Twice a year, we host a Learning Technology Showcase in tandem with our monthly L&D happy hour. We invite members of the L&D peer groups to share presentations highlighting innovative ways they are using new and familiar technologies to support learning and performance.

This June, five presenters joined us at our Saint Paul office to share their insights and expertise. After the presentations concluded, attendees and presenters gathered in the main room for networking, conversation, and idea exchange.

After the excitement of the showcase was over, we reached out to the presenters to learn more about the key concepts, challenges and takeaways from their sessions. Whether you attended the Learning Technology Showcase and want a refresher, or you couldn’t make it and want to catch up on what you missed, read on for some insights.

AI Is Becoming a Practical Partner, Not Just a Productivity Tool

Artificial intelligence has rapidly moved from experimentation to everyday application in learning teams. However, several presenters emphasized that success with AI depends less on the technology itself and more on how intentionally it is used.

Ambre Quinn, Senior Instructional Designer at Ryan Companies, Got SME TMI? Assign AI the Closed-Book Test (Analyze-Synthesize-Design!) demonstrated how “closed-book AI” approaches can help tame overwhelming amounts of subject matter expert content. Rather than allowing AI models to search broadly across the internet, platforms such as NotebookLM, ChatGPT Projects, and Claude Projects can be restricted to approved source materials. This approach helps reduce hallucinations, keeps answers grounded in organizational knowledge, and provides citations that enable learning professionals to verify sources.

Ambre highlighted four rules of closed-book AI:

• Bring your own notes (Data Ingestion)
• Demand clickable citations to check the sources (Check the Receipts)
• Block outside answers (Bounding)
• Use one-click output templates (Toolkits)

The result is a more reliable AI assistant capable of transforming dense content into searchable knowledge bases, study guides, flowcharts, and even audio learning experiences.

Similarly, Zoey Thao, Senior Instructional Designer at Fredrickson Learning, Copilot as a Design Partner: Accelerating Instructional Design without Losing Quality, explored how Microsoft Copilot can function as a design partner throughout the instructional design process. Rather than replacing instructional designers, Copilot helps accelerate drafting, brainstorming, summarization, and content development, allowing practitioners to focus more time on strategy, learner experience, and business impact.

A key takeaway from both Zoey’s and Ambre’s sessions was that AI performs best when paired with strong human judgment. Whether creating course objectives, synthesizing research, or generating learning materials, AI outputs still require validation, refinement, and contextual understanding.

The Real Competitive Advantage Is Asking Better Questions

One message surfaced repeatedly throughout the showcase: AI success depends heavily on the quality of human input.

Presenters emphasized that effective prompting is rapidly becoming a critical professional skill. Clear instructions, defined expectations, and thoughtful constraints produce significantly better outcomes than generic requests.

Laura Nedved, Senior Experience Designer at Mind the Performance Gap, AI Vibe Coding in the LXD Space, shared how she used AI-assisted “vibe coding” techniques to rapidly create an entire fictional business ecosystem in support of a learning experience project. In a matter of days, Claude AI helped fabricate a company (Kinetic City Cycles) including realistic versions of the following components:

• Business concept
• Overview, vision, and goals
• Business financial model
• Solutions to business problems (right-sizing my business to create a profit without pricing myself out of the industry)
• Creative community engagement ideas
• Corporate brand colors and standards document.
• A PowerPoint template for corporate presentations and learning events
• A full organizational chart
• User personas for my employees/learners.
• Empathy maps
• Knowledge, Skills, & Abilities (KSA) Matrix covering all employees
• 6 onboarding agendas (all employees, all supervisors, and 4 team agendas)
• Engaging interactive onboarding activities beyond what is typically found in corporate onboarding
• Onboarding PPT deck
• Onboarding checklist
• Employee onboarding ice-breaker activity
• Employee “passport” online activity
• Employee manufacturing station cards (online versions of job aids)

However, Nedved stressed that speed should not be confused with accuracy. She described AI as a “super-fast but somewhat incompetent assistant”—valuable for accelerating work, but never a substitute for review and critical thinking.

Several practical lessons emerged:

• Verify information before using it
• Be highly specific in your requests
• Challenge fabricated content
• Ask AI to explain unfamiliar concepts
• Compare outputs across multiple tools
• Never upload sensitive or confidential information

As AI capabilities continue expanding, the differentiator may not be technical expertise alone but the ability to guide, evaluate, and refine AI-generated work.

Learning Technology Decisions Must Start With Business Strategy

While AI captured much of the attention, Sarah Martin, HR Systems Analyst at Royal Credit Union, From System Replacement to Strategic Advantage: Rethinking Learning & Performance Technology, reminded attendees that technology alone is rarely the solution.

Sarah shared lessons learned from a learning and performance system transition that evolved into a broader evaluation of how technology could support talent development, performance management, compensation alignment, and long-term workforce strategy.

Her team approached the project by first defining business needs before evaluating potential solutions. Through extensive collaboration with HR, IT, Finance, Operations, and business leaders, they developed a framework that ensured technology decisions remained aligned with organizational goals rather than vendor-driven feature comparisons.

Several key principles emerged:

• Start with the business problem, not the software
• Engage stakeholders early and often
• Establish structured evaluation criteria
• Consider long-term organizational growth
• Evaluate vendor partnership quality alongside functionality

One particularly valuable insight was that the evaluation process itself often determines the quality of the final decision. Clear requirements, disciplined scoring methods, and cross-functional alignment create better outcomes than focusing solely on platform features.

Learning Experiences Are Expanding Beyond Traditional eLearning

Another important trend highlighted during the showcase was the growing shift from course-centric thinking to experience-centric design.

Laura’s presentation illustrated how modern learning experiences can extend far beyond traditional eLearning modules. By combining Learning Experience Design (LXD) methodologies with emerging AI tools, designers can create interactive ecosystems that blend onboarding, performance support, storytelling, digital experiences, and workplace application.

Meanwhile, Ambre demonstrated how AI can automatically transform static knowledge assets into dynamic formats such as:

• Interactive podcasts
• Searchable knowledge assistants
• Study guides
• Visual flowcharts
• Audio learning resources

These capabilities allow organizations to present information in multiple formats, making learning more accessible and adaptable to learner preferences and workflows.

The implication for learning professionals is clear: employees increasingly expect learning experiences that are engaging, searchable, personalized, and available when they need them—not just when a course is assigned.

Human Expertise Remains the Essential Ingredient

Despite the excitement surrounding AI and emerging technologies, perhaps the most consistent takeaway from the event was the continued importance of human expertise.

Whether selecting enterprise learning technologies, designing learning experiences, building AI-powered workflows, or developing instructional content, presenters agreed that technology is most effective when guided by experienced professionals who understand business needs, learner behavior, and organizational context.

The organizations seeing the greatest success are not simply adopting the newest tools. They are thoughtfully integrating technology into well-designed processes, maintaining strong quality standards, and staying focused on performance outcomes.

Would you like to learn more about the Learning Technology Network or view recordings of the showcase sessions? Please send an email to communities@fredricksonlearning.com.