I truly believe IDT is still an emerging field despite its lengthy history. This is evident to me because most of the literature on IDT surrounds only three industries, military, healthcare, and higher education despite its ability to benefit nearly any field – once they learn about it.
In fact, one of the most humbling experiences happened when my mom asked me to describe what I do so she could explain it to her friends. She didn’t want to say “well she is finishing her Master’s next May in Instructional Design & Technology. No, she’s not a computer designer, no, she’s not a teacher, no, I did not mean Industrial (for context, I have a B.S. in Industrial Engineering). She, well, she, she …” I can appreciate that, and at the same time take note that clearly, our field has not broken into the main stream quite yet. Given this, I helped her understand that our field is growing and what I am really interested in doing is 1) working with instructors to build more interactive, learner driven classes and 2) developing online learning modules both focusing on adult learners. An example I gave her to use is that often time instructors are the SME on the content while ID’s are the SME of the delivery of the content. BAM! I saw the light bulb go off!
After which mom, dad, and I had a great conversation on how IDs could be used in trials to help lawyers educate the jury on specific key points they want the members to takeaway from the arguments and how IDs could be used in advertising. Both ideas highly divergent from the roots of ID, but after a lengthy debate/conversation, I could see how IDs could use their skills in both of these fields. Food for further thought I guess…