Learning and development teams often begin with content, courses, and completion rates. Nick Shackleton-Jones and Charlie Kneen argue that the better starting point is performance.
Nick, creator of 5Di, and CEO and founder of
Shackleton Consulting, explains why he would erase education from the L&D industry and replace content-centred thinking with human-centred design.
Charlie, CEO and Founder of
Solvd Together, shares how 5Di has shaped the way his team works with clients to define business problems, understand context, and design for measurable outcomes.
We discuss how emotion drives behaviour change, why completion rates are weak evidence of impact, and how to shift from designing education to designing performance. They also explore federated learning organisations, delegation of authority, AI’s impact on human capability, the risks of outsourcing judgement, and why L&D should architect experiences rather than information consumption.
Some curious takeaways:
- Start by defining the business problem and the impact you want to create
- Design for changes in behavioural capability, not content completion
- Use human-centred design to understand people, context, tools, and systems
Episode highlights:
(
00:00) Welcome to Harald’s Curious Corner
(
01:48) Why L&D should stop thinking like education
(
05:33) What completion rates fail to tell us
(
07:31) Start with the business problem
(
09:38) Define impact before designing learning
(
14:38) Finding the balance between centralisation and autonomy
(
17:25) The three capabilities L&D actually needs
(
19:18) When AI starts reducing human capability
(
25:29) A more scientific approach to behaviour change
(
31:57) Why AI content isn’t the answer
(
33:50) Are we outsourcing our thinking to AI?
(
38:23) Why humans could become the premium product
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What is Harald’s Curious Corner?
Harald’s Curious Corner is where curiosity meets connection.
Harald chases that question with a guest, gathers perspectives from voices across the industry, and then steps back to reflect on what it all means. The show unfolds like a story arc, part exploration, part roundtable, part reflection, blending imagination with analysis.
The result: trusted insights, meaningful conversations, and forward-looking takeaways that shine a light on where learning is headed next.