The question I've been wrestling with for the last few weeks is, "How do I get my foot into the door for Instructional Design?" I come from 6+ years in human services, education and communication but my experience doesn't exactly line up with the qualifications asked for by ID employers.
So where do I start to bridge that knowledge gap into ID?
Ultimately, I narrowed down where I should focus my energy into three major task categories:
The percentage is how much time I'm going to allocate to each task. This is based on amount of time invested vs. yield amount in terms of helping me attain my goal.
For example, it's important for me to spend time researching about various employers such as Google, Amazon, T-Mobile and Expedia so that I can tailor my resume and develop answers for interviews, but if I don't have solid competencies in ID skills such as Adobe Captivate, Dreamweaver, HTML, PowerPoint, and learning theories, I can forget about even landing an interview.
Another reason why I'm investing more time to develop ID skills is because it will improve my candidacy for both of the other categories.
Hence, 70% of my time will be for familiarizing myself with Adobe E-Learning Suite 6 ($1,600 software which I still need to figure out how to get my hands on...), HTML, learning theory, and blogging to document my learning and increase my online presence.
15% will be dedicated to researching on the products and cultures of different companies. Another 15% will be dedicated to researching various subsidized Ph.D. programs related to the field and meeting admission advisors.
Somewhere down the line, once I gather enough information, I'll plot out a pros/cons table between going straight to work for corporate vs. conducting research in academia.
More to come!
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