Inclusive Subject Matter Expert Selection
Whose voices shape learning?
The experts we choose to inform our learning design don't just provide content—they fundamentally shape whose perspectives, experiences, and ways of knowing get centered in the learning experience. When our subject matter expert pool lacks diversity, we inadvertently create learning that reflects only some learners' realities while marginalizing others.
Inclusive SME selection goes beyond finding people with technical expertise. It means intentionally seeking voices that represent the demographic, cultural, experiential, and professional diversity of our learner population. It means recognizing that expertise comes in many forms—not just formal credentials, but lived experience, community knowledge, and diverse professional pathways.
This approach isn't about tokenism or checking boxes. It's about understanding that different backgrounds bring different insights, blind spots, and solutions to the same challenges. When a learning experience is informed by diverse expert voices, it becomes more relevant, more comprehensive, and more effective for all learners.
The questions we must ask are: Who is at the table when we're designing learning? Whose experiences are being centered? Whose knowledge is being validated? And critically—whose voices are missing?
By democratizing expertise and expanding our definition of who counts as a subject matter expert, we create learning experiences that truly serve the full spectrum of our learners. Because when everyone sees themselves reflected in the expertise that shapes their learning, engagement and outcomes improve for all.
These are guidelines for selecting learners to participate in a pilot, advisory group, project team as a SME, or focus group for a learning project, program, or initiative.
Based on a Harris Poll for Instructure, one of the major reasons employees leave their job is because of a lack of employee development. A new survey found that, second only to compensation (46%), over one third (34%) of employees quit their jobs because of a lack of career development opportunities and that “Three in four people (77%) reported that they feel like they are on their own to determine their career development.”
In a report on The Impact of Equality and Values-Driven Business by Salesforce Research, companies (and by extension, teams) that actively work to make their cultures more inclusive have strong customer loyalty and experience a “boost in both employee engagement and productivity.”
Here are some statistics that illustrate this point:
Employees who feel their voice is heard at work are nearly five-times (4.6X) more likely to feel empowered to perform their best work.
Employees who say their company provides equal opportunities are nearly four times (3.8X) more likely to say they are proud to work for their company.
With all that in mind, how can we, as learning professionals, encourage and facilitate more inclusion and diversity whenever possible? Let’s take a moment to find out.
One challenge that we find is that it is not uncommon to reach out to the same group of employees to present or teach concepts or provide feedback or SME advice on Readiness projects. Whether out of convenience or uncertainty about the capabilities of others to step in and offer their experience, we are missing a big opportunity. One potential pitfall is the overuse of one pool of our “experts”. When you continue to utilize the same individuals, you risk overworking those who provide the most support. A byproduct of that decision presents another challenge in that you are not giving others, who may also have interest in this topic or would be provided a development opportunity, a chance to contribute by participating and offering their own expertise, energy, and differing perspectives.
As Learning Experience Designers, part of our responsibility is to help facilitate growth and development with your team members. So, to increase opportunities in career development and reach out to more individuals within our organization, here are some parameters to look for when you are working to help more of our employees step into potential career growth opportunities. When nominating folks to step in to more of leadership roles, please consider the following guidelines:
Who’s looking for personal development opportunities?
First and foremost, there are likely people on your team that are ready to take on new responsibilities and that should be encouraged. Is there anyone on your team that is actively looking to step into personal development opportunities? Have they reached out to you and expressed interest? This is a group of people you can certainly leverage and help take on more responsibilities.
Is there proportional representation by regions?
When you consider your current pool of SME’s and people resources, are they all consolidated in one region? Is there someone from other time zones or even countries that could be afforded an opportunity to contribute and support your project or initiative? Cultural differences that often accompany different regions of the country and world can play a significant role in helping to customize and adapt your project, program, or initiative to support global representation. No matter your answer to the above question, there is no time like the present to start creating your own group of people resources and SME’s in every region.
Do we have balanced gender representation?
Different perspectives, enhanced collaboration, improved staff retention and greater profitability are just a handful of the benefits of gender diversity in the workplace. Look for opportunities to include different genders when building your people resources on a given project or program. Especially, if you find that your team is heavy with a specific gender.
Do we have ethnic and cultural representation?
Ethnic and cultural differences can play a significant role in the success of any organization and it is useful to keep an eye open for including people resources from diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds. According to analysis conducted by McKinsey in 2019 on the benefits of ethnic and cultural diversity found that when it came to corporate leadership “...the likelihood of outperformance continues to be higher for diversity in ethnicity than for gender.”