The Mindtools L&D Podcast

Epizódy

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  513 — Articulate goes all in on AI: our reaction 15.09.2026 33min

  Articulate's latest product release puts AI at the heart of it's strategy. What does this mean for learning designers? In this week's episode of The Mindtools L&D Podcast, Ross G flies solo to react to Articulate's Articuland announcement, unpacking what Frontline, Nova, and the platform's pivot toward operational teams means for learning design. He discusses: What Articulate's new 'Frontline' and 'Nova' tools actually do, and why the launch has 'annoyed basically everyone' Whether the shift from 'training creator' to 'capability architect' holds up The seven things humans can still offer that AI can't automate, from 'embodied presence' to 'provenance' During the episode, Ross discussed Articulate's own recap of the Articuland 2026 announcement, covering Frontline, Nova, and the new integrations in full. He also discussed The AI Acceleration Gap, Monika Saha's thought-leadership piece arguing for a shift from training creator to capability architect. See also Dr Philippa Hardman's LinkedIn post testing Frontline against a real fraud-reporting policy document. And The AI Daily Brief's episode on the new jobs AI will create, the source for the seven things humans still offer. For more from Mindtools Kineo, visit our new website mindtools-kineo.com. There, you'll find out how we can help your organization build AI skills, and how our Skills Practice scenarios help build human skills. Connect with our speakers If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Ross Garner
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  512 — Learner enthusiasm, AI tutors, and a neuromyth that won't die 08.09.2026 44min

  What research papers did you read while lounging by the pool this summer? In this week's episode of The Mindtools L&D Podcast, Ross D is joined by Claire and Dr Anna to review three studies that have caught our attention over the last few months. Anna's pick was Vestner and colleagues' 'A dyadic training to promote technology-related learning and development among age-diverse employees: the power of co-workers' enthusiasm', published in the Journal of Occupational and Organizational Psychology. Claire brought Kestin and colleagues' 'AI tutoring outperforms in-class active learning: an RCT introducing a novel research-based design in an authentic educational setting', the Harvard study comparing an AI tutor with in-person active learning. Ross referenced Will Thalheimer's LinkedIn article 'The Learning Styles Challenge After 20 Years', and Clinton-Lisell and Litzinger's 'Is It Really a Neuromyth? A Meta-Analysis of the Learning Styles Matching Hypothesis'. For more from Mindtools Kineo, visit our website mindtools-kineo.com. There, you'll find out how we can help your organization build AI skills, and how our Skills Practice scenarios help build human skills. Connect with our speakers If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Ross Dickie Claire Gibson Anna Barnett
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  511 — L&D at scale: How do you support 750,000 people? 01.09.2026 40min

  Training one person is hard. Training 750,000 people, in more than 80 countries, spread across frontline shifts, event security and executive teams, is a different problem entirely. In this week's episode of The Mindtools L&D Podcast, Ross G and Claire Gibson are joined by Brent O'Bryan, Senior Vice President of Global Training and Talent Development at Allied Universal, to explore what L&D looks like at genuinely massive scale. We discuss: Why 750,000 employees are never one audience How to choose between the LMS, the classroom and virtual training The role of AI and automation in training frontline workers at scale. Brent and Ross G first got talking about this after Brent shared The Josh Bersin Company's research on dynamic enablement. You can read the executive summary of The Definitive Guide to Corporate Learning: From Static Training to Dynamic Enablement on the Josh Bersin site. In 'What I Learned this Week', Claire shared the world's smallest Fringe venue, a chicken coop in the Pear Tree garden in Edinburgh. Brent recommended The Surprising Power of Reflection, an episode of Trevor Ragan's The Learner Lab podcast, on why reflecting after learning can beat a second round of practice. Ross G shared Garner interference, a cognitive science effect named after Wendell Garner, in which irrelevant information slows people down. For more from Mindtools Kineo, visit our new website mindtools-kineo.com. There, you'll find out how we can help your organization build AI skills, and how our Skills Practice scenarios help build human skills. Connect with our spearkers If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Ross Garner Claire Gibson Brent O'Bryan
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  510 — You don't have to talk to add value (Rebroadcast) 25.08.2026 37min

