to be a teacher to begin with?

Jennifer Neydon  
Oh, I think that was something that was just always, I just kind of knew, like, I always enjoyed being, you know, around kids. And I always liked playing teacher and helping them learn new things. I growing up, I taught swimming lessons. And just to see that progression for a little kid who didn't even like to get into the swimming pool. And you know, at by the end of our two week, three week sessions, I would I just I still remember she she literally looked at her dad and said, watch what I can do and jumped into the pool in the father's face of just what what what did you do? How did you get my child to do this, who we literally had to, like, bribe to get into the pool the first day, you know, so just see that, that natural progression and and to understand, like, just the most amazing things amazed children, you know, and especially in the elementary age, you know, you can teach them something and show them something and and they just you just see the sparks when the light bulb start lighting up. And they continue to ask well what about this? And how about if you did it this way and just that that natural curiosity and that natural, wanting to know more and even their natural being inventors, it just always something that I enjoyed. I graduated from Southeastern Louisiana University and I'm going to age myself and 2003 in January, so or in December. So when I wanted to where I wanted to teach at the time and Louisiana was very hard to get into like it was a very hard market. So I applied for an internship position with a wonderful company, the Walt Disney World company and I was a youth education series facilitator. So I just continued my my education and use my education degree and I basically got paid to Hawking ride rides and say, let's learn about the science of why Space Mountain does what it does. And talk about this. And just, it was just always fun. I always just had fun. So yeah, I knew that if I was going to have fun, and this is what I needed to do.

Luis Malbas  
So from a very early age, you knew that you just wanted to be a teacher, pretty much. Yeah, yeah. But then, when did you decide to shift your career? When did you decide to make the make the change and move towards lnd?

Jennifer Neydon  
Um, I think once I realized I was, I'm probably say, around your seven or eight and, you know, teaching that I was like, I don't know where else I can go. You know, like, once you're a teacher, like, there's, there's great opportunities, if you want to get into leadership, but to be in leadership means that one day you're going to be a an assistant principal or principal, and I was just something that I never wanted to do. I didn't, you know, that's a really hard job. And that's amazing. There are amazing administrators out there, but I just knew that that wasn't going to be me. So I didn't, I knew I wanted to continue my learning. So I started looking well, well, could I work for a curriculum company? Or could I, you know, how could I still use my education in my education background? To you know, could I be a facilitator or training trainer that worked for, you know, something corporate or something like that, and, and then the more I got into it, I just just the more research and talking to people, that's where I found instructional design, and a lot of people still are kind of like, well, what in the world is an instructional designer? You know, so it's not something that that's out there. I mean, it's becoming more prevalent, but it's still kind of a new, a new thing.

Luis Malbas  
So you knew about learning and development prior to making the change? You knew that there was this place that you could potentially go to?

Jennifer Neydon  
I did, yeah, it took a research on my end, but I was like, you know, I, if it's, if there's somebody to train train, you've got to do there's always trainers out there. So how can I how can I go and be a part of that?

Luis Malbas  
Okay. And so, we did talk earlier, you were saying that? A couple years ago, I guess it was in 2020. You decided to, to go after your masters at university, University of Central Florida.

What's that experience been? Like?

Jennifer Neydon  
It's been amazing and really challenging to be honest. Like, I think one of the another reason why I was a little hesitant is because I just, I never really liked homework. But then I never, as a teacher, I hated assigning homework, because it's homeworks just not fun, you know, so but the, the classes have been so challenging, and so amazing. And I'm able to take what I've learned and apply it right there, and apply it within my, my position that I have now or see, okay, well, how I can create those connections of, oh, I used to do this here. And this is exactly what that means, you know, so it's one of those. It just, I really enjoy the program and I love the different options, options that they have, you know, it's not like a first you take this class than you have to take this class. Like there's there's their core elements that you must take, but there's so many different electives that I'm able to choose from like, I I took a class when creating simulations, you know, and that I didn't even like it just was kind of mind blowing to me that there's so much out there that being an instructional designer, you can have your third there's so many different options that are so many different, you know, pots, you could put your hand in

