156: 5 Things YOU Should Be Doing to Land a Role in Learning and Development

Holly Owens (00:01.08)
Hello everyone and welcome to another fantastic episode of EdUp L &D. My name is Holly Owens and I'm your host and today I'm also your guest. This is my first ever solo podcast that I will be recording for you.

If you're on LinkedIn World, you probably saw that I posted recently talking about my fear being on video alone and how I have a little bit of hesitation when it comes to doing that, but I'm pushing through and I wanna record this podcast episode for you, especially for those who are looking to get into the field of learning and development. So today I wanna talk about five strategies

that I use to land my role in learning and development. So as most of you know, I started out my career as a high school teacher and then I transitioned into higher education. As an instructional technologist and instructional technology specialist, I had some various titles within higher education that eventually evolved into instructional design. And I was already doing a lot of instructional design work in those roles anyways with helping faculty design their courses around using tech.

and just thinking of different ways to engage students and make learning fun. So definitely learned a lot through those different types of roles. And then I jumped in the corporate space for about two years and I worked at Amazon Pharmacy as an instructional designer. So I really got a feel for how things work in the corporate environment when it comes to learning and development, specifically instructional design.

And now with my current role at a net tech company called Yellowdig, I've jumped into marketing, which I'm gonna talk about in a different episode and how that all relates and correlates with things that I learned in being an instructional designer over the past 17 or so years. As you can see in the background, I'm moving this weekend, so I have stuff everywhere.

Holly Owens (02:08.842)
Eventually it's gonna be a brand new setup for me when I get into my new spot. So please excuse some of the mess behind me. It's just because I'm about to move to a new location in Wilmington, North Carolina. All right, so let's get into it. Listeners, I want you to know that each of these five things is something that's very easy for you to do and to start out, but it's going to require you to

do some planning. So definitely landing a role in learning and development. There's no one thing, there isn't just one thing, and I am writing a book about this and I hope to have it out later this year, that you can do to land a role in learning and development. There isn't like if you just record a video or your resume looks great or your portfolio is amazing. It's really a combination of a variety of different things that you need to do and

order to land that role. So just be aware that it's not just one thing and you definitely need to take some steps and some actionable steps in order to do this. So one of the things that happened when I left the classroom is that I stepped into actually e-learning development for about six to eight months.

And it was really eye opening for me in terms of that I wasn't working directly with students anymore. I wasn't planning lessons. Instead, I was the person who was building the lessons. So that was really a shift for me. So if you were a transitioning teacher, it's going to take you a little bit to acclimate in terms of shifting from dealing with students or participants every day and then shifting to being kind of backstage.

and just being the person that is planning out what is happening. So in my career, I have really tried to, from each particular role, I have learned something that is taking me to the next step for the next role. So even if you're not in your, I like to call your forever role, or the one where I say I'm gonna retire from,

Holly Owens (04:26.624)
It's okay to feel that way, but also too, it's important that you take into consideration and learn as much as you can from that role because it's definitely going to help you as you prepare for your next role. All right, so let's do a quick overview. There's five different strategies that I want to talk about of things that I did in order to land a role in learning and development.

And these are definitely ones that everyone can do. It just takes a little bit of time. They're not difficult. just, it's time consuming. It takes some effort on your part to really plan out things like networking, things like figuring out what your transferable skills are. So the first one I'll talk about is building a strong personal brand. Now, when I mean strong personal brand, I'm not talking like you're gonna be like a Nike brand. You're gonna be your authentic self and you're gonna be

talking from the lens of what you're interested in or what you're passionate about. So I'm very passionate about learning. So naturally talking about learning and development and doing the job postings on LinkedIn came very easily to me and then growing my network. The next thing I'm talk about is leveraging those transferable skills. So what kind of skills that I have as a teacher, as an instructional technology specialist.

as a corporate instructional designer that really helped me transition to these various roles that I've had over the past, we'll say almost 20 years at this point. Networking with intention and authenticity. Often out on LinkedIn World, we see people out there just kind of connecting with you, not really knowing about you, not really forming a bond or a relationship with you. They're kind of just in it for themselves, but I wanna talk about networking with intention.

