The Call of the Global Training Professional: Q&A With Geri McArdle

Dr. Geri McArdle is the quintessential “global trainer.” She is on the heels of a contract in the Middle East, where she spent more than three years putting her knowledge to work for Saudi Aramco.Corporations have been “going global” for many years now, but as the speed of doing business around the world increases almost daily, the role of the versatile global training/HRD professional becomes even more crucial. In this interview, Dr. McArdle offers her insight into the role of the global trainer, and how practitioners can make the leap onto the world stage.

ASTD: As a US-based professional, how did you break into international training?

Geri McArdle: I have lived and studied aboard at various times since 1985. I worked with the Department of State and various international companies abroad, and these opportunities provided me with a training career niche: instructional design and project management.

My Saudi experience began when a former client (ASTD member), asked that I take a position in her department with a small woman-owned business group that she had been working with for the past three years. I took the job, and after four months with the company, my boss asked me, “…Have you ever thought about working in Saudi Arabia?” The company was awarded a contract to develop training for newly hired petroleum engineers. This initial three-month contract lasted three years.

Opportunities to expand into the international arena exist right now! We have easy to use, and readily available, networking tools – blogs, social networking sites, video sites and much more that provide opportunities to market yourself, and invite others to dialogue with you. Incidentally, many professional training and development positions I have had during my career were either listed in the ASTD Job Bank, or \[came about\] as a result of a reference from an ASTD member.

ASTD: Where did you learn to translate or transfer learning best practices from the US for an international company? How can one gain that skill set?

McArdle: The Australian Institute for Training and Development (AITD founded 41 years ago), contacted me through ASTD and Mike Crisp, the founder of Crisp Publications. I presented workshops to each of the AITD chapters, from Sydney to Perth, sharing my instructional design models based on my research in the areas of brain-based training design and blended learning delivery strategies. Through these dialogues I negotiated a partnership between AITD and ASTD and secondly, a number of AITD members continue to collaborate and share research.

My advice is to first understand your own training design and development strategy because if you do not reflect on the model and philosophy that you use to design training, you will just continue to use the same design tools and never perfect your craft. Focus on that and perfect your models. Then share those best practices and trade your ideas with others in different geographies. Seek new people, concepts, and pathways to understanding how things work. What you give away will come back to you.

ASTD: In terms of US versus international companies, what, if any, are the differences one must take into account during the needs assessment process?

McArdle: Training needs assessment (TNA) is a universal understanding. The process should identify where the performance gaps are. Where are performers struggling, and how can you (training professional) help? Today, conducting a TNA we might “drill down” deeper to determine “best performer indicators” and then develop training around those indicators or, use an “evidence-based” method. Yet, what we are trying to accomplish with the TNA is to identify the challenges and the opportunities and then design accordingly to address those issues.

Performers want two things: to understand their job, and to know what they are doing well, and what might be improved. Managers and supervisors can do three things to help make the training stick: invest the energy to invest in your people, be honest, and listen for understanding.

Many companies abroad do this better than we do in the US! You can design a wonderful course; however, it’s the continued investment in people that counts! There should never be any surprises about a person’s performance.

ASTD: What kinds of challenges did you face as a female consultant working in Saudi Arabia? Were you limited in your interactions with male colleagues, travel and day-to-day activities? Did you ever need to “prove yourself” to your counterparts?

McArdle: My only wish is that I would have had the opportunity to have lunch with King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. From what I witnessed working in Saudi Arabia, the King seems to think and act holistically, especially in regards to women’s rights. For example, in 2011, the world's largest university for women was opened in Saudi Arabia. The Princess Nora bint Abdulrahman University has the capacity for 55,000 students to study subjects, including business and science. It also has its own teaching hospital, laboratories, and libraries. This will certainly create more opportunities for Saudi women to excel in their educational and career pursuits.

ASTD: Please tell us about your partnerships with businesses or other consultants based overseas. How do trainers select the right partners and establish the most mutually beneficial kinds of relationship?

McArdle: Given today’s global marketplace, we are finding that most business practices are somewhat universal and that training practitioners in the US are similar to practitioners abroad, due mainly to \[the\] shared practices of our craft, open exchange, and dialogue. To seek out the right partnership, five basic ingredients are required:

1. The sponsor must be a champion for training.

2. The trainer has \[to have\] the right credentials and a willingness to learn.

3. The partnership (company and trainer) must be respectful of \[themselves\] self and others.

4. The term diversity should no longer be needed – we are all one!

5. The “can do attitude” is necessary for both parties.

ASTD: You’ve mentioned blended learning in the context of US trainers working overseas. What are the special nuances, strengths, and opportunities that you’ve discovered with blended methods as compared to other approaches?

McArdle: While at Harvard, I designed and taught an instructional design course in the Management Seminar Series at Radcliffe College. I introduced new learning and training design models based on my thoughts about the philosophy of education and my exposure to the techniques at the MIT Media Lab.

I began to do some “experiential teaching” using new instructional technology and media in every class meeting. Soon I realized that learners who come to training all share an individual need—the “What’s in it for me?” factor. To address these needs, one must design and deliver topics using various modalities – meaning we use blended learning strategies. While in Saudi, I had support for my nonconformist thinking and behavior; although my direct boss Dr. Tamir Aggour would shudder sometimes and my project boss at Beacon Associates Mason Holloway would send me words of caution as my employer, both believed in me and continually supported me, and as a team we created some truly outstanding blended learning opportunities to foster that “knowledge bridge,” which transmitted professional “know how” to the young beginner engineers. Maybe these two professionals, Tamir and Mason, exhibit the qualities of what makes a partnership successful!

About Geri: Dr. Geri McArdle serves as managing director of Training Doctor (www.trainingdoctor.us). She is the author of several books, including Instructional Design for Action Learning (AMACOM 2010) and Training Design and Delivery from ASTD Press. Geri obtained her Ph.D. from Syracuse University. She is a Harvard postdoctoral fellow at the Philosophy of Education Research Center and an “Outstanding Faculty” member at Johns Hopkins University. She has been a consultant in the human resource field for over 20 years and has published nine books on human productivity, and instructional design, development and delivery.

See the December 2012 edition of T+D for Geri's article describing the training design and development project at Saudi Aramco.