We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Russell Sweep a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Russell, appreciate you joining us today. Can you talk to us about how you learned to do what you do?

Instructional design is a balance of developing effective training opportunities for learners while also appeasing a stakeholder’s desire for projects to be: cheaper, faster, and better. Initially a college professor for 6 years, I felt I understood what the learner needed and how to present new material to them. Unfortunately, I knew nearly nothing about the corporate workforce and how to get buy-in from higher-ups. When I moved from California to North Carolina, I expected the same support for teachers as I had on the west coast: Unions looking out for your benefits, tenure you can count on, and a livable wage. The reality was a big shock to my system. Before my first interview for an adjunct position, the college asked me for my prior pay rate. When my interviewer reached that section of my application, he literally laughed out loud and said “There’s no way you will make that much here”! This was a turning point for me. Already feeling burned out from teaching virtually during the Covid-19 Pandemic, I was eager for a change. Hearing the lack of support in front of me made me question whether a career shift was in my future. When I finally received an offer letter for a full-time teaching opportunity at a community college, I froze. I was gonna have to teach more than a full load of classes while only making 1/3 of what I did in California. I panicked and told the recruiter that “I’m sorry, but I received a better offer that I’m gonna be accepting”. The thing was… there was no offer. My first 100 rejection letters came from my eager attempt to force my higher education experience to meet the definition of Instructional Design. “I taught adults”, I would repeat to myself, “Isn’t that the same thing”? The humbling onslaught of emails told me that I was sorely missing some key features and I began to reflect on my inexperience with newfound curiosity. I had previously spent close to a decade in school acquiring my teaching position and I didn’t really want to go through academia again. So, perhaps stubbornly, I traveled my learning journey with only free resources and a desire for change.
I treated that period of upskilling like a full-time job: wake up, brew some coffee, kiss my wife goodbye, and slip into another room with a bulky pair of headphones to grind the day away. I have a friend that says: “If there’s a youtube, there’s a way”. This became my mantra as I would devour free content every hour. When it felt like I had hit a roadblock, I would reach out to my new blossoming LinkedIn community for recommendations for books or podcasts. Every day I felt invigorated by learning something new and seeing the potential of how adult learning theories could be applied in a corporate environment.
There were some tough calls that had to be made. My family was now a one-income household and the most expensive (and most popular) E-Learning software was for PC users only. Of course, I was a Mac user… I decided to bite the bullet and purchased a refurbished $400 laptop while using the teacher-discounted version of the software. However, it was enough to get started. This field requires a virtual portfolio of your previous projects and if you had no work, recruiters would quickly pass you by. My self-directed education was filled with learning theories in the morning, portfolio web development at lunch, theoretical project design in the afternoon, and corporate educational books for dinner.
Every day I would apply for jobs that came across my radar. Some were full-time positions that would fill with 200 applicants in the first 10 minutes while others were contracts that would require a menial repetitive task. I had more success with the latter. curating resources, copywriting documents, and reviewing e-learnings. These were my experiences in the field that helped me determine what work I enjoyed and what I could do without.
It was around a year since that community college interview that I received my first full-time Instructional Designer offer letter. Currently, I’m coming up on 6 months at my company and have never been happier. I often tell my wife that it’s a marvel that in 6 months I haven’t had a day where I was sick of the work.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

Russell sweep is a content development manager for Goodwill Industries International. After recently deciding to make a shift out of academia, he has worked hard to transition into online learning and development. As an avid multimedia professional, he creates a wide range of content for learners to enjoy like his podcast The L&D Hot Seat: a show where guests are provided 3 challenging scenarios in the field of L&D and asked for solutions. You can find him at multiple L&D conferences this year, in Chicago, Seattle, and Las Vegas where he acts as Press, interviewing many leaders in the field. Russell Invites you to connect with him on LinkedIn or visit his website www.RussellSweep.com to learn more about his work!

Have any books or other resources had a big impact on you?

Free is always my favorite price! however, it’s important to separate the value from all the noise. These were my favorite resources when upskilling in instructional design: Devlin Peck’s Youtube channel
LinkedIn for community support and networking
The Global Learning and Development Community (MyGLDC.com)
Teaching: A Path to L&D (Linkedin community)

Contact Info:

• Website: www.russellsweep.com
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/russell-sweep/
• Other: https://www.buzzsprout.com/2064776