Michelle Parry-Slater is working very hard at bringing organisations into the 21st century. “I am moving people away from just offering classroom based training in their organisations to embracing the best of social and digital to add to their other offerings,” says Michelle, who runs her own consultancy business called Kairos Modern Learning.
Michelle firmly believes that workplace learning could be so much better than it has been, than it is. That is what she wants to achieve, through transforming learning into something more social and digital.
Michelle comes at everything from a very practical perspective. “I won’t just talk about what people should be doing. People always say ‘I’ve heard the evidence, I’ve seen the speakers and so on but I just don’t know how to do it. I plug that gap.”
Is she succeeding? Is she bringing organisations into the 21st century? Well, the pace of change is very slow, but Michelle says the learning profession has by and large finally woken up to the fact that the old ways of learning are outdated and there are much better, newer ways of learning. “Three years ago, people were open mouthed at conferences when I spoke. Three years ago, if I asked at a conference who was involved in tech learning, there would be no hands in the air. Now it’s about 50%. Now, people are saying ‘We have tried this but it’s not working’. Or ‘We are thinking about trying this’. There is a definite movement.”
When people come to Michelle for consultancy, they often have an idea of a new tool that they want to implement. But, before getting to implementation stage, Michelle takes them right back to basics. “We (my partners and I) do a lot of change management first. What are your business needs? What are the challenges and strategies? Do you have the right culture? Are employees ready for this? Is the senior team ready?”
Even when it’s not a technical solution that a customer is seeking, Michelle says she still strips everything back to basics. “When customers come to me and say they want to implement 70:20:10, I have to ask them the same questions: Are your stakeholders ready? Is the business environment ready?”
A real selling point of Michelle’s is that she has a long career history in corporate L&D. “I used to manage a team of 35 operationally, for example.” She has also had roles where she was the one and only L&D person. “I started Kairos Modern Learning after coming out of a big corporate role where there was a workforce of 3000 people, but just me in L&D.”
Why is this a selling point? “I very much remember what it’s like to be that lone L&Der in an organisation. As a result, I am very practically focused. I won’t just talk about what people should be doing. People always say ‘I’ve heard the evidence, I’ve seen the speakers and so on but I just don’t know how to do it. I plug that gap.”
Michelle comes at everything from a very practical perspective. Check out her twitter feed #noplasters. “I run practical support for people in L&D roles to help them move their story on by themselves.”
I won’t just talk about what people should be doing. People always say ‘I’ve heard the evidence, I’ve seen the speakers and so on but I just don’t know how to do it. I plug that gap.”
As well as all of this, Michelle runs something called LnDcowork with a friend and colleague, Fiona McBride. Noddlepod’s very own Ollie is also involved and it’s a monthly event aimed at the sole L&Der in a corporate and freelancer L&Ders. The idea is for L&D professionals to bounce ideas off each other, share and collaborate in a safe space with like minded peers.
Collaborative working, networking, judging awards and talking and blogging at conferences are all really important to Michelle. It’s how she innovates and stays current. “It’s how you stay close to the new stuff.” She also stays close to the new stuff through her work with institutions such as the CIPD and Towards Maturity. “I do a lot of work with the CIPD. They are taking a very strong direction and are upskilling people. I really admire the fact that they are trying to lead the industry forward and it’s very special to be part of that.”
“Noddlepod is collaborative, it’s very effective and it’s cheaper than most of the platforms out there”.
Then of course, there’s Michelle’s partnership with Noddlepod. The Noddlepod platform is a good fit with lots of Michelle’s clients – it’s collaborative, it’s very effective and it’s cheaper than most of the platforms out there. Michelle likes all of that. But she also likes the fact that Ollie knows that Noddlepod won’t be right for everyone. “I love the fact that Ollie says ‘I don’t want you to sell Noddlepod to people or encourage them to use Noddlepod if it isn’t right for them’. It’s an enlightened provider who recognises that their solution will not be right for everyone. It also means you can have very honest conversations.”
But, because of what Noddlepod offers and because Ollie stays close to the learning industry, Michelle thinks Noddlepod is right for a lot of people and will continue to evolve as the learning profession evolves. “Something that is unique about Noddlepod is that the team behind it are learning people and not just tech people. Ollie stays very close to the industry and the wider learning world and that drives her work in a way that is future proofed.”
You can read more about Michelle Parry-Slater here.