Introduction

The angel of death. Beautiful, isn’t it? A perfect sphere radiating from some kind of inner light, punctuated by trumpet-shaped protrusions that might be arms, sensor probes, ornaments, or even the eyes of a strange new insect or alien being. Is it a disco ball discovered in your granny’s basement, an exotic planet in a distant galaxy, or an artificial neuron whipped up in a lab? It could be a Christmas ornament, or even a Christmas angel, sparkling with the message of hope and dazzling in its brilliance.

But it’s none of these things. It’s the well-known image of the novel coronavirus.

As I write this, the world is deep into the pandemic of 2019–2020, fighting a new and highly contagious virus that delivers the multispectrum disease we call COVID-19. Although many people who contract the virus suffer only mild symptoms, others become violently ill, and sadly, some of those people die. In the absence of a cure, a vaccine, or even reliable treatments, our only weapon at the moment is behavior change. We are teaching people to follow sanitation and containment protocols that are clumsy and inconvenient. We’re changing the way we work and buy simple things, like groceries and fast food. Schools closed almost overnight, leaving much of the burden of keeping their kids entertained and educated on the shoulders of parents, who were adjusting to working from home and learning how to homeschool their children at the same time. Traditional “brick and mortar” colleges and universities quickly converted to online education. Airline travel, restaurants, grocery stores, department stores, movie theaters, swimming pools, rock concerts, shopping malls—all part of our modern experience—have been shut down or severely curtailed.

This crisis is making many of us rethink our priorities as we draw the circles of our lives ever inward, making our physical world as small as possible in the hope of keeping ourselves and our loved ones safe. At the same time, Internet usage has exploded, as we turn outward to a digital world to educate and entertain ourselves, staying connected with friends and family we can no longer reach out and touch in the physical world, at least for now.

The scope and urgency of this crisis is putting the learning profession in the spotlight. This isn’t the first time we’ve been asked to respond to a global crisis, and it certainly won’t be the last. The most recent event prior to the current pandemic started before I was born and lasted through my childhood.

The Race for Space: A Lesson in Magnificent Desolation

In 1957, the Soviet Union successfully launched the first man-made satellite into orbit around Earth, creating what was believed to be an existential crisis in the “free world.” The United States and other countries in the West perceived this achievement by a communist nation as an imminent threat. If we were unable to answer this threat, the logic went, we might one day be wiped out by weapons from space. A crisis is an excellent mechanism for focusing public attention and gaining federal funding to solve a problem.

In 1961, when President John F. Kennedy said, “We choose to go to the moon,” many people thought he was crazy. From a strictly logical perspective, we had absolutely no business putting three human beings in a tin can, strapping them onto a partially controlled bomb, and launching them into the seemingly endless and deadly abyss of space, 239,000 miles from home. Maybe it was the inspiring vision of a dynamic and persuasive leader, maybe it was the general paranoia brought on by the Cold War with Russia, or maybe it was just our natural human arrogance, but something inside our collective consciousness said, “Why not? Let’s go for it.”

Eight years, $49.4 billion (that’s $490 billion in today’s dollars), and three lost lives later, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first humans to step onto the moon, while Michael Collins kept the lights burning on the Command and Service Module.

As he bounced along the surface, Aldrin described the lunar landscape as “beautiful, beautiful, magnificent desolation.” Magnificent, as he pondered the sheer power of the engineering feat and the labor of more than 100,000 people to land him on this cold rock. Desolate because there was no sign of life as far as he could see.

Kennedy had set the goal of completing this mission by the end of the decade. Perhaps the most remarkable fact of this achievement is that they also came back safely, four days later. During the “race to the moon,” education was highly valued in Western society. Americans invested in schools and emphasized courses in science and math. Discoveries that helped us land on the moon also gave us major advances in medicine, telecommunications, information technology, electronics, navigation, medicine, food preservation, and many other practical fields. The number-one goal of nearly every kid was to grow up to become an astronaut.

At the time, most people expected the moon landing to be the first of many advances in science and technology to follow, all led by the United States, the recognized leader in science, technology, healthcare, and overall standard of living at the time. But the moon shot didn’t belong just to the people of the United States. It was watched live all over the world, and inspired many to envision a new era of prosperity and hope, all powered by the advancement of education and science.