Then I wanna talk to you about telling your story with confidence. Your story and your experience are very important to what you put on a resume, to how you land interviews, to how you talk in interviews. So I definitely want you to be able to tell that story with confidence and to help you feel like you don't have to leave parts out. Oftentimes, and I'll discuss this with transitioning teachers, we feel like we have to leave out the teaching part, no.

Holly Owens (06:46.572)
You need to honor those experiences that you've had because they have led you to where you are today. And then I wanna talk about and share some resources about having, crafting like a targeted application strategy. So really putting some of these things into action and applying. So you'll notice on that list, I didn't say anything about a resume, I didn't say anything about a portfolio, I didn't say anything about those documents or building a website at this point. These are just.

Five strategies that led me to that point to landing a role in learning and development. And my main role, as you know, is instructional design. So instructional designer is the lens that I will be speaking from in this particular episode. All right, let's start with the first strategy. Building a strong personal brand. You don't know it, but your beliefs...

what you do, what you've experienced in life. You already have your own personal brand, your personality, what you like to share, what you like to do. You're gonna be sharing that personal brand with the world if you're trying to land a role in learning and development. And one of the things I would say is that it's important for you not to fake it till you make it, but share your authentic self with people as much as you can share. I think it's important

that you're sharing regularly out on LinkedIn and engaging with different types of topics that are in the industry, like accessibility, learning management systems, technology, you the different topics that we talk about, how do we get backward design, how do we get learners to change their behaviors, all those different things you can talk about. But also too, when I've worked with clients in the past who are looking to get into a role in learning and development,

They were like, I don't even know what to post about. I don't have anything I really wanna share about. Think about an experience you have or something you're really passionate about. For example, I'm really passionate about landing a good role and seeing roles that have salaries listed. So I started posting regularly job postings that I researched and found on out of LinkedIn and other job sites. And then I started connecting with other people who were doing the same thing like Chelsea Maud Averitt, who posts.

Holly Owens (09:08.814)
jobs that pay 60K or more out on skip, and I'll link to this in the show notes. And she's post stuff for free. Like it's free. And the stuff that I'm doing is for free. We're doing it because we want to help others. And we're also passionate about finding those roles that fit your life. Making sure also that you are optimizing your profile to

show that you're interested in instructional design or learning and development. Now, one of the things I caution against here is as a teacher or as somebody in the education system, shifting your role to saying that you were an instructional designer, that is not a good idea because you are not an instructional designer yet, yet. You're not an instructional designer yet. You need to take a look and I'll talk about this in one of the five.

You need to take a look at those transferable skills. For example, and I'll talk about this a little bit more, lesson planning transitions often as a skill into project management. So one of the things you need to do to set yourself up for success is kind of take your profile and look at it and it can have an education feel but tell why you're interested in instructional design, what you're looking to do. Maybe you've done some consulting work. So highlight that.

with an instructional design. Don't put yourself as like, I'm an e-learning developer and I'm instructional designer because I was a teacher or because I did this. That may not be the case and it may look bad on you for saying that. So just be very truthful and authentic in what you're talking about when it comes to the industry. All right, networking and engaging with professionals.

Over the past five years, I have had so many different people reach out to me and I reached out to other people who are in the industry. Everybody in this community, most people are very willing to share their experiences. They are willing to go the extra mile to tell you what they have done in their lives and really give you an insider's perspective into what they do daily. If you look at

Holly Owens (11:29.666)
the role of instructional design, you're gonna see it titled different things, instructional designer, learning experience designer, e-learning developer, they all kind of mesh together at some points in every single organization I have worked. Not even kidding, even when I was just in the higher education sector, sees that role differently depending upon the needs of the institution or the organization.

