The AI value framework applied to learning and development

The three paths in learning and development

The three paths sort AI use cases by what changes for the person on the receiving end. They are Boosting productivity, Creating new value and Driving disruption.

Boosting productivity: the same work, faster

• Content development that ran in weeks running in hours, including variants of one module for different audiences.
• Translation and localization at a low enough cost that a multi-market rollout no longer needs its own project.
• Practice scenarios and assessments drafted from the material that already exists.
• Custom visuals and voiceover produced without a studio booking or a designer in the queue.

Many functions start on this path, and the gains are worth having. Many also stop here, which is the failure mode the framework is designed to catch: the tools are rolled out, but the workflows stay the same.

Creating new value: something the function could not offer before

• Learning advisors that answer a person’s questions in the middle of a task.
• Role-play and simulation that respond to what the learner says.
• Learning paths that adapt to each learner’s progress.
• Support delivered inside the tools where the work happens, at the moment the work is happening.
• Skill assessment that names a specific gap and the next step against it.

These are new offerings. To check whether a use case belongs here, ask whether a learner could have received the same thing before, only more slowly. If they could, it belongs on the first path.

Driving disruption: who does the work changes

• A small team producing and maintaining content at a scale that used to require a department or a vendor.
• Instructional design compressed from months to days, with revision built into the regular cycle of work.
• Expert knowledge captured and structured once, reducing the dependency on an expert being available.
• Capabilities that used to require an enterprise platform assembled from ordinary tools.

This path can be uncomfortable because it puts the structure of the L&D function itself up for review, including which parts are bought from outside suppliers. It is also the path most likely to give the function a lasting advantage, and it is why we score use cases on each path separately.

How this is delivered

Use-case discovery applies the three paths to your own use cases. You get a prioritized portfolio, with the reasons each rejected use case was left out.