Dr. Guieswende Rouamba - Project Management for Instructional Designers
On today's episode, we are joined by Dr. Guieswende Rouamba. He's the author of the book the Instructional Designer's Guide to Project Management and a Learning Designer at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
In this conversation, you'll hear about his journey into instructional design and the critical role project management plays in the field. We discuss why project management often doesn't get the attention it deserves, the challenges instructional designers face today, the power of storytelling in conveying complex ideas, and the importance of collaborating with SMEs. Guieswende shares insights on conflict resolution, preventing burnout through effective project management strategies, and the future of instructional design in an AI-driven world. Our conversation focuses on strong leadership skills and the integration of project management principles into instructional design practices.
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Transcript
Luke Hobson (00:00)
Guieswende, welcome to the podcast.
Guieswende Rouamba (00:02)
Thank you for having me, Luke.
Luke Hobson (00:03)
Of course, of course, my pleasure. And I cannot wait to dive in more into everything with your book and what you have going on if an instructional design land. But before that, I get ahead of myself. Could you please introduce yourself to the audience and tell us more about who you are and what is it that you do?
Guieswende Rouamba (00:19)
Again, thank you. And I want to start by saying that you have a fantastic book and I encourage seasoned and new instructional designers to go and read your book because it's a fantastic one. ⁓ So ⁓ for my background, grew up in Burkina Faso. It's a French speaking country in West Africa.
Luke Hobson (00:34)
I did not pay you to say that, but I thank you very much for saying that.
Guieswende Rouamba (00:49)
where my father was a university professor and he studied abroad in England. And that sparked my dream also to study abroad. But my journey to studying abroad was not easy. I was first rejected from Ohio State University because I didn't understand the application process in the United States. But I kept on going and I was accepted at West Virginia University.
where I taught French as a graduate teaching assistant and I also earned two master's degree, one in French and foreign languages and the other one in and healthcare administration. For the dream, we have the dream to work for NGOs or nonprofit companies. But unfortunately,
that did not work, I couldn't secure a job in those sectors. Then my wife suggested that I look into instructional design. At that time, I had no idea what instructional design was. So I'm glad that I listened to her and that shifted my whole career. ⁓ I went and then earned a PhD in instructional design and then
I realized that that PhD actually combines my love for teaching, technology, and also learning. So today I am a learning designer at the Gees College of Business at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. I have over a decade of experience working with great universities like the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, Notre Dame, and Purdue. I enjoy working.
with faculty to design courses that are meaningful and impactful, but I also love working with my fellow instructional designers to try to find ways so that we can support one another. And that's what led me to write the book, The Instructional Designer's Guide to Project Management.
Luke Hobson (03:06)
Awesome, well thanks for sharing. So now the fact that I just learned that you can also speak French, the only French thing that I can say that is still embedded in my head by the way is because of a 90s television commercial that was called, was it Muzzy that was trying to teach kids how to speak? And I remember I kept on seeing this commercial every single time about this little girl who was saying like, ⁓ I am a little girl, was like in the commercial, which I think is what it roughly translates to.
And that's still in my head. Like even now, it's 37. I can still remember that commercial. So I have no idea if I said that correctly, but of course I had to share that. The other thing though, how did your wife know about instructional design? That's... No, it was interesting. Yeah, how did she know about it?
Guieswende Rouamba (03:52)
She was doing her PhD in education, in cultural studies, education, and then she was taking classes with other people who doing instructional design. And then one night she came at home and she was like, have you heard about instructional design and technology? I'm like, no, I have no idea what Stadfield is. And she's like, you definitely need to look into that because...
I know you love technology and you have to be teaching background, you will love that field. I'm like, okay, so I went and started Googling and meeting people to talk about it. I mean, it was the perfect fit for me.
Luke Hobson (04:30)
Yeah, there you go. Yeah. that's so cool. It's, it's always so interesting
to me to hear about how people actually found out about the field and hearing from loved ones to say like, you might be a good fit as an instructional designer. that okay? Sure. Maybe. Yeah, that's, that's cool, man. That's awesome to hear. Well, you mentioned about your book. That's why you're here today. We got to talk about it because you wrote a fantastic book, the instructional designer's guide to project management. And to me, this is something that is missing in our field because I have read other books about
project management and such. And to be honest, many are boring. It is a cold hard truth for him. Just like, ⁓ it's such a slog to read this, but like, okay. And then when you mentioned to me that you're writing this book and I was able to get my hands on it, it was simple. It was effective and you wrote it in such a really ⁓ unique way. So what actually inspired you to want to write this book in the first place?