So just be very cognizant of that when you're talking to industry professionals because one thing an instructional designer might do, say in the corporate space, project management, they may not do that in the higher education space. They may be the person who's completely designing the courses for faculty. So it's important for you to get out there and see what people are actually doing.

Then I think the other thing too that's really helped with my personal brand is doing this podcast. Not saying that you have to start a podcast, but I feel like when you share your face and yourself with the world, that really does help people get to know your personality a little bit better and who you are. And I feel like people get to know you. Like it's interesting how we get this sense and I'm gonna use Taylor Swift as an example.

Like we feel like we know her a little bit just from what the media reports, what she puts out on Instagram. You get a sense of like who she is. She's a very kind person. She's very giving. I just heard she donated like $10 million to the LA fire. So you get a sense of who she is as a person. You know, now you don't know her personally. You may not know me personally, but you know that that's an authentic situation there, that that person is genuine and authentic because of what they're they're putting out there and they're helping others. Right.

So that's one of the things the podcast has allowed me to do. And one of the main reasons I started this is for people to share their stories. It started out as EdUp EdTech, and now it's transitioned into EdUp L &D. And I think it's important that these industries and these people get to share their stories. There's a reason behind what they're doing, what they're doing, and it's not just to get money. It isn't. They have a real purpose that they're trying to drive behind this.

Holly Owens (13:45.646)
So it was important for me to build a stage for them to share that on. All right, so the first one, building a strong personal brand. And this is something you're gonna have to work at every day. It doesn't happen overnight. So you're gonna have to maybe take 20 minutes a day to post that on LinkedIn, know, network with people, doing those different things that just kind of get people an idea of who you are and what you're looking to do. All right, number two.

leveraging those transferable skills. So how does your previous experience, and I'm gonna stay in my wheelhouse as an educator, how does that transition into a role in L &D? What are the different things, if you had to write down all of your skills that you have as an educator, like lesson planning, classroom management, administrative tasks, because we do a lot of administrative tasks as educators.

Curriculum development, I'm trying to think of all the different things, it's been a while since I was a teacher. I still teach in higher ed, but it's been a minute. So thinking about how all those different things would transfer over into learning and development. Like I said before, lesson planning and curriculum planning is project management. Like you're planning backwards, like this is the end result we're going to get to.

you know, the students are taking some sort of assessment or they're doing some sort of project. And I have to plan these lessons to prepare them as scaffold in order for them to create this deliverable that I'm expecting of them. So you really need to take a look at those experiences and you might need to do a little bit of research. You might need to look at, for example, like what a corporate instructional designer does or what an instructional designer does in education.

And I'm gonna give you this as a little bonus side to this transferable skills is that one of the things that you need to do before you even start applying to roles is you need to know where you're gonna go. You need to know where you wanna be because like I said, not only does every organization treat an instructional designer or somebody in learning and development role different and how they manage those responsibilities, they also,

Holly Owens (16:05.038)
It varies across sectors. So you have to figure out like where you wanna be. Do you wanna be in corporate? Do you wanna be in higher education? Do you wanna be in K to 12? Do you wanna be a freelancer? Do you wanna be a nonprofit? So your transferable skills, you're gonna have to do some research and say like, if I was a teacher, this transferable skill goes over into corporate because I've done blank, blank, and blank. It's important that you understand that those industries are different.

And of course, when you transition over, like I'm talking about, if you've used certain technologies, implementing certain technologies, that's a part of an instructional designer. Knowing how to use those technologies for pedagogy, androgogy, and figuring out how learners are going to be engaged with using technology. Obviously, corporate and education, and I've done some...

sessions on this, difference between corporate and education instructional design. So you have to figure out like, okay, I've used this technology, but how did you implement it? What did you do? What did the, what were the results of that, especially if you're going into the corporate space? And then in your resume, you're going to be honoring your teaching experience and you're going to be articulating these skills, not only in your resume, but when you jump to those interviews.