  We've been talking a lot about AI on the podcast recently. So this week, we're revisting a distinctly human episode from 2024 on the value of listening. As experts, managers or leaders, we often seek to help others by talking, talking, talking. But what if we didn't talk and just listened? In this episode, Ross D and Gemma are joined by Georgie Rudd, an executive coach, to discuss the trials and delights of listening. We explore: reasons that we don't listen well the consequences of not listening (and of listening!) how we can improve listening skills. Georgie recommended Nancy Klein as an expert on listening and techniques to improve. Time to think is a good place to start. You can find out more about Liz Wiseman's concepts of multipliers and diminishers in her book Multipliers. In 'What I Learned This Week', Gemma spoke about the widest fairy ring in the world. John Wright reports that it's around 800m across in A spotter's guide to countryside mysteries, but a quick internet search revealed this to be a questionable fact.  For more from Mindtools Kineo, visit our website mindtools-kineo.com. There, you'll find out how we can help your organization build AI skills, and how our Skills Practice scenarios help build human skills. Connect with our speakers    If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with our speakers on LinkedIn: Gemma Towersey Ross Dickie  Georgie Rudd Georgie can also be contacted via her website: https://www.ruddcoaching.co.uk/
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  509 — What are L&D teams really doing with AI? 18.08.2026 39min

  Every L&D team thinks everyone else has AI figured out. Almost nobody does. Ross G recently ran structured interviews with 12 Mindtools Kineo customers, spanning tech, financial services, pharmaceuticals, energy, media and more, to find out what's really happening on the ground. In this week's episode, Ross D and Cammy Bean join Ross G to discuss his findings. We cover: Why every L&D team believes it is falling behind Where teams are continuing to invest at a time when budgets are constrained Why AI ambition keeps stalling at the governance stage During the episode, Cammy referenced a LinkedIn post titled 'L&D Overboard' by Srishti Sehgal. In 'What I Learned This Week', Cammy shared the history of Nix's Mate, a shrinking island in Boston Harbor where convicted pirates were hanged and left on display as a warning to passing sailors. Ross G recommended The Rest Is History's interview with Paul McCartney. And Ross D recommended The West Wing Weekly's 'Political Film Fest' review of All the President's Men. For more from Mindtools Kineo, visit our website mindtools-kineo.com. There, you'll find out how we can help your organization build AI skills, and how our Skills Practice scenarios help build human skills. Connect with our speakers If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Ross Dickie Ross Garner Cammy Bean
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  508 — What will compliance training look like in the age of AI? 11.08.2026 43min

  Outside of L&D, most people and organizations see compliance training as a box that needs to be ticked, not something that can drive behavior change. Will AI make this problem better or worse? In this week's episode, Ross D and Cammy are joined by learning designer Anisha Sridhar to explore what AI is really doing to compliance training. We discussed: why the productivity argument for AI is incomplete contextualization, and why it beats personalization in compliance how to keep slop out of your learning content. During the episode, Anisha described using the Gunning Fog index to test whether legal text is actually readable. And Cammy brought up Bret Stephens' New York Times opinion piece, I'm Begging You: Never Write With A.I., which argues that giving up the writing means giving up the thinking. For more from Mindtools Kineo, visit our website mindtools-kineo.com. There, you'll find out how we can help your organization build AI skills, and how our Skills Practice scenarios help build human skills. Connect with our speakers If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Ross Dickie Cammy Bean Anisha Sridhar
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  507 — Do learning games still have a place? 04.08.2026 43min