Luis Malbas  
definitely yeah. And I think that you know, new new instructional designers may not realize that that there are just a variety of of roles that you can take on and of course and as so many people know you can also kind of be those one person teams where you kind of have to do everything which is you know, sometimes not so great because you're sort of just get handed all of the training responsibilities and and that can be a real pain. Now when you decided to go after your master's degree and and go that route. What prompted you go to University of Central Florida or why did you or why not? You know, go certificate program or something else? What Why did you decide to go after your masters?

Jennifer Neydon  
Um, well, the biggest person that pushed me to do my Masters was my husband and he was like, you know, you having you he just he has a very big respect for having those degrees and I and I just thought like, If I'm going to learn about instructional design, I need to, to know about it like and not just know, like, you know, like of where I can just go to a class for, you know, half a day and then think I know everything because I've, because you're not. And I will say even I'm about to graduate, and I still don't know everything, because you know, technology is always changing. I really to be honest, like, I liked that UCF, they offer certificates within their programs, and they offer you can get a master's degree, or you can to continue on Guam and get a doctorate in instructional design. So I like the fact with UCF that there were different levels, and that they were very vested within the education. So, right, right. Now,

Luis Malbas  
did you at all, like, see out there, like,

boot camps, or, you know, sort of, I mean, did anything like that lower you at all, like, just sort of, like, you know, the, like I mentioned earlier, just how you, you there are programs out there where you can be an instructional designer in two weeks kind of deal. Anything like that come across your, your, your radar that, that you had looked at,

Jennifer Neydon  
I saw one that came across my Facebook feed one time, and I was like, Okay, well, let me sign up. But then it just, in a way, I just felt like it was very, like, cookie cutter, like, first you do this, then you do this, and then next year will go here. And, and I thought well, but there's so much more to learning and development than, you know, you won't, you don't always have to do it one way, you know, and especially like, working with, you know, different clients or different subject matter experts or whatever. Like sometimes you want to approach your your design for a course, a little bit differently. You know, like sometimes, right now, like a big thing is that micro learning and you can't do 1000 things in one module, like you have to keep it simple. You know, you've it's one topic one, one objective, and you don't want to inundate people, because they're probably learning on their cell phone. So I think just knowing that, and knowing the theory behind instructional design, and just how much it really is rooted within education, really, that's why I chose the Masters route over over going to a boot camp or something. Now, I would love to add certificates to my masters. But I would definitely like going, like, because there are great certificate programs out there. But But I think just knowing that takes research on on your fact of like, where are you going? And where are you getting this from?

Luis Malbas  
Right? Is there anything in particular that kind of surprised you going from being a teacher, and then going into lnd is, especially, you know, in regards to your, your, your new your new role at at sidecar.

Jennifer Neydon  
Um, I think the biggest thing that surprised me was the freedom that I had five car were a remote team, and we're very diverse remote. There's one of us in New Orleans, one of us in Mississippi, I'm in North Carolina, we have people in Texas, and, and we have such freedom to control our our day and our schedule. And, you know, while we all have projects, it's, it's, you know, we we have that accountability, but I'm not on a set schedule, like I was so used to tardy Bell is 845. And then you start teaching math, and then you start teaching science. So it wasn't, and I never got to choose the schedule. So that part to me was the biggest like, oh, well, if, if that works better for me to do this, that in the morning, and then I can, you know, if I need to run to go, you know, take care of life, then I can, which is kind of, it's really kind of amazing, like, it feels way more like I'm an adult, even though I was an adult as an educator.