Guieswende Rouamba (05:04)
Thank
Yeah. So the first thing is that I realized that there was a gap in the field. So let's look at, let's do some kind of little research on it. So if we search on Amazon, one of the biggest platform for books, there are only two books that truly talks about project management and instructional design. One of them is Agile.
by project management, Agile for Project Management, for Instructional Design, sorry, by Megan Torrance. And the other one is ID Project Management by Michael Greer. That was written in 1994, so 30 years ago. So if we go and search on Google, we will find, I think, two open education textbooks on that topic.
smaller articles. If we go on academic databases and we look at like ProQuest and others, there are some dissertations and also articles that talk about project management. But the problem is they only talk about the issue and don't teach us about project management. that was eye-opening for me like, my goodness, we need
Luke Hobson (06:48)
Hmm.
Guieswende Rouamba (06:54)
there is a big gap in here, so I was happy a little bit. And also like, okay, why people are not writing about it? So, but I realized that the gap is not only in the literature, but also in practice. Most instructional design programs at universities don't teach about project management. I hold a PhD in instructional design. I'm from a great university. I studied learning theories and practices.
and I had like awesome, I mean like training, but I never took a single course on project management. Yet what we do every single day is manage project. So, and also the reason why I wrote it is for personal reasons, because burnout, right? I've been there working weekends, late nights, and I was like, there should be a better way.
for me to work in instructional design. And one of my friends, Michael Tingri, very smart guy, recommended in the past that I look into project management. I'm like, nah, there's no, I will feel it's big enough. I don't need to look into it, something else. But it was eye opening for me when I started learning about project management because it helped me better plan and deliver courses on time and have.
more time for myself. So that's the reason why I wrote the book. And you mentioned that, I'm glad you said that, that the book was simple enough and also accessible. And that's one of the reasons I wrote it to be short and concise because nowadays, I mean, it's not easy to spend four or five hours reading a book. So I wanted something simple.
that people can read in one or two hours and be able to take some principles and apply it right away. So I didn't want to just write another academic paper that would sit on shelves. So, but those are the reasons why I wrote the book and the style that I chose to write the book.
Luke Hobson (09:07)
Right.
And it's
and I'm not sure if you found it ⁓ challenging to be able to write in a more simplistic manner because like as academics, you're like, I have to include 7000 references and I must do it like this scholarly type of a way. But then when you're thinking about it, we're like, well, no, I actually want a lot of people to read this book. I shouldn't be going in this direction of like just writing a traditional white paper, which is what I appreciated that when I was I was reading this book because I wasn't sure.
As soon as I got my hands on it, I was like, I don't know which direction you're going to go into, but as I'm looking at it and I was just like, this is interesting because you wrote it in this type of like of a, a narrative storytelling sense where like, yes, you do talk about the fundamentals and such, but at the same time there was characters and you're thrusted into this world of Bob, who is a newly appointed manager of his different type of team. And then Bob has to deal with anyone who has tried to be able to go into a situation where you're becoming.
a manager of an already formed team that people have perceptions. They already have their own ways of doing things. And now as their new type of leader, you're trying to be able to take things in a different direction. And you naturally have people who push back like George in our case, where I was getting really angry reading the book where I'm like, I know these people who are so resistant to change and they try to actually undermine you and go behind your back. you're like, you know, those people do exist, but I love how you wrote it.
Guieswende Rouamba (10:30)
you
Luke Hobson (10:41)
⁓ in that type of style, what made you want to write it actually in a way of like a real story that's so unique? I haven't seen that from like anything else in instructional design land.
Guieswende Rouamba (10:52)
Yes, yes. Yeah, thank you.
One of the things that you said that really, I mean, it was important for me is I didn't want to add any reference inside my book. Beside the end, like at the end, like citation and stuff like that. I want it to be simple story. Even the first part, which is kind of a little bit about the psychology and stuff like that. I didn't want to cite directly inside, but
people can go through references and see the different books and articles that are used. The reason why I wrote it this way, I mean, there are two or three main reasons. First, storytelling. I grew up in Burkina Faso in West Africa and storytelling has been part of my life. I remember my parents and my grandparents listening stories from them and
Stories has a way to captivate us in a way that dry explanation cannot simply do. So that was for me, an easy way to convey a message. Like that can be complicated, but using a story makes it simple for people to learn about project, to learn about the message, project management. Secondly,
as an instructional designer, I know that people learn best when they are in real world scenarios or authentic learning. So that's the reason why I try to replicate like the office setting of an instructional design office so that people can relate to anything that goes inside it because that's what they're living every single day. The good, the bad, the drama, the politics and all these things.
try to encapsulate all of that into stories so that it's not only story in some ways, but also people can learn what I'm trying to say. Lastly, with stories, we can have multiple themes inside. So the obvious theme is about project management, but the underlying theme you touch on it is
about leadership and wanted to incorporate leadership traits like empathy, clarity, support, courage. And those are traits that instructional designers need because as we know, we sometimes lead without title. So we need to know those traits to be able to be good leadership.
good leaders when we are designing online courses, when we are designing courses.