The good news is, is I have some resources that I'll share in the show notes about, you know, I have an interview pocket guide. have something that Nadia, who used to host a podcast with me created about what they're really asking in the interview process. So those things are going to be very, very helpful to you when it comes to, you know, knowing those transferable skills and then talking about it in the interviews.

So you really need to sit down and write down all your skills and be like, this transitions to this when it comes to learning and development, or this transitions to this when it comes to learning. Lesson planning, project management. Pedagogy, transitions over to androgogy, you can transfer over to adult learning theory, do a little bit of research about that. Technology integration, how does that all work? How you prepared your students to...

Holly Owens (18:22.698)
use technology and how you could possibly prepare participants to use some sort of technologies in the classroom that they're gonna be in or in the learning management system out in the virtual world. So, so far, we've done building a strong personal brand and then leveraging those transferable skills. Okay, there's more to these. just kinda giving a brief overview so that you can get started when you're thinking about your journey.

So let's move to the next one, which I think is really important. And I'll tell a little story about how I grew from 50 followers to 40,000 on LinkedIn in four years. So networking with intention and authenticity. I can't tell you how many times I get somebody in my inbox. I'm gonna take a quick sip of coffee. It's morning here.

I guess somebody in my inbox and they just.

They say hi, they haven't researched my experience. They send me their resume, they want me to review it. They don't really, they're not being authentic. They're asking for something in return without even getting to know me first. It's really off putting and I don't answer those messages anymore. So if you're taking up someone's time and you're sending them a message and telling them to review your resume or please help me without having an authentic conversation,

That is, that's not gonna work. That is not gonna work. As much as I understand that there is some, you know, emergencies, I guess you could say behind finding a role, or you just wanna get it done, you have to be prepared to be more patient. Because meaningful connections don't just happen through one LinkedIn conversation, or one text message, or one phone call. Those develop over time.

Holly Owens (20:27.31)
I will say that some of my very best friends in the L &D space have come from LinkedIn and building those authentic conversations. I wouldn't be where I am today without those people. So in 2020, well, yeah, about February 2020, I logged on to LinkedIn and I'll get back to networking with intentions and this kind of all ties together.

I said I'm going to do a better job of networking on LinkedIn. I'm just gonna reach out to people, I'm gonna have some 15 minute conversations, I'm going to just talk to people, where they're at. Like what is your role? at the time I was a instructional designer in higher education, I just wanted to get to know people. So I just started having these 15 minute conversations. And those led to more conversations and then that led to maybe.

doing a little bit of coaching on the side, and then obviously I was still teaching in higher education. So I really started to continually talk to some of the same people. And just everybody was kind of going through the same different things. They were in their current role. They were maybe looking to transition or elevate themselves in their current roles. So really just started growing from there. So I would have...

Async and synchronous conversations with people and oftentimes that like a bond would develop over common Interests over a common thing so I would keep those relationships going and then I would say you know Maybe share an idea with them about should I do this webinar? What do you think about this? Particular choice in terms of like doing something coaching so really I was networking with intention

And I made some of, like I said, the very best friends that I have out on LinkedIn World, and I know that they're there for support. Shout out Luke Hopson, Heidi Kirby, Elvin Frites, Joe Sallustio, many, many more. I can't list all of you. Don't get mad that I didn't mention your name, but those are just the ones that come to mind right now. And one of the things I would say is that,

Holly Owens (22:37.1)
those friendships go beyond learning and development now because we figured out we have connections and commonalities in life as well. So the human experience is a part of something that is networking with intention. I would say too, it's important to join groups, attending events, getting information. There's tons of free stuff out there and exhaust all those free resources before you even jump into like something that's a paid for opportunity.

Don't want you wasting your time paying for something where you're not, say, gonna go in the corporate space, you're not gonna go into the education space. You really wanna exhaust those resources and ask people what they've been doing. People are gonna answer. It's possible and it happens all the time. Everyone starts somewhere. I'm here now because I did a lot of work. Not because I started here, I didn't start here. And I would consider myself successful at this point.