  Online learning keeps sliding back to text and images. Authoring tools and AI course generators make content cheap, but it often looks like learning without ever asking the learner to think or choose. Games work the other way, running on decisions, feedback, and the chance to try again. Following our recent conversation with Julie Dirksen, we ask where games belong in the age of AI. In this week's episode, Ross G is joined by Richard Durham, Co-founder and Lead Game Designer at Tentacular Games and Great Grand High Lord of Everything at Wonder Tree Studios, and by Mindtools Kineo's own Claire Gibson, to dig into why games work for learning and whether they still earn their place. We discussed: What makes games actually work for learning Why in-person, analog game-based learning never went away Whether modern authoring tools have flattened games into quizzes During the conversation, Richard pointed to the beer game, MIT Sloan's classic supply-chain simulation that demonstrates the bullwhip effect through decisions and their consequences. He also referenced ABC Learning Design, the rapid workshop method from University College London for mapping out the activities that make up a course. In 'What I Learned this Week', Claire shared The Sumerian Game, a 1964 resource-management game created by Mabel Addis, who is credited as the first video game designer. Ross shared a piece by Nicholas Thompson, CEO of The Atlantic, on a study of AI-generated books on Amazon and how their slow creep is starting to erode sales of human-written books. For more from Mindtools Kineo, visit our new website mindtools-kineo.com. There, you'll find out how we can help your organization build AI skills, and how our Skills Practice scenarios help build human skills. Connect with our speakers If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Ross Garner Claire Gibson Richard Durham
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  506 — Is your AI companion a colleague or rival? 28.07.2026 41min

  If you're rolling out AI licenses, how do you get people to use them? For AI learning designer Emily Valencia, there are two key requirements: that people can experiment safely, and that they can share results with others. In this week's episode of The Mindtools L&D Podcast, Ross D and Matt meet with Emily to discuss: What organizations get wrong about AI rollouts What effective AI adoption looks like Whether we should really see AI as a coworker (or whether this framing is one of the obstacles we've created for ourselves) During the discussion, Matt referenced recent news that an OpenAI experiment went rogue. Find out more about Emily at emilyvalenciaai.com In 'What I Learned this Week', Matt discussed the always-round-the-corner nature of Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). Emily discussed Anthropic's partnership with Detroit Public Schools. Ross D discussed the documentary Rafa. For more from Mindtools Kineo, visit  our new website mindtools-kineo.com. There, you'll find out how our AI Skills Academy supports practical, hands-on AI upskilling for the enterprise: four weeks, role-specific use cases, governance built in from week one. Like the show? You'll LOVE our newsletter! Sign up to The L&D Dispatch now. Connect with our speakers     If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Ross Dickie Matt Mella Emily Valencia
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  505 — Are your managers killing your AI strategy? 21.07.2026 43min

  There are at least four factors that influence the success of AI adoption in your organization: training your people, clarity of compliance guidance, how people are rewarded, and the influence of managers. In this week's episode of The Mindtools L&D Podcast, we're exploring the last of these. In his book, Leading with AI - How to build high performance teams with AI as your sparring partner, Joris Merks-Benjaminsen presents an action-focused framework for helping managers adopt AI. In our discussion, we focus on: whether AI can replace managers how to help managers get started with AI why embracing AI is a mindset shift, beyond just 'writing good prompts' During the discussion, we referenced Google's Project Oxygen. This was led by Laszlo Bock, who wrote Work Rules! about his experiences. The woman who "married" her ChatGPT companion was covered by Forbes. To pick up a copy of Joris' book, visit managingwithoutpower.com.  In 'What I Learned this Week', Ross G discussed AI's preference for negative parallellisms. For more from Mindtools Kineo, visit  our new website mindtools-kineo.com. There, you'll find out how our AI Skills Academy supports practical, hands-on AI upskilling for the enterprise: four weeks, role-specific use cases, governance built in from week one. Connect with our speakers     If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Ross Garner Ross Dickie Joris Merks-Benjaminsen
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  504 — Becoming a skills-based organization 14.07.2026 46min