Luke Hobson (13:56)
It's not even sometimes we leave it without title. It's all the time. It's all the time we leave it without title. Especially for working with tenured faculty and for very senior stakeholders and everything. always that type of an uphill challenge ⁓ at times for things. So it makes plenty of sense from that type of perspective. So let's talk about project management as this is literally the theme around your book. When I think...
Guieswende Rouamba (13:59)
So.
Luke Hobson (14:22)
about project management and what I've kind of like perceived over the years is that it's almost kind of seen as like a nice to have, if you will, which is really crazy when you think about, because to me there are really five pillars of instructional design, if you will, is that like what makes up an instructional designer? Well, we know about learning science, know about technology, research, relationship management, and then project management. Like to me, those are the five key things that what makes us who we are today.
Why is project management though kind of seen as like a bonus? Like why is it not talked about as much and why is it overlooked?
Guieswende Rouamba (14:58)
Yeah, that's a very good question. I think the first simplest answer is because our field focuses on teaching and learning. and our field is so big already, but so that anything outside of that field is considered bonus. That's what I realized. Second, I think project management is not part of our curriculum. I mean, like,
Most instructional design programs at universities don't teach about project management and we're still preparing the students as if they're going to be all professors and researchers. But most of us actually end up in instructional design field where we manage courses, juggle different ⁓ stakeholders and then navigate scope creep.
This is the reality. It's not part of our curriculum. And lastly, it's overlooked because project management is misunderstood by instructional designers. And I was one of them. I used to believe that learning theories and practices were good enough. I don't need project management. mean, like, ⁓ why is not taught in my curriculum? This is good enough. But what I realized is that project management
open my eyes to the project side of instructional design, which is different than instructional design because they have instructional design, RDE and all these theories, then we have the project side that need to complement instructional design. And when we start using the project side, the project to help with instructional design, then we start to plan better, like little
less burnout and then we can deliver courses on time. So I think those are the reasons why I think it's usually overlooked.
Luke Hobson (17:01)
It's interesting how when people think about creating different types of courses and learning experiences that they don't call them projects. It's like, you need to manage your project, which is this. Like this is now your baby. You're going to work on this for some of them. It could be years depending upon what you're actually designing. And you know, there's going to be pitfalls. There's going to be challenges. There's going to be potential budget issues or pushing things back for your timeline. Like, I don't know. It's the same as what you were just saying that
when I was studying about instructional design, project management kind of never came up and then you get thrust into the role and you're like, ⁓ I'm managing people, I'm managing projects. Like, okay, this is not just talking about all the things that I thought I was gonna be diving on into. It's much more in this type of manner. Are there any types of project management strategies that you find really resonate with?
instructional designers in particular that if we saw something, we can try to be able to have a easier time adopting that into what we do.
Guieswende Rouamba (18:03)
Yes, I will say the first thing is the process itself. When we look at project management process and ID process, they're kind of similar. ID we have analyze, design, development, implementation and evaluation. In project management, we have also similar process, initiation, planning, execution, monitoring and closing. So it's kind of
easier for instructional designers to adopt project management. The only difference is that again instructional design is about learning and project management is about workflow but how we manage the project. So it's easier for instructional designers to adopt project management.
Luke Hobson (18:59)
When we're thinking about the projects too and trying to use different types of processes and whatnot, I know that one of the things that has always been a known thing that I was going to have to do with every SME that I've worked with in the past is kind of explain about my process to be able to say, especially from if we're gonna be talking about Addy or backward design or whatever we're gonna be going on into, it's always trying to make sure that they're kind of kept inside of a loop to know about, hey, this is the journey we're gonna go on.
And then this is why I'm doing this thing. This is why I'm organizing this meeting. This is why we're going to be doing, know, just to try to be able to make them more informed about things. And then of course, you, the project management side, and it's not like you, you go into being like, well, here's why I do XYZ from a project management perspective. But obviously you're, doing that in the background, which is all to say that collaboration with subject matter experts is crucial because it's not just you obviously working on your project.
And you touched upon this in the book, which I was so happy to see that right away you mentioned about subject matter experts. And I was like, thank you so much for saying that because there's so much that I've read that kind of makes the instructional designer seem like a team of one and that they don't work with anybody. And I'm like, well, there's cases of that, but that's rarer. I would say in our line of work.