It's hard to say that because I'm like, no, I won't take comments or things like that. But I would consider myself successful at landing learning and development roles and then other roles. If I hadn't had networked, and I'll tell you this right now, I wouldn't have the job I have right now with Yellowdig and Seanak Roy and the Yellowdig team. It would have never happened if I wasn't networking. Seanak was one of the first people on my podcast and he's been on there a few times now.

more recently, a lot of different times. But if I wouldn't have network, it wouldn't have landed me this current role that I have as the director of growth marketing.

So networking with intention, asking people about what they do, developing those authentic connections. Yes, it's going to take some time. Some people are fine right off the bat. like, you know what? We should be texting buddies. So you definitely need to do that. Please, please, please don't message people and just ask them for something. That to me is something that is like, it's probably one of the worst things you can do.

Holly Owens (24:43.726)
You can ask people, know, like, hey, I saw that you've done this, this, and this. I'm interested in getting a role in learning and development. What are your best tips? And then maybe say, is there a time where it's convenient for you to chat? Or, you know, maybe just get to know them a little bit first before even asking for a meeting, because everybody's time is really crunched, especially with full-time roles. So make sure that you're,

being respectful of what people have done in the past and also their time. I I try to do the same thing. And when I reach out to people like, hey, how are you? How are the kids? Like generally I know about people's, I generally know about people's lives and it's very interesting. And also like clients too, like I'll get to know their personal lives because we're all living in this space. We're humans, we're not just working all the time. have people.

Like she's not doing it now, but my mom often makes an appearance in the podcast. I'll tell her I'm recording and she walks by anyways. It's just like, it's just life. It's just life. It's very authentic. All right. So, so far we've talked about, we talked about building a strong personal brand, leveraging transferable skills and networking with intention. All right.

So have two more I wanna discuss. So the next one is telling my story with confidence. So one of the things that I like to do when I tell my story, it's a long story. There's a lot of different pieces to it, but I like to tell it with brevity because if I'm in an interview or if I'm in a conversation with somebody, I can tell you more details as you ask questions. But I wanna share how my...

personal career has aligned with what I'm doing in learning and development and or marketing now. So how are the things like my passion for learning and helping people stems from the fact that I was labeled as a slow learner when I was in elementary school? Uh-uh, not true, not true. I carried that with me for a very, very long time. So.

Holly Owens (27:02.144)
A lot of that passion has come from helping others who have felt the same way or dealt with some of those stigmatisms of being labeled a slow learner. So that's why I love developing these learning experiences that are applicable to everyone, that are accessible to everyone. And I would say too, it's important that you are a human and that you tell about your story. Like in the background of my life and not many of you, I don't share very often the personal stuff on the podcast.

There's a lot of trauma. There's a lot of death in my life and unexpected deaths, including suicide that I've dealt with throughout my career that has impacted me as a professional. And I do bring those things up when I talk to people and feel comfortable with people and open up to that. So that makes me more authentic. We are not robots. We do not operate in this machine every day. We have experiences.

You know, people have, there's good things that have happened to us that impact who we are. There's bad things that have happened to us that impact who we are as humans, and we're always shifting and changing. So also too, through that, can teach people like how I've dealt with grief. So again, it aligns with some of the things that I do. And in the interview process, telling those stories.

about things that you've done or conflicts you've ever come or things that have been difficult for you or celebrating your successes. So it's important that you tell your story with confidence. One of the things you might have to do is you might have to write it down first and then figure out the pieces you wanna share in brevity and then maybe some things that align with those transferable skills or things that you might share in an interview.

You know, you're gonna wanna make a lasting impression. And I feel like I can tell when people are faking it. I can tell when people are just saying what I wanna hear. They're using all the buzzwords around learning and development, things like, you know, backward design, accessibility, and they really can't speak to what those things are. They're kinda just using it because they think it's gonna give them an in. We can tell, I can tell. I don't know about other people, but I can tell.