  As AI transforms the way work gets done, many organizations are trying to understand the skills they need today, as well as the expertise they'll need tomorrow.  In this week's episode, Cammy and Gemma are joined by skills expert Koreen Pagano to unpack the rise of skills-based organizations.  We discussed: What becoming 'skills-based' in an organization might look like  The benefits and challenges of shifting towards a skill-based approach  The impact of AI on this shift, skills development and managers. You can pre-order Koreen's forthcoming book, Rewiring Your Organization for AI, and buy her published books Building the Skills-Based Organization and Immersive Learning: Designing for Authentic Practice.  In 'What I Learned this Week', Cammy shared a non-fiction book recommendation for Shakespeare was a Woman and Other Heresies.  Koreen described the lives of a family of eagles which she's been following on the Big Bear Bald Eagle cam. For more from Mindtools Kineo, visit  our new website mindtools-kineo.com. There, you'll find out how we can help your organization build AI skills, and how our Skills Practice scenarios help build human skills. Connect with our speakers     If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Gemma Towersey Cammy Bean Koreen Pagano
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  503 — The Eras Tour: Part 4 (AI takes over) 07.07.2026 40min

  In the final part of our 500th anniversary 'Eras Tour' retrospective, we conclude by saying farewell to our human co-workers and embracing the technology that will ultimately destroy us all: Artificial Intelligence (AI). Ross G and Dr Anna B are joined by our most frequent guest of all time, Donald H Taylor, to discuss: how AI took over Don's annual 'Global Sentiment Survey' the mindset shift that L&D professionals need to embrace to adapt to change whether, 10 years after we first asked this question, L&D is truly dead? During the discussion, Ross referenced the ultimate hidden banger in our back catalogue: 357 — L&D governance (the ultimate juggling act). He also referenced an August 2025 report which found that 95% of AI pilot programs deliver no value. In 'What I Learned This Week', Ross discussed the incredible longevity of sharks. Don referenced a conversation with his AI reports co-author Egle Vinauskaite. You can find their reports on Don's website. See also: donaldhtaylor.co.uk Like the show? You'll love our newsletter! Subscribe to The L&D Dispatch now. And if you're currently building AI skills in your organization, we can help! Check out our AI Skills Academy to find out more. Or drop us a note on LinkedIn, we'd love to hear from you. Connect with our speakers     If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Ross Garner Dr Anna Barnett Don Taylor
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  502 — The Eras Tour: Part 3 (The hybrid period) 01.07.2026 37min

  If the pandemic years saw the office become a 'blank space', the hybrid era gradually witnessed that space fill up again through return-to-office mandates. In this week's episode of The Mindtools L&D Podcast, Rob Baker joins us to continue our 'Eras Tour'. We discuss: how the pandemic created an opportunity for 'job crafting', and what's changed since we've come out of lockdown whether job crafting has lost relevance since the pandemic, or just gotten harder to realize what new research tells us about the impact of job crafting on performance and wellbeing. You can find out more about the work Rob does at tailoredthinking.co.uk. See also: Tailored Thinking's series of articles on Work and Job Design (including AI crafting): Building Better Work by Design Rob's book, Personalization at Work: Personalization at Work In 'What I Learned This Week', Rob discussed the art of subtraction, including the Lego experiment explored in this video. Ross G referenced an article in People Management on the challenge we may experience fulfilling AI roles in the future. Like the show? You'll love our newsletter! Subscribe to The L&D Dispatch now. And if you want to work with us, please do visit mindtools-kineo.com or find us on LinkedIn. We'd love to hear from you. Connect with our speakers     If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Ross Dickie Ross Garner Rob Baker
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  501 — The Eras Tour: Part 2 (The pandemic years) 23.06.2026 39min

  Ross G stays out too late. Got nothing in his brain. At least, that's what people say. In this week's episode of The Mindtools L&D Podcast, we're joined by Heeral Gudka and Andy Lancaster to continue our 'Eras Tour', with a look back at the pandemic years. We discuss: the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on L&D, and how much of the 'new normal' we've held on to what connectedness and belonging look and feel like in the post-pandemic era how attitudes and organisational priorities around DEI have shifted since 2020. In 'What I Learned This Week', Ross discussed an HBR article on the pros and cons of continuous assessment. Like the show? You'll love our newsletter! Subscribe to The L&D Dispatch now. And if you want to work with us, please do visit mindtools-kineo.com or find us on LinkedIn. We'd love to hear from you. Connect with our speakers     If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Ross Garner Heeral Gudka Andy Lancaster
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  500 — The Eras Tour: Part 1 (Starting with evidence) 16.06.2026 41min