How have you developed your different types of best practices when it comes to working with subject matter experts, trying to build out that collaboration, build out those relationships? What have you found that have worked for you over the years?
Guieswende Rouamba (20:31)
Yes, ⁓ I would say I start by human relationships. Like, we need to spend time really, like, trying to connect with this miss. I mean, it's hard to work with someone we don't know. We'd rather work with someone we know. That's plain and simple. So my first meeting usually, it's like really
low-key meeting where we talk about the instructor like background like teaching style, background, research interests, my hobbies, his or her hobbies, like what if she want to talk about those things. But those early connections creates a psychological safety. So later on, if there's an issue,
The SME is open to come and tell me, ⁓ actually, you remember we talked about the research, my research, I have to submit it this week. So I won't be able to deliver it on time. So those are the kind of connection and relationship that we need to have at the beginning that makes it easier later on for people to open up and talk really about the project and how we can collaborate.
Secondly, we need instructional designers to clarify roles and expectations. And this has been a big struggle for me because conflict usually comes from unclear roles and expectations. Like, I may assume that the SME is going to do the heavy lifting on the content and the SME may be assuming that it's me. So,
We need to clarify those at the beginning of the course so that everyone knows what they're going to do, their role, expectation early, so it's clear. So that can help down the road create not only stronger relationship and also avoid frustrations and tensions. Lastly, we need to communicate often. I say that because I've been there sometimes.
I know the due date and then I wait like on the due date, like the due date of the content. And then I message the SME, hey, the content is due today or you should have sent me the content a couple of weeks ago. And then, I mean, like it's tough. So what we need to do is send like reminders to send, I would say check-ins. Like it doesn't have to be something like super long.
I'm just messaging to see how you're doing on the content and those kind of things. And those small checkings can help. I mean, it's kind of also remind a gentle reminder for them like, ⁓ you gotta, you gotta work on this one because it's due in one or two weeks. So those are the kind of things that I think help build like strong relationship and then also shows that we care about the cause or the training.
and faculty or SMEs usually gravitate around people who have those, I would say, or tips to keep them on track.
Luke Hobson (24:10)
them and the the worst thing that I hate hearing when joining a project and there's like let's say there's multiple instructional designers working on something which I've been a part of those before but whenever someone says like let's jump right in and it goes like immediately to drafting learning objectives and I'm like no wait no stop wait wait wait is this like my gosh I've been as you were just saying if you don't build that relationship first and you don't have that chemistry then this person is so much more likely to not respond back
to you to quite frankly care because you don't have that connection. And it doesn't need to be a lie. As you were saying, it can be simple. Like there have been some professors who, as soon as they told me, you know, like they would come into the office and I asked them like, you know, how was traffic, you know, driving in. And there was one professor who had a Harley-Davidson and he was just like, great day. Got to ride my bike. It's like, so every single time I saw him, I was like, Hey,
How was your bike ride this morning? Every single time. And he like immediately lit up because he loved talking about his Harley so much. ⁓ Same thing if they tell me about their favorite sport or the fact that if they say that their kid is into like this type of activity and that they're going to this like hockey practice or whatever it is, I'm like, I will forever remember that. I'm just like, that is now my thing that we will talk about to make sure that you know I'm listening and that I care and that we go back and forth and you can't overlook that.
Guieswende Rouamba (25:05)
you
Yeah.
Yes.
Yes. Like your example made me think about another example that I have. Recently I was working on a course. Actually, I'm working on a course now and the faculty loves tennis. So we'll talk about US Open and then he's like, ⁓ actually one of the cases in the course can be about US Open.
he's doing, like just the conversation of getting to know each other, like led to actually an assignment that is applicable because now this is, I mean, US Open just finished, but it's still, I mean, like a good topic to talk about.
Luke Hobson (26:15)
Absolutely. That's all that it takes to be able to
do. And then once you have that and now that you're going to be talking about tennis for the rest of your life with this person, as long as you work with them, but now that you also have that chemistry and that bond and everything else, then you don't feel so annoying, especially from a project management perspective of how often you were saying that you check in. Like I check in with some folks every day. It's like, if we have a tight deadline and I'm not hearing from you, I will send you an email.
