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Dealing with Subject Matter Experts
At a recent world meeting for an organization in which I am supplying services, one of the managers was attempting to explain to a group of subject matter experts how the instructional designers were going to help them produce learning content. One of the experts asked for our credentials in their field, to which the manager tried to explain that our skill sets were different and applied to the development of the material for the students. To this, the expert replied, "But if they don't know anything about the subject, then why don't we just create this stuff ourselves?"
Herein lies the fundamental difficulty with subject matter experts, and the hurdle that you must overcome in your initial work with them. The subject matter expert, or SME, views their world from the pinnacle of their own knowledge, they are the masters of their worlds, and are quite comfortable in their areas of knowledge. This means that they believe they know the best way to impart this knowledge to others, and can best produce the content used to teach. This is even more prevalent with SMEs that are also instructors of some type.
Typically, however, while SMEs are the bearers of knowledge and experience, they have no real experience in envisioning, managing and producing learning content. They are unaware of the challenges of education within an organization from systematic viewpoint, and have little or no knowledge of the multiple interdependencies required for the research, production, evaluation and dispersement of educational content.
They're attitude towards curriculum developers usually ranges from dismissal to confusion, and in the case of classroom instructors and on-line educational developers, often outright hostility as physical educators see their world changing and often do not understand that on-line learning is not going to replace their professions or dilute the value of their knowledge; only change how they work.
Deal With a Group as a Group of Individuals
We need to do our best to build a relationship with each SME, because we will, at some point, be interacting directly with each one for information, the completion of a task or some other type of support during a project. Even if we are not managing them in an organizational sense, we will be managing their deliverables, so we need to understand their particular strengths and weaknesses, as well as how to communicate with them.
Explain What We Can Do
If they don't know what we do, then we need to inform them. Let them know our expertise in instructional design, information architecture, learning technology and anything else that we need to convey, but do so in a professional, non-confrontational and non-egotistical manner. We can let them know our value.
Explain What We Can Do (For Them)
Ultimately, they may not care who we are or what we do, but once they understand how on-line learning is not going away, and that they have been given some responsibility for contributing to its production, they will be looking for help from experts, just as we are doing. In the realm of educational content and on-line material, we are the experts. We have knowledge and understanding that they do not, and are willing to share.
Provide a New Way of Doing Something or Thinking About Something
If we can get the SMEs excited about a new process or procedure by showing them the benefits to them, their audience and the organization, we can harness that enthusiasm to work on projects together. What do they want? The same things we all want: more respect, greater opportunities, interesting projects and less time doing what they consider irrelevant or boring.
If we can build the relationship properly from the first encounter, we have a better chance of succeeding in our objectives, because we will have the support from the sources of our content, the subject matter experts.
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