Luis Malbas  
I you know, I think part of that is kind of the remote, you know, working from home experience altogether. Right? It's like we've all had to sort of make that adjustment it especially for those of us that are new to it, sort of like realizing, yeah, there's this freedom there, but you need to manage it and make sure that you're not like, you know, taking it for granted and you still need to be productive and have that kind of focus. But yeah, it's it's it's definitely be a it's definitely been a different thing. And so, what do you think, like over this last year? What are some of the more important lessons that you've learned? actively working as an instructional designer? Is there anything like basically I'm looking for an answer that might be able to share some Um, some, I don't know, like tips to new instructional designers, if there's anything specific that kind of that stands out to you, this is what I learned in the past year. That's kind of important.

Jennifer Neydon  
I would say the biggest thing that one of the biggest things that I learned and kind of goes back to schedule is time management, you know, like, just understanding and like you said, like, we all like it, especially within the remote world, understanding that, you know, you have deadlines, and creating, creating deadlines and, and making sure you're holding yourself accountable to it. The other thing that I another big learning thing is for me is that you can't be afraid to get out there and ask, I work for a sidecar. We're a startup. So I don't have a like, it's me. I'm the instructional designer. That's it. Like, while I'm on a content team, but when it comes to instructional design, that that's me, myself and I. So, you know, when I'm looking for subject matter experts, or when I need help with something like, just to get out there and to network was such a scary thing. But within this community, everyone wants to help each other and there's no one that's going to say, well, you should already know this, it's, it's okay, well, you know, what can I do? How can I help you? But on the flip side of that, you can't just walk into a meeting, or request help and go, Okay, so tell me everything, you know, you have to be very specific about what you're asking and what you want. And, and so that goes to a another lesson of just about how to prepare and, and just being very specific about your questions. So I think that's, that was the biggest lesson that that I've learned.

Luis Malbas  
Interesting. I'm curious, just, you know, for startup first year, how much of your job is like, say writing how much of it is like graphic design, since you're kind of doing everything, how much of it is storyboarding or curriculum production or anything like that.

Jennifer Neydon  
So I would say about, I would say about 75% of my job is writing. Now it could be writing, like webinar descriptions, or bootcamp descriptions, or, you know, or courses. But I would say about 75% of it is the writing part of it. And fortunately, we have a wonderful graphic designer, so I do not have to do any of that graphic design. But I do have to understand the aspect of, you know, I can't let my my visualization overpower the written content, or vice versa. So that I really had to kind of to look around and to learn a lot about just because it can't just all be pictures, but I would then the rest of it, a lot of it is especially like with the webinars and our boot camps that we offer. It's a lot of speaker management and project management, which is, you know, it's, it sounds hard, it sounds hard, but it's not, but but it is like I don't, you know, like sometimes you're just like, it's a lot of follow up with with other people and helping the project move along.

Luis Malbas  
Right, right, I think it feels like that a lot. That's pretty typical, especially for a startup, I would think the project management piece is just really kind of primary, right? You're really doing that and a lot of writing. So that's, that's pretty interesting. And I think that's kind of to be expected for a lot of people that might be doing kind of entry level, ID, anything in particular, that was just like a really big adjustment for you that you had to make going from, from teacher to instructional designer.

Jennifer Neydon  
I'm a big adjust. I will because I had taught for so long, like there was I I felt like I knew a lot. And you know, uh, being a teacher and being in the education world, and then coming into the business side of things. You know, I would, I would go into meetings and people would say things and I was like, What in the world are you talking about? Because it's just I feel like some of the biggest learning like it was learning the vernacular of the, of the business world and even even the sidecar. We have support nonprofits and association. So the nonprofit and association world is even a little bit just has a little bit extra spin on top of the business world. So it's something that just learning just learning what everybody was talking about, I think for the first month, I know I was like, I'm I need at Google was my best friend.