  Ten years, 500 shows, countless guests. To celebrate our anniversary, we're releasing a special four-part series looking back at the evolution of L&D. In part one, Ross G and Ross D are joined by friend-of-the-show Julie Dirksen to revisit our early years. We discuss: whether L&D has yet become 'evidence-based' dumb ideas we fall for, get over, and fall for again evidence-based orthodoxies which we once believed, but now aren't so sure about. During the discussion, we referenced the Mehrabian fallacy, problems with the forgetting curve, and how psychologst Anders Ericsson improved his memory by forming connections with running times. In 'What I Learned This Week', Ross D referenced A History of the United States in 100 Objects, a podcast collaboration between the BBC and 99% Invisible. He wants you to know that his description of the 'screws' episode is inaccurate. Ross G discussed the carrier pigeon-based social media app Roost. Next week, we'll be revisiting our second Era: The pandemic years. You can find details of Julie's books, Design for How People Learn and Talk to the Elephant, at our website usablelearning.com Like the show? You'll love our newsletter! Subscribe to The L&D Dispatch now. And if you want to work with us, please do visit mindtools-kineo.com or find us on LinkedIn. We'd love to hear from you. Connect with our speakers     If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Ross Dickie Ross Garner Julie Dirksen
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  499 — Why workplace learning has never been more important 09.06.2026 37min

  According to Dr Tessa Forshaw, Faculty Director of the Harvard Graduate School of Education's Workforce Learning and Innovation Initiative, workplace learning has never been more important. It's also never been at greater risk. In this week's episode of The Mindtools L&D Podcast, Tessa joins Ross D and Matt to discuss: the role of L&D at a time when the World Economic Forum has estimated that 59% of the global workforce will need retrained by the end of the decade the importance of 'desirable difficulty' in learning, and how this is undermined by technologies like AI what the future of L&D should look like in an environment where skills needs are evolving at such a rapid pace. You can find out more about The Future of Workforce Learning and Innovation certificate programme here. Enter the code MIND5 for a discount on the programme. In 'What I Learned This Week', Matt referenced research exploring the similarities between whale and human communication. For more from Mindtools Kineo, visit  our website mindtools-kineo.com. There, you'll also find details of our Learning Management Systems, Content Hub for leaders and managers, and custom learning design service. Connect with our speakers     If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Ross Dickie Matt Mella Dr Tessa Forshaw
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  498 — Know yourself to know others 28.05.2026 37min

  Our Building Better Managers research identified that employees care about having an empathetic manager, but only half reported having a manager who was fair and empathetic.  All is not lost. Empathy is a skill, and like any other skill, it can be developed. So what might that process involve? In this episode of The Mindtools L&D Podcast, Loren Sanders joins Ross G and Gemma to discuss: the difference empathy makes developing self-awareness to develop empathy tact as the expression of empathy. You can find out more about Loren and her book Empathy is Not A Weakness and Other Stories from the Edge at loren365.com.  Ross referred to Self-awareness and empathy that Ross referred to : Whiteside, D. B., & Barclay, L. J. (2016). The face of fairness: Self-awareness as a means to promote fairness among managers with low empathy. Journal of Business Ethics, 137(4), 721-730 In 'What I Learned This Week', Ross recommended C.J Cooke's gothic thriller A Haunting in the Arctic. For more from Mindtools Kineo, visit  our website mindtools-kineo.com. There, you'll find out how we can help your organization build AI skills, and how our Skills Practice scenarios help build human skills. Connect with our speakers If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Loren Sanders Ross Garner Gemma Towersey
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  497 — The business impact of play at work (Rebroadcast) 26.05.2026 41min