Guieswende Rouamba (26:23)
Thank
Luke Hobson (26:42)
The next day, well, I haven't heard back from you. I'm going to call you. Well, I'm going to text you. And like, it walks that border of like, I'm kind of annoying, but you know why I'm doing it? Cause I'm waiting on this from you. And I can't have my team do the rest of the build without, you know, what your, your share is of this one. And that allows me to definitely really blast some folks devices without being like, this person is going to hate me for forever.
is because of that. no, let's go into that. Speaking of some smeeze never wanting to work with me again, let's talk about conflict for a second for things, because we know that unfortunately, even with some of the best stakeholders and the best smeeze that we have that inevitably there's gonna be an issue in the project. And then that's gonna come things to a screeching halt. So what do you do as far as for your sensing that something is something is coming down the pike, you're having this problem.
Guieswende Rouamba (27:13)
Yes.
Luke Hobson (27:41)
All the warning signs are there, but something's about to pop up. What do you do to try to make sure that the project isn't getting derailed?
Guieswende Rouamba (27:49)
Yes. So ⁓ I would say the first thing, I mean, you mentioned to that for project managers is to sense issues that are coming. So if you don't sense issues that are coming, I mean, like it's going to derail your project when they come. So when I sense that there's an issue, I will wait and see, is it something I will try to see where the issue is coming from.
If it's coming from the SMIC, do I need to have an open conversation with it? Or sometimes the issue may be me, myself. So how I communicate with the faculty may make them not want to do something for some reasons. Or the issue may be internal within the team that I'm managing. in my case, for example, we have
graphic designers, have videographers and all these people. So we need to assess the issue and then also look at how we're going to do it. We can use differentiation, for example. Try to figure out what's the key issue before jumping into conclusion. That's what I by differentiation. So sometimes the issue can be
mask with a lot of things around. But until we peel all the layers and find the source of the issue, we won't be able to resolve it. And once we have that, now it depends on the type of relationship we have with the faculty. Sometimes we don't have a good relationship. It can be, we're going to have to walk the tough line communication and then be like, oh, true that we don't have relationship, but we
still need to talk about it and then like man up and then just talk about it. If we have a good relationship like as you said, ⁓ simply email can resolve the issue or we can also jump on the call. But I think most of the time, not I think, having also a call is easier than just emails because we know emails can be misunderstood or interpreted different ways. Or if we have like a
a meeting with the design team. So these are also opportunities for us to talk about ⁓ issues in a gentle way, not blaming. One thing also I would say is blaming others. That's easy route that we can all take, but it's asking questions when there's an issue. A feather is easier for me to ask like,
I let's assume that the issue is about content not being delivered, attention. I'll be like, did we give you enough time to develop the content? Those kind of questions doesn't blame, or is there anything that we didn't provide that would have supported you to give the content on time? Those are the kind of questions that we ask and it helps a lot.
resolve tensions.
Luke Hobson (31:14)
do the same thing all the time. One of the questions that I ask is to help me understand. So help me understand what's blocking you from doing the, what's happening from that. Like, so try to be able to kind of dive in further. And when you say it as in like, I'm trying to learn more. So inform me about what's going on. They want to share with you where truthfully I want to be like, Hey man, you are really messing things up. Like I've been waiting for weeks. Where are you? What are you doing? You know, kind of a thing, but
Guieswende Rouamba (31:20)
⁓
you
Luke Hobson (31:42)
when you say it in a more professional manner, it's certainly going to be in a bit of a received in a better way from that type of perspective. But I'd like to dive in then even further into this because you mentioned before about scope creep, we have shifting deadlines, which are an issue. We have poor communication. We were talking about can be an issue for things. What's a type of like of a practical tool or a strategy for folks trying to get back on track and to avoid these types of pitfalls?
Guieswende Rouamba (32:11)
Yes. So I will say that if you haven't done it and you already start your design, try to go back and do a scope document. It's so important in project management. The scope, I mean, a scoping document. The scoping document serves kind of like the blueprint. It includes stakeholders. This is so important. We need to know who are the key people.
that can move the project forward or not. So I made that mistake in the past, designed a course with a SME and did a check with the program director. And then at the end, the program director was like, nah, this is not what I expected from the course. And what happened? The course didn't get launched. So, ⁓ effort, time wasted. Anyway, so this.
Scoping document talks about stakeholders, responsibilities, deliverable, timelines, mind stone, communication, and constraints. not, I mean like there are constraints in every project. For example, which elements are we gonna, no like in the elements, which tools are we gonna use, right? Are we gonna use third party tools? All these things are constraints.
like resources and all. So we need to talk about those. Are they going on vacation? These are constraints that affect the project. So we lay out all these things in the blueprint and we discuss it, we discuss them with the faculty. sometimes, like faculty love doing that because they think that, wow, this guy really care about the project. wanted...
succeed, look at all these questions ⁓ he's asking and even make the faculty and us think deeply about the project side of instructional design before we even go into design. So if you haven't done it, I would recommend that you do a scoping document because also later on if the faculty comes, or the SMIA you usually say faculty because I work with
at the higher education. So the SME comes and says, hey, we need to add this, we need to add that. You can point back to the scoping document and be like, ⁓ let's look at what we agreed on on the pass based on the timeline and the resources. Is it something that we can really do? And sometimes, I mean, it can be like, OK, we cannot do it. And the faculty are like, ⁓ actually,
That will be a lot of work. We can do it. And then you're already good. But sometimes it can be also scope discovery in the sense that there are some things that always pop up and then you have to address it. So there is no way around that. But we need to start doing scoping documents at the beginning of a post design.
