E-Learning Design - How did you get started?

Hi Martin!

Welcome to the community and thanks for posting your question here! I think it's a great topic and I see you've already got some great feedback. I think the one constant when it comes to e-learning is that most people somehow fell into the field by accident, and that would include me.

I like to be really practical, so here is a list of things I would recommend to you to help you get involved and develop your e-learning skills =)

1) Take some courses or certification in Instructional Design. This will help round off your skillset. I took an amazing 3-day workshop called Instructional Design for New Designers by Langevin Learning Services and I can't recommend it highly enough. It changed my life and how I view training. They teach you how to do a training needs analysis, a task analysis, how to choose different presentation methods, etc. It's super practical and great workshop to give you good basic ID skills. Something else you might want to look into are courses on graphic design basics. Knowing how to do some cool graphic stuff (and even just basic things like removing backgrounds, cropping, adjusting brightness, adding filters, etc) will go a long way in helping you design great looking courses.

2) Develop a portfolio and a simple website for yourself. There are tons of great threads going on in the community where people share how and why they are sharing their blogs and e-learning portfolios (here, here and here to name a few). If you have access to Storyline and Captivate, develop a little 5-slide mini course in each tool that you can use in your portfolio. You can even build out a sample in Powerpoint. If you don't have any authoring tools to use in your free time try to download the 30 day free trial and create something within 30 days.

3) Take part in the Articulate weekly challenge. David Anderson hosts the Articulate Weekly Challenge where every week he posts a new topic/theme/idea and people develop their submissions using Powepoint, Studio, Storyline.... whatever they have access to! It's a great way to get inspired by others, and it's a great way to get some practice and develop samples. You can also get some good constructive criticism and feedback from others in the community, if you so choose to ask.

4) Cultivate your social media personality. Twitter, LinkedIn, blogs, the Articulate forum. These are places where you can share ideas, tips, tricks and build a following and make a name for yourself in the industry. I would NOT be where I am today in my career without the blog I started (Flirting with E-Learning) and without my strong social media presence on Twitter and LinkedIn. Make sure you're putting your name out there and that will help make sure (that eventually) opportunities come to you.

5) Stay tuned to the Articulate forums and Blogs. I know this is cliche... but as they say, it's often not what you know, it's who you know. So make sure you're connecting with tons of people in your industry! One way to do this is to stick around the forums. You should also check out the blogs section to make sure you're always on top of what's new and happenin' in the world of e-learning

Good luck to you!! Hope to see more of you around the forums and on social media