  This week, we're revisting one of our favorite episodes from last year, focusing on the role of play at work. All children play but, over time, that instinct goes away. We don't lose it, we don't forget. Instead, we get taught to stop. For author and toy designer Cas Holman, that's a problem. With a very real impact on business performance. In this episode of The Mindtools L&D Podcast, Cas joins Ross G and Gemma to discuss: how traditional workplaces surpress play the business benefits of play at work how to encourage play when your organization won't tolerate it. You can find out more about Cas and her book Playfulness at casholman.com/book. You can also see her in the Netflix series Abstract: The Art of Design. In 'What I Learned This Week', Ross discussed peculiar experiments involving moths, via The Economist. For more from Mindtools Kineo, visit  our website mindtools-kineo.com. There, you'll find out how we can help your organization build AI skills, and how our Skills Practice scenarios help build human skills. Connect with our speakers If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Cas Holman Ross Garner Gemma Towersey
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  496 — How to project presence 15.05.2026 45min

  You know those people who seem to command a room with a certain gravitas? How are they doing it? In this week's episode of The Mindtools L&D Podcast, Gemma is joined by Frankie Kemp and Ross D to explore: what presence is the difference between presence and presentation techniques to use to develop your presence. During the discussion, Frankie referenced: 'Why You Need Charisma' (via Harvard Business Review)  'Can Charisma Be Taught? Tests of Two Interventions' (via Academy of Management Learning & Education)  You can find out more about Frankie's work via her website frankiekemp.com. For more from Mindtools Kineo, visit  our new website mindtools-kineo.com. There, you'll find out how we can help your organization build AI skills, and how our Skills Practice scenarios help build human skills. Connect with our speakers    If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Ross Dickie Gemma Towersey Frankie Kemp 
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  495 — Driving performance with AI 12.05.2026 34min

  If AI is so transformative, how come it's so hard to adopt? In this week's episode of The Mindtools L&D Podcast, Ross G is joined by Mindtools Kineo AI Strategy Director Rodrigo Bolaños to explore: the hype surrounding AI's potential the reality experienced by many organizations how to drive AI adoption at scale. During the discussion, Ross G referenced: 'The state of AI in 2025' (via McKinsey) 'The AI Adoption Reality Check' (via Thomson Reuters) 'Many workers are using unapproved AI tools at work' (via TechRadar) '38% of AI-suing employees admit to sending sensitive work data' (via National Cybersecurity Alliance) 'AI-generated "workslop" is destroying producitivty' (via HBR) 'AI workslop is muddying the American workplace' (via The Week) 'AI in L&D: The Race for Impact' (via Don Taylor and Eglė Vinauskaitė) In 'What I Learned This Week', Ross discussed 'death-cleaning', following the passing of Margareta Magnusson (via The Economist). For more from Mindtools Kineo, visit  our new website mindtools-kineo.com. There, you'll find out how we can help your organization build AI skills, and how our Skills Practice scenarios help build human skills. Connect with our speakers     If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Ross Garner Rodrigo Bolaños
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  494 — What we learned at Learning Tech 2026 05.05.2026 34min

  Last week, the Mindtools Kineo gang attended the Learning Technologies exhibition and conference, Europe's largest L&D event. And so, this week on The Mindtools L&D Podcast, Ross D, Ross G, Gemma and Matt are regrouping to discuss: our personal highlights from Learning Tech what the conference tells us about the shape of the industry the key themes that emerged over the course of the two days who and what industry conferences are for in 2026. In 'What I Learned This Week', Ross G mentioned the Stat Significant newsletter. Ross D recommended A Spy Among Friends by Ben Macintyre. For more from Mindtools Kineo, visit  our new website mindtools-kineo.com. There, you'll also find details of our Learning Management Systems, Content Hub for leaders and managers, and custom learning design service - including AI skills development! Like the show? You'll LOVE our newsletter! Subscribe to The L&D Dispatch at lddispatch.com Connect with our speakers     If you'd like to share your thoughts on this episode, connect with us on LinkedIn: Ross Dickie Ross Garner Gemma Towersey Matt Mella