Luke Hobson (35:27)
What you just said too helps me to stay under budget. That's always my big thing is that you're working. As you said, you already agreed upon the details, what you're going to be doing. And then something pops up where they're like, but can we include this article? Can we include this simulation? What about this other thing? And then you're like, well, wait a second, hold on. Like, let me add up the cost of things. And you're like, ⁓ like it's like, and of course you want to include those.
because you know it's going to make the course better. But as you keep on adding up, I'm like, all right, how many articles did we pay for for each student? How many licenses do we need to buy for this new simulation? But we already have another simulation and now we're like, so that absolutely adds up. And as you were just saying, you can go back to that document to say, here's what we have. So we need to stick with this blueprint for things. And what you said, too, about not having all the right people in the room, I've also encountered where
everything is buttoned up and done and I'm like, we're good. And like, you, go to talk with one other person for a final type of an approval and they're like, well, wait a minute. Like, did you consult with the blah, blah, blah? Cause higher education is all about politics. So you need to make sure you're discussing with somebody else first to get the approval of everything else. And you're like, I didn't know I had to talk to this group first. And they're like, cool. Go talk with them. Like, no, like it's already done. What are we going to do? You know? So yeah, been there. It's not fun.
Guieswende Rouamba (36:48)
Nope, nope, nope, nope.
Luke Hobson (36:49)
Nope,
nope. It's never fun. You, ⁓ you mentioned about burnout earlier too. And I want to make sure that we touch upon that because as instructional designers, you're wearing many, many hats all the time. You're juggling a thousand projects. You're, going above everything else and you kind of forget about your mental wellbeing. You just like, can drink more coffee. can stay up later. I can wake up earlier and you kind of keep on going through the motions because
You want to get it done because you have your deadlines. You're going to do whatever you can to hit those deadlines. But all the while, you know, the next time you start a project and you're already completely burnt out and just like, well, your next project is not going to go well. You're already ready to collapse for things. How can we use project management to our advantage to help us when it comes to preventing burnout?
Guieswende Rouamba (37:37)
That's a great question. There two tools I use all the time. The first one is the MVP approach. The minimum viable product. This is very important for me.
The minimum value product suggests that instead of looking for perfection, we should first aim for a version that is solid, functional, and works well. So let's assume I'm working on the graphic for a course. And at some point, when I see that it's solid enough, what I would do is send it to this me.
or send it to me to check it. And most or sometimes my first version is already pretty good. And they'll be like, ⁓ that's what I needed. So good. Then I move forward. But if not, I will stay in that creative loop of spending days and days perfect, like trying to make it perfect. And does it really add value? So I
live by minimum viable product. And when I send that minimum viable product also, it gives me like a roadmap. I will know that, okay, am I going the right direction? Am I going the wrong direction? So the person can comment and I can improve on that and we can keep on going. So that's one of like, I would say key element to avoid burnout because as you know, now I feel really creative. We can spend
days working on something we want to just keep making perfect. The second one is the critical path approach. And that can help also a lot for burnout. The critical path approach is kind of like the sequence of tasks that must happen for a project to stay on track. Let's take another example.
like a video project. We know that there are usually three critical elements in the video project. We need to write a script, we need to record, and we need to edit. But there are other things that are not part of the critical path, such as polishing backgrounds, polishing music, refining the on-screen text, spending days, like...
the B-rolls, searching for B-rolls, it's not easy, adding all these things, but they're not part of the critical path. So for me, if I'm really in a tight deadline, I will go with the critical path. What do I need in terms of minimum value of product to get it to the SME or get it to the person that needs it? So those two things have been very helpful for me.
Luke Hobson (40:50)
How do you see these different elements coming more together into our roles? Because one of the things that I was having a conversation with someone out about on LinkedIn the other day was that in when I first joined MIT, my job title was originally program manager. I was an instructional designer over time and then kind of morphed into senior instructional designer program manager. Like, and I had some people comments on a recent job posting at
Guieswende Rouamba (40:52)
Thank
Mmm.
