Communication and collaboration have been central to my professional practice in learning design and educational technology. My work has involved collaborating with academics, learning designers, technical specialists, educators and industry professionals, often with different perspectives on teaching, learning and technology.
Through these experiences, I have come to recognise that effective communication requires more than explaining technical or pedagogical concepts. It involves understanding the perspectives of colleagues, creating opportunities for dialogue and being willing to reconsider one’s own assumptions.
An important example was my involvement in supporting the implementation of Canvas at UTS between 2018 and 2020. Working alongside learning designers and technical specialists, I facilitated professional learning activities for academic staff across different faculties.
The participants had different levels of technical confidence, teaching experience and familiarity with online learning. Consequently, a single approach to communication was unlikely to meet everyone’s needs.
I used a combination of group workshops, practical demonstrations and individual consultations. The workshops provided opportunities to introduce shared concepts and demonstrate possibilities, while individual consultations allowed colleagues to raise questions related to their own teaching contexts.
Reflecting on this experience, I recognised that practical, collaborative activities could be more effective than presenting colleagues with abstract principles of good learning design. They also created opportunities for academics to draw on their disciplinary and teaching expertise when reconsidering the design of their subjects.
This experience reinforced my understanding that academics, learning designers and technical specialists contribute complementary forms of professional knowledge. My role was not simply to communicate learning design expertise, but to help create conditions in which these perspectives could inform one another.
Beyond my institution, I have contributed to the development of professional communities for learning designers. I was involved in establishing the Australian Association of Learning Designers (AALD), initially as a network for students and graduates of the GCLD. The community subsequently expanded to include learning designers working across different sectors. It now has almost 2000 members!
Through the AALD, I organised and contributed to webinars, hackathons and discussion forums. These activities provided opportunities for participants to share experiences, examine common professional challenges and collaboratively develop responses.
I have also served as Convenor of the ASCILITE Learning Design Special Interest Group, facilitating professional learning and discussion on topics such as inclusive design, assessment and learning analytics. Below is a video from one of our sessions:
These professional communities have been important to my own learning. Engaging with learning designers working in higher education, government, corporate learning and other settings has exposed me to different organisational constraints and different approaches to educational design.
This has reinforced the importance of avoiding assumptions that practices developed in one institutional context will necessarily transfer successfully to another. It has also encouraged me to think more critically about how learning design expertise is developed, recognised and shared.
Mentorship has been another important dimension of my professional communication. Through the ASCILITE Community Mentoring Program, I have supported early-career colleagues, including individuals transitioning into higher education learning design.
In these relationships, I have sought to combine practical guidance with opportunities for discussion and reflection. Rather than assuming that my experience provides a universally applicable model, I recognise the importance of understanding the mentee’s professional background, goals and circumstances.
Reflecting across these experiences, I increasingly regard effective professional communication as reciprocal. It involves listening as well as explaining, questioning as well as advising, and recognising the expertise that colleagues bring from different professional and disciplinary backgrounds.
I also acknowledge the need for more systematic evaluation of my communication activities. Attendance figures, membership numbers and positive reactions can demonstrate reach or satisfaction, but do not necessarily establish changes in professional practice. In future, I would seek to document more clearly what participants applied, what challenges remained and how their feedback influenced subsequent professional learning activities.