Luis Malbas  
Yeah, you know, that's interesting, because I feel like that was one of the biggest topics or one of the most popular topics. I don't know if you were in on that when we're talking about with the event. Was that vernetta either going to the terms like going from, you know, basically, the when you're talking as a teacher versus talking as for an organization or for business, just just that change, and I do know, I think we're gonna have at least two sessions at the event, at this month's event where we're going to be talking specifically about that, you know, moving from, from the academic side of thinking to, to the business side of thinking, which really is it can be a pretty significant challenge. So, any mistakes you think that you made, when you were sort of anything you wish you'd maybe done a little differently when you were making decisions about maybe getting your degree or moving into this space? Anything like that you can share?

Jennifer Neydon  
Yeah, I think I mean, I probably make mistakes every day. But I think the biggest thing that for me, within getting my, within my master's in my master's program, if I could go back and rewind, and reselect some of my elective courses, I would, and I definitely would just because of how much writing I do, I would take more courses on writing. And I know that the world is moving away from that technical writing and more building in the storytelling part of it. But, you know, my writing was spent with for 18 years with kindergarten through fifth graders and, and writing while you want, you know, your writing to be around the seventh or eighth grade level, you don't it's not the same as if you're, you're teaching a second grader how to how to put a comment in a series, you know, it's a little bit different. So I think, on that aspect, I think I would have I would have focused a little bit more on on the writing part of it and but I also think I would have just asked, not be afraid to ask questions, like I know, even like within my first month, like I sat in our our morning, huddles every morning going. I don't know what this is talking about. But I was too afraid to ask that question. Because I didn't want people to think that, well, Jennifer doesn't know what she's talking about, you know, so just understanding that it's okay to ask those questions and to go for that extra extra support and extra guidance, because, you know, everybody wants you to be successful.

Luis Malbas  
Yeah, no, I can totally imagine that. That's, that's great advice. And, you know, just a quick plug for tomorrow. Actually, I've got Kim Lindsey as a guest tomorrow, same time. 8am Pacific Time 11. Eastern, and she's gonna be talking about writing for instructional design more specifically for for, like shop floor or like the warehouse floor workers, for people maybe like working the assembly line, that type of thing writing for the for those folks, which is something that I've actually done in the past. So I'm excited to have her on tomorrow. So yeah, just a quick plug there. Now, um, now what's so exists specifically, like your daily schedule, new instructional designer for a startup? What's that look like for you?

Jennifer Neydon  
So every morning, we have morning huddle, so we have a 10 o'clock my time on Eastern. So at 10 o'clock meeting, I usually am logged on once I get my son to school, or camp or whatever. And I'm usually logged on around eight. And from eight to 10. I take care of kind of my more, just my more administrative stuff, making sure like, I clicked my boxes for my speakers on my project management side of it. And then right now we are we're building a new website for sidecar which is really kind of amazing, but I'm taking all of the courses that I inherited, and I am transitioning them into articulate 360 So I am, too Yeah, so I am we're taking courses in our LMS that is not so great. Not so hot, but we're going to we're making it into more force for compliance. So which is I'm able to make it more interactive, and I'm able to kind of put my own spin on it and, and just just really have fun. So I the majority of my day is is doing that. And a lot of the times within my courses I have I have to do a little bit extra research because some of our some of the some of the things that I just feel like, well, it's missing this piece or where's the why or or how do we apply this so I a lot of within my transitioning, I do a lot of research to and then I'm also developing a course for our new our new LMS on just learning about what in the world is web three. So I doing a lot of research on web three and blockchain and crypto To currency because before we started talking about it, I didn't know what what three was. So you know, you just got to warm it. But

Luis Malbas  
that's great. That's a lot of fun. Yeah. That's cool. That's, um, that's neat. I'll send you some links on web three I actually worked for, for a company O'Reilly that has some, some some great sort of opinions about web three. So let me say those teams. Yeah.

Jennifer Neydon  
Yeah, that would be great. Yeah, that's a really great people like, with that, like I, I interviewed, a, he worked. His name was Tim would occur. And he worked for news story. And they're a nonprofit, that they not all of their fundraising, but they set up a NFT. And that's how they did some of their fundraising to help build homes in El Salvador, and just how nonprofits and associations can apply this and this new technology and, and bring it to their members, which I think is, you know, really kind of amazing.