Luke Hobson (41:20)
MIT that once again instructional designer program manager and people are kind of like why why you have two titles in one like they're different because you need to be able to focus on X versus Y but also keep in mind too that neither of those are project manager Program manager because you would manage and oversee the program onboarding the hiring the rerunning the maintenance the development the blah blah blah So it's kind of interesting and I'm curious from your perspective
As we keep on thinking more about the future and our ever changing world of instructional design, is project management going to have more of an emphasis in what we do? Is it going to evolve? it gonna, where do you think this is going to go for our field?
Guieswende Rouamba (42:04)
I think we'll do a lot more project management. And the reason is also because of AI. Because ⁓ project management in terms of managing other instructional designers and stuff like that, but also project management instead of course design. Because we will be able to, I mean, now, even now,
Luke Hobson (42:10)
⁓ of course, of course.
Guieswende Rouamba (42:33)
we able to make courses a little faster because the scripting and all these things, videos can, I mean like AI is helping a lot on that. So we will have, I think, lesser, hopefully not, instructional, less instructional designers, but more portfolios to manage because of what AI is now enabling us to do. So we will have to manage
Luke Hobson (42:54)
Mm.
Guieswende Rouamba (43:02)
more courses and be more like a portfolio managers of wide range of courses. That's where I see that the field, our field will be moving towards a lot.
Luke Hobson (43:20)
That's interesting. Have you tried using something with AI to be able to create like a different type of a scoping document, compared to like what you're doing right now to be able to see like what it generates for you from the start?
Guieswende Rouamba (43:33)
Yeah. Yes, I've tried and I mean, it keep on getting better and it's sometimes amazing what comes out. I mean, we still need the human element to be able to correct a lot of things. But honestly, sometimes it's amazing what we can get. So even I mean, to add that, like I work with people in the video side and what's
they can do with videos nowadays in a short amount of time, what they can produce is amazing. So AI is, ⁓ we all know it's gonna be, we're gonna change a lot of things on our field.
Luke Hobson (44:15)
Yeah.
And, definitely want to make sure to emphasize once again, the need of humans. We're not getting replaced by robots anytime soon for all you are freaking out right now. ⁓ but it, mean, but it can definitely kickstart things. I mean, I even think about if I have, so let's say that you and I are developing a new course together about starting on October 1st, and we want to be able to have a timeline as far as for like, here's our runway and we have.
Guieswende Rouamba (44:21)
Right.
Luke Hobson (44:40)
so many different types of deadlines and deliverables that comes with figuring out like the blueprints, the kickoff call, then making sure to have like, let's say, ⁓ the different types of learning outcomes done, the objectives and then like module like one, two, three, four, five, six, the assessments. Like we have all these different types of pieces and patterns and whatnot that we can incorporate that into using something like a chat GPT to be able to say, here's all of my elements create for me a timeline of we're starting in October 1st and it's launching.
on, you know, on December 1st, like, let's, let's go create it for me. And like, and again, and of course you need to use it. You can manipulate it, you can edit it, whatever. But if you have that, as opposed to when I first started where I just had like a billion Excel spreadsheets and I'm like, okay, how am going to make this work? I'm developing three different courses right now. I got like seven different faculty and like it's so you can give you a helping hands. They really can.
Guieswende Rouamba (45:38)
absolutely use foreign. mean, like, I use it every day for my project. And as you said, I mean, I can combine later on, look at the timeline and use my human judgment and be like, oh, that won't be done in one week. I would need two weeks to do that. But I mean, it will do 50 to 75 % of the heavy lifting for us. So.
Luke Hobson (46:01)
Yeah. Yeah,
it's it's getting more and more helpful by the day. That's for sure. Well, I would be remiss if I didn't ask about the I wanted to hear your thoughts around like the leadership elements because it clearly is a strong emphasis on leadership. You mentioned about that in the book and then clearly when you read the book and if you haven't yet definitely go down to the show notes to be able to go and find a link to the book. But one of the things that as you're reading the journey
Guieswende Rouamba (46:07)
Yes.
Luke Hobson (46:31)
of Bob and going through this and seeing about all the struggles of being a first time leader and trying to lead with grace and empathy and not want to like throw things at people for undermining you and all those things. Like there's a strong emphasis on leadership in your book that does tie into how a project does get managed and how it is successful and the team is successful and things like that. And you've been doing this for a while too.
What is your advice for up and coming designers who are entry level, who have been doing this for a little bit and they want to grow into a leadership role or go from a senior instructional designer to that next type of a level? What is your piece of advice for folks in our field to grow?