Holly Owens (29:20.12)
So make sure you know what you're gonna say. the part of that is knowing and then telling that story with confidence and connecting it to your journey, your values and your goals and connecting it with the mission of the organizations or companies you're applying to. It sounds like it's difficult, but it's really not. We're here to help others as far as I'm concerned. So in learning and development, we get the opportunity to do that every single day, no matter what.

what small tasks we're doing from the larger task and the larger project, we're here to help people. So it's important that you're able to tell your story with confidence. And I wanna put a little side note and a little announcement. I guess, this is a little message to transitioning teachers because I've worked with so many. I don't want you to leave out your teaching experience. That is not.

what you need to do. You've probably experienced some trauma in your teaching experience. You can't leave that part out. It's important to your development. It's important to who you are as a human. So please don't leave that out. Please honor that experience. I know I worked with a certain client. She was working with a professional coach that told her to completely leave out everything teaching. I'm like, why? Why is that a thing? No, do not leave out your teaching experience.

Please honor that and what you've done because educators, this world doesn't continue without them. We wouldn't be where we are today without teachers.

All right, so we've gone through four, building a strong personal brand. I'm looking at my notes here so I can remember. Leveraging transferable skills, networking with intention and authenticity, telling your story with confidence. And then the last one is crafting like an application strategy. So after you figure out where you wanna be, after you figure out like who you are and why you're going into learning and development, you're gonna start tailoring

Holly Owens (31:22.19)
those documents and those resources to roles in learning and development. And one of the things I tell people, like, I spend, they say, I spend all day a job applying. Well, that's gonna cause you to get burned out and very rapidly. You're gonna get tired of that after three days. You're gonna be like, I've applied to, and I've heard all these sentences, 200 roles, 300 roles, and I haven't got one job interview. You know why?

because you're not applying strategically. You don't have a strategy. You're just applying to different things. You're throwing the noodle to the wall and you're hoping it sticks, but if it falls off, it's not ready yet. So that's a little cooking analogy. I'm not a very good cooker, but I mean, it's important for you to think about like where you're gonna apply. So if you wanna be in corporate instructional design, you're gonna focus on the corporate space. And then you gotta figure out like what industry you wanna be in in corporate.

Is it healthcare? Is it real estate? it, you know, is it retail? Is it a restaurant? it like, you know, hospitality? There's a whole bunch of different industries in the corporate space. So you have to really think about where you're going to apply and how that all relates to your strategy. I say 20 minutes a day is enough, is enough. You can apply to a lot of different roles in 20 minutes a day, especially when you have all your stuff.

And another little side note here, your resume and all your stuff, your portfolio, if you wait until it's perfect, if you're like perfect, perfection is a state of mind and it's not, it's a hallucination as far as I'm concerned. It's an illusion. So you need to make sure that you're not waiting until things are perfect. You're applying anyways. If you have 60 to 70 %

of the skills that are listed in the job description, apply. You don't know what they're looking for. Honestly, you do know what they're looking for. They're looking for the unicorn, and I've said this in the past. They're not gonna find the unicorn. They may need someone like you who's able to learn and grow and develop with them as their organization is evolving. 60 to 70 % apply. Do not sell yourself short.

Holly Owens (33:46.976)
All right, so also to like crafting this strategy, you can also say like how you're gonna prep for interviews, you're gonna do mock interviews or you need to research the company, you need to align your values with their values and what you're looking to get in there. So this is more specific to when you're actually applying to a company. I would say some of the best resources and I post about this on LinkedIn often and repeat this content.