Luis Malbas  
So let me ask you this, just how satisfying has the change been for you from going from teacher to trainer? Has it? Has it been? What you expected? You had mentioned earlier that you do miss like, you know, the kids, right? Yeah, yeah. But overall, I mean, how are you feeling about it?

Jennifer Neydon  
I feel like I wish I would have done this 10 years ago, to be very honest, like, and I loved being a teacher, I loved my co workers, I loved the my students that I had, you know, and there's any, I feel like in any job that you have, there's always going to be that one task that you just, it's not your favorite. For me, it was grading papers, but you still got to do it, you know, it's just one of those things you have to do. But, but they're there. I can't tell you, in this past year, how many times and now I do work from home. But I can't tell you how many times this past year that I have brought work home, or worked outside of my hours. And then just the fact that I'm able to kind of just close close my computer and go spend that time with my family has been amazing, you know, teachers, teachers go above and beyond all the time, but there were so many times that I was, you know, take, I felt like once I had my son, I was taking time away from Bath time or bedtime, or or dinner time because I had to answer a parent email, or I had to, you know, finish getting a project ready or finished getting my data ready from for, you know, my, for a data meeting, and my my planning time got taken away from me the day before, so I didn't have that time within the day. So, but to have just have that it's almost like a big weight was taken off my shoulders.

Luis Malbas  
Wow. Wow, that's interesting. You know, I love hearing that for you personally. But it's also really hard to hear just as a parent with a second grader, you know, like, just thinking about what, what, what what, you know, potentially, his teachers are going through, you know, so

Jennifer Neydon  
No, and I totally agree with that. Like, it's just one of those things. Like, I'm so excited for my son to start. So I can go to that teacher and say, you know, what, what can I help you with? Like, what can I do for you that, you know, let me let me help you. Let me help you. Or even if you don't want help, and put your favorite Starbucks because I can get you that every Friday, you know, right thing just to, because teachers do do so much. And it's just one of those things that I just want to appreciate.

Luis Malbas  
Yeah, totally. Um, last question, what's your future goals look like? We haven't anything planned.

Jennifer Neydon  
So my goal, right, and like, right there in the reach is I will graduate my masters in December. So that's my congratulations. Like, let's, let's finish. Let's get that last semester done. And I think I just want to I want to continue learning, I really, you know, understanding, like, what project management is, and how can I apply that within the instructional design space and, and I really, I really would learn to love or love to learn about graphic design, like what our graphic designer does is just amazing and beautiful. And to know that she creates that is how you know, so I just want to I just want to learn about that.

Luis Malbas  
Yeah, no, that's great. Excellent. Jennifer, thank you so much for spending time today is it's um, these are really I don't know, I just learned a whole bunch from these conversations. I mean, we had Devin last week, and just talking to you this week. I think that It, you know, you sharing your your knowledge is just really, really helpful even for somebody like me that, you know, I'm not even a practicing instructional designer, but I'm learning a lot about your background and about the reason you made these changes and, and sort of what you the lessons learned. And it's so important. I'm hoping that other people can take advantage of, of what you you've learned as well. And yeah, like Amanda appreciates your, your your, your conversation. So, Jennifer, thanks so much, everybody T to LD, let me paste that in chat here at WWW dot t to ld.com. If you want to sign up for that at the end of the month, it's free. And I think we're just going to have some some great sessions on, on on transitioning teachers, just helping you out to figure out whether or not instructional design is the right choice for you. And Jennifer, thanks again and everybody. We'll have more of these set up. Don't forget to register tomorrow for for Kim, talking about writing for instructional design and shop floor workers. And with that, I'm going to close it out. Thanks again, Jennifer.

I think you're right i Everyone thanks

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

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