Guieswende Rouamba (47:12)
I will selfishly say buy and read my book first. Yeah, but I mean, I mean, I'm not serious, but on the other side, as you said, the book has a central figure who is Bob. And what I try to do is Bob is kind of like the dream leader if we look at it.
Luke Hobson (47:17)
Yeah, sure. Fair enough. Fair enough.
Guieswende Rouamba (47:42)
because he has almost, I would say, all the great characteristics for a good leader, like compassion, you mentioned a lot of them. And those are the traits that if we wanna move up the ladder, that we need to have. Not only those good leadership characteristics will impact the people around us, but also,
will show other people above us that we have those traits that can make us good leaders. most of the time, people are looking for good leaders to support them. So if we are really good at leadership, they're going to promote us and stuff like that. And the second piece I will say is, if we look at most leadership instruction and design positions,
there is a huge component of project management. Sometimes it's 25, 50 percent because you're managing a project, you're managing people and stuff like that. So I would encourage people, go beyond my book and take courses on project management, certificates on project management. There are so many of them. And then deepen your knowledge on project management because also at the end of the day,
Project management is not only for instructional design, but it's for everyday life. It's an everyday life skill. use now when I have a project at home, I think project management. I'm like, okay, what's the critical path? If I wanna clean my garage, I will be like, okay, I'm gonna use the MVP model and then just clean a little bit. mean, as long as it's tight and clean, that's good enough. So those are skills. ⁓
Project management is a skill that everyone needs. And I think it shouldn't be taught only in business or business schools or engineering school, but it should be taught in all the disciplines because it's, as we've been discussing, it helps to burn out, right? Like getting our time back and all these great things that it can help us do.
Luke Hobson (50:05)
And once again, as you were just saying, it reminds me too, around the fact that for you will always have projects. So as an instructional designer, you have a certain set of projects. And as a senior instructional designer, you have a different type of projects. And then now as an assistant director, I have different kinds of projects. So now it's not just like, I get to design learning experience. It's like, no, now I'm actually partly responsible for, for budgeting and for payroll and for making sure that these, ⁓ my team members are.
happy and that they're growing and that they're doing well and you have all these different types of elements that you're like, right, this is now a part of what I do. But there is still learning design involved, but it kind of shifts for things. So what you just said, it's true, project management is truly applicable to anything, you know, really.
Guieswende Rouamba (50:51)
Yes, and
including strategic projects because the dean can be like, ⁓ look, I need you to look at this department and then assess this and this and this and give me a report and those kind of, this is a project by itself. And if you don't have like project management skills or cannot ask the right question to the dean, it's going to lead up to burnout because the right question will be like, ⁓ Dean, like how much time?
do we have? What success look like for this project? What are the deliverable? What are those kind of questions? You may even help the dean think deeper about the question. And that's if we don't have project management skills, I mean, it's, it can really work.
Luke Hobson (51:38)
Yeah, that take taking
that step back is really critical because I was I was saying before people are just like, I'm going to roll up my sleeves, dive on in. And I'm like, and I appreciate that enthusiasm. I love that. But hold on. We don't have all the information at hand. We're going to be spinning our wheels here and come to find out that like, we missed this or this or this. it's like, we could have prevented so many things if we had kind of taken a moment to ourselves, look around, ask those meaningful questions you were just talking about. And then.
Guieswende Rouamba (51:51)
Yes.
Luke Hobson (52:07)
we're gonna be in the right track. So, so it makes sense. Well, hey man, I have hoped that the folks listening to this episode enjoyed it because certainly, as I was saying to you previously, project management somehow falls to the wayside for things, but it is so valuable for everything that we do. So I really appreciate the fact that you wrote this book coming on this show, first podcast, by the way. So I think you crushed it for your first podcast. Gotta say that right now. So, so that's been awesome. Where can people go to learn more about
Guieswende Rouamba (52:32)
thank you.
Luke Hobson (52:36)
you to follow your work, everything else, where can they find you online?
Guieswende Rouamba (52:40)
Yeah, I'm very active or trying to be very active ⁓ on LinkedIn. That's one of the best places for me right now. Trying to grow to have a platform, but LinkedIn will be the best place. And the book right now is available on Amazon. So that's the place I'm trying also to expand to other publishers, not publishers, but other ways of selling the book. they come, once I'm able to do that, I will add that.
to LinkedIn so that people have different ways to access the book.
Luke Hobson (53:18)
Awesome. Awesome. Well, I'll be sure to include all those links inside of a shown us for everything. But once again, man, thank you so much for coming on the show. It's been a blast. Appreciate it.
Guieswende Rouamba (53:25)
Thank you, Luke. It's been a real pleasure.
