Sponsored by iSpring

Hey there, friends! Bianca Baumann and I had a blast presenting at ATD24 last week! We shared our "Unlocking the Top Marketing Secrets for L&D" with a group of incredibly pumped-up folks. If you're curious to see what we talked about, just hop on over to this link and check out the slides and resources. It's all there waiting for you!

Thanks for reading!

📰 News & Notes

Do you still think Canva is only for amateurs? Not so fast.

Canva has grown way past its starter-designer image. They just held a big even announcing a ton of new features a few days ago. Today, it's a strong design platform used by pros to make top-notch visuals. With features just as good as those in fancy design programs, Canva lets teams work together, keeps branding on point, and saves time. Learn about some of what makes it a great tool for businesses and creative work. Do you use Canva? I do almost every day.

🎯 Take away: Canva is no longer just for amateurs; it is now a robust, professional-grade tool for creating high-quality designs.

How Humans Do (and Don't) Learn

A new, large-scale study by University of Pennsylvania researchers analyzed various behavior change efforts, revealing key patterns for influencing both individual and collective actions. Surprisingly, the review found that common interventions like video, quizzes, lectures, and generic skills training have minimal impact on actual knowledge gain and behavior changes. Effective learning needs to focus on the context in which learning happens, not just the content. This includes long-term engagement, practical activities, ongoing support, and rewards. AI tools like ChatGPT can help by creating personalized learning plans, designing mentoring programs, and providing regular feedback, making learning more impactful.

🎯 Take away: Effective learning builds contexts, not just content, for long-term engagement with practical application, driving behavior change.

Rewriting Digital Content for Brevity

Rewriting content for brevity is like decluttering a messy room: tossing out the redundancies, polishing the essentials, and making sure everything has its place. By trimming unnecessary words and focusing on clarity, your writing becomes more engaging and digestible for readers. Think of it as a workout for your words, shedding those extra pounds to reveal a lean, mean communication machine.

🎯 Take away: Writers always get the advice to be concise, but doing so is easier said than done. These tips and tricks help reduce your word count.

🧰 Tech Tools & Tips

If tools are your jam, check out my new Work Smarter newsletter.

The best new app for newsletter reading.

Reading newsletters in the inbox is frustrating - it is noisy and easy to lose control of subscriptions. Now you can enjoy your newsletters outside the inbox with Meco, an app built for reading.

🎧 Podcast

This is the conversation that caught my ear this week. Check out previous episodes in the Friday Finds podcast playlist.

🧳 Where’s Mike?

• Canadian eLearning Conference, Toronto, June 13-14

• Greater Cincinnati ATD, September 4

• DevLearn, November 6-8

sponsored

Try Spring Page for Free

Did you know that generative AI can come in handy for your eLearning authoring projects? From suggesting content ideas to enhancing course structure, AI is a new go-to asset for course creators of all levels of expertise. 

If you haven’t seized the opportunity to implement AI in your authoring work yet, iSpring Page is the perfect software to change that. An intuitive web-based tool, iSpring Page enables you to create interactive scrollable courses that look stunning and keep your learners engaged. The iSpring AI assistant lends a helping hand throughout — use it to generate course topic ideas and outlines, get content suggestions, and even improve course design, all with a couple of clicks.

Start a free trial of iSpring Page and experience the power and convenience of AI-assisted authoring firsthand. 

Like this post? Share it with someone you love. Don't like it? Share it with someone you don't!

Friday Finds is an independent publication that I produce in my free time. You can support my work by sharing it with the world, booking an advertising spot, or buying me a coffee.