Teal, DeFano and his team have created something so amazing that I wish I would have thought of it myself. Teal has job tracking for free. It helps you develop your resume for free. They have articles out. They have a specific article out about transitioning teachers. Teal is where I tracked all my stuff recently when I was leaving Amazon. I tracked everything that I did from the time I applied to the role.

to the time I got rejected, I'll say, to the time I was interviewing, to the time I was landing the role or salary negotiating, and it's free. They have some paid for things that are very affordable as well, and I'll put the link in the chat to those. I'm not getting any money for that. I just love that stuff so much, I wanna share it. So Teal, Team for Learning.

Ashley Lennoni has completely revolutionized some of the putting your stuff into her portfolio and sharing it out with her audience. Free has a job board. You put your resume in there, you're like, I'm available to work and this is what I'm looking for. And then people are, you can see how many people have viewed it. And then finally, one of my favorites, all time favorite job boards and advice and.

Chelsea Averitt has done an amazing job. She goes through, and I know she goes through, because I can see the work that she does. She goes through over 400 job boards a week, and she posts roles from those job boards, and she checks them to make sure they're still available. They're 60K or more. Most are remote. Some are work from home. She tells you if it's like,

Holly Owens (36:07.584)
in early career, if it's like you need relevant skills or it's something where you need to be like you're more mid to senior. She tells you about the location, how much pay there is. It's unbelievable how much work she puts into this and offers most of it for free. Again, she has some paid for stuff and I'll put a link in the chat to that. It's very affordable if you're in the industry and it's not just learning and development. It's like all whole bunch of stuff.

I've seen product manager on that list, technical writer, sales account representative. I mean, there's a variety of different stuff out there. And like she offers most of it for free. So you got Teal, you got Team for Learning, you got Skip. So I encourage you to go into the show notes and click on those links and explore those opportunities. These are really going to help you target and craft this application strategy. Like you're gonna feel more organized.

Spreadsheets are a thing of the past. If you wanna use spreadsheet, fine. But I feel like Teal does it all for you and I don't even have to think about it. It's literally, I saved the job from LinkedIn or Indeed or wherever I'm at. It's there, am I interviewing? Do I need to do follow up? And it even gives you already written emails to follow up with. You can just kind of shift it and change it to your voice. It's there and it's for free. All right, so.

Let's recap, building, in order for you to get into a role, and there's five things that I've done. I've done all of these things. Five things that I've done and five strategies you can implement right now. Building a strong personal brand. It's not gonna happen overnight. It's not gonna happen overnight. It's gonna take some time. Leveraging your transferable skills.

What have you done in previous roles that are transferable to the next role that you want to have? Networking with intention and authenticity. Telling your story, your story is important, with confidence. Crafting a targeted application strategy. It's so important that you remember that you are a human and that this job market is competitive and that you're going to face rejection.

Holly Owens (38:32.558)
But that's okay, because that wasn't a role that was meant for you. And one thing I tell people too is when you're interviewing with these companies, you're interviewing them just as much as they're interviewing you. They don't have all the power, you do. You get to decide if you want to work there. Does that align with your values? Is it a good cultural fit? So please, please, do not, do not put all...

your hopes and thinking that they have all the power because they don't.

Holly Owens (39:09.814)
All too often we jump into these interviews nervous as hell and we don't think we have power. We do. I would love for you when I post this episode out on LinkedIn world to share your own personal experiences about career transition. And coming up, I'm going to do some Q and a podcast as well. So again, this is your journey and you are in control.

of what you need to do in order to successfully transition to a role in learning and development. I would love for you to follow my podcast. I would love to connect out on LinkedIn World. And please share this episode with anybody else that you would think would find this helpful. I hope that you found it helpful and that you're able to take some of these strategies, even if you're only implementing one or two at this time and start working on those.

You know, who knows, you may get a role and then you're like, you know, I don't necessarily need to have an application strategy, but then you're working on your personal brand still because you don't want that to fall to the wayside because now you're learning new stuff. So please remember that this journey is yours and that you got this. You got this. We all started somewhere. We all started somewhere. All right, everyone, thanks for listening and I'll see you next time.