In Summer 2023, I had the amazing opportunity to work as an Instructional Design Intern on the Sales Enablement Team for OneStream Software. In my internship, I developed two main training experiences for the onboarding of Sales and BDR employees. The first was educating new hires on the origins, development, and present/future state of the company, and the second was outlining specific BDR responsibilities. I was able to learn from the talented professionals on my team, network and learn about business operations throughout the company, and develop my instructional design skills.
The main project I was tasked with for the duration of my internship was to create three interactive video-based learning experiences that educated new hires on the origins, development, and present/future of the company. In order to achieve this, I went through many rounds of research, design, feedback, and revision, while utilizing the ADDIE method and other adult learning principals throughout my creative processes. I conducted research by sifting through resources posted in company digital repositories such as Seismic and MindTickle, and worked in Vyond Animation for video creation.
Conducting research to synthesize content for these trainings was a beast in itself. I was given a multitude of sources to sift through, SMEs to consult with, and facts to check across multiple platforms in order to create an effective, historically accurate training experience. In creating these trainings, I not only had to learn about how to company came to be, but also gain a brief overview on how the software operates to give new hires a taste of what they will be working with.
After I was able to gather as much content as I could on the training topics, I grouped whatever I could into relevant content "buckets," condensed overstated facts, and began outlining what would be discussed throughout the lessons. After my outlines were approved, I began storyboarding the content into what I wanted it to look like for video creation.
This was my first experience working in sifting through a vast amount content for trainings in a corporate setting, and I was able to develop my research skills thoroughly.
Vyond Studios served as my animation and video creation platform that I utilized to make the video-based trainings. Vyond allows for easy to use graphics and AI powered text-to-voice narration features that streamlines instructional video production processes. This was my first time utilizing this platform, so I was able to play around and learn a lot of the fun features it provides for creating fun and engaging trainings. Below, you will find some screen captures from the videos that I created for the History of OneStream training project.
Throughout my project lifecycle, I continuously had several feedback and revision meetings with my manager and coworker, after I completed major milestones within the project. This taught me how to successfully take constructive criticism and apply changes to my work, and ultimately made me a better instructional designer. I was grateful for all the help and support I had received from my management team during my internship. At the end of my internship, we were able to integrate the learning experiences within the MindTickle platform, and rollout shortly followed. Using MindTickle, we were able to track participation on individuals, grading on interactivity within lessons (short quizzes), and received feedback from the employees on what to change and how to improve.
For this project, I was able to kickoff the research and design of the training experience. I followed similar habits that I utilized creating the History of OneStream project, except this time I was given most of the information needed to be stated in the video within a powerpoint deck. This streamlined my process a bit easier, as I was able to focus on creating an engaging video, rather than synthesizing all the content upfront. Check out some of the designs included in the BDR Roles & Responsibilities Onboarding.
Overall, my experience working as an Instructional Design Intern for OneStream Software during Summer 2023 was an incredibly valuable that developed my instructional design skills, communication and collaboration skills, my technical writing, and my creativity. I was fortunate enough to own the project I was working on, from start to finish, with amazing help and support from my team. I asked a ton of questions, networked with people throughout the company including individuals from the Global Learning Department and the Employee Development Department, and got to have a fully remote corporate experience. I hope to translate the skills I learned from this internship to a full-time role that aligns closely to my skillset and interests. I was able to develop my skills considerably in instructional design. Below, you can find my final internship presentation that I was able to present to the entire company.