But it didn’t happen quite that way. Sadly, we have been living in a period of magnificent desolation for some time now. In an era of unprecedented technology, the human race is more ignorant of science than ever. Many college students are less capable of putting together a coherent sentence than their less-educated parents, and many people believe that science is something you can choose to “believe in” or not.

That is why I wrote this book.

Today, nearly every scientist in the world has turned to focus on conquering the coronavirus. One of the most important tools we have in a race against the angel of death is artificial intelligence (AI). As a matter of fact, the Blue Dot algorithm first alerted the world to a new and potentially deadly virus that had “jumped” from animals to humans. The Blue Dot algorithm searches airline travel and news reports to uncover emerging trends that signal the spread of related diseases (Niiler 2020). So AI was part of the story from the beginning.

As it became clear that this was no ordinary virus, but a dangerous pandemic, neuroscientists who had been using machine learning to map the complexities of the human brain began using it to sift through oceans of data to find a cure or a vaccine. Recognizing patterns, confirming or disproving hypotheses, predicting trends, and poring over decades of research are all tasks that machine learning is well suited to perform—and AI can do it faster and much more accurately than an army of humans. Although it is my fervent hope that these smart people and their algorithms will help us find a way out of the current health crisis, it is also very likely that we will make major discoveries that have immediate, practical applications in other fields along the way. The same programs that are analyzing medical data today might be identifying training gaps in a major organization tomorrow. The young people who are choosing careers in AI to fight the virus will remain in their profession once the imminent danger has passed, and they will be smarter and more confident in their ability to apply AI to solve the biggest problems of their world.

In this book, we’ll talk about how AI is transforming the way we learn, such as personalizing learning experiences based on individual student interests and progress, assessing organizational needs based on financial forecasts, and even delivering education directly to students in the place of a teacher. These applications exist today, and they can only be accelerated by the work being done on COVID-19. Eventually, we will find the solution to COVID-19, and when that happens, we all will know a lot more about artificial intelligence, big data, and the power of science.

I believe that the learning profession—the teachers, trainers, and educators of the world—has taken a central position during the pandemic that will continue long after the initial danger has subsided. It will be up to us to continue to demonstrate our value. We can do this by being on the leading edge of emergent technology, rather than by simply following and reacting to requests from our stakeholders. One of our most compelling opportunities to lead will be in the implementation of artificial intelligence, which is getting a huge boost of attention and investment in response to the desperate need for answers that we humans are painfully slow in developing on our own.

I am absolutely certain that we will all be changed by the experience of surviving the pandemic. Despite our whimsical and understandable desire to turn back the clock, there will be no “going back to normal.” Once the initial threat has passed, there will be a new normal that has actually been creeping up on us for a long time.

As with any revolution, the AI transformation didn’t just happen overnight. Back in 2016, just a few short years and a lifetime ago, I was one of the first learning-science writers to point out that the fields of neuroscience and AI were converging. I wasn’t looking for it. I was happily running my consulting business, helping schools and corporate training departments apply cognitive science, when I wrote a blog post about intelligence. The more I researched the neuroscience evidence for a new understanding of human intelligence, the more I kept bumping into discoveries and models based on artificial intelligence. I posited that it was impossible to talk about one without the other, and noted that the two disciplines were engaged in a virtuous cycle that was propelling both disciplines forward, leveraging advances from each other to make great leaps in understanding all kinds of intelligence—whether carbon or silicon based. At the time, I was surprised and encouraged by the response from neuroscientists and psychology professors. I knew that thousands of trainers, training managers, and university professors read my blog, but I never thought to get the attention of the scientific community.

I realized that I was onto something important; it had become impossible to be an expert in adult learning without also being an expert in machine learning. That insight has changed how I view myself, my clients, and the work I’ve been called to do.

My Story, My Calling

My good friend John was the best man at my wedding, more than 30 years ago. After completing his education and becoming a certified pharmacist, he went back to school to become an MD. As every doctor will probably tell you, advising your friends and family on matters of health goes with the territory. One day I was apologizing to John for taking up his time with a question like this when he said something powerful to me: “Margie, don’t ever apologize for asking me to be a doctor. This is what I do. This is my calling.”

It’s funny how we arrive at our calling in life, isn’t it? When I met John we were both still in school, and he already “knew” he wanted to be a pharmacist. He changed his path when he found his calling, his own personal way to bring value to the world. While some may have a clear sense of mission from an early age, I just wanted to get a job out of college. I was already married, and income was a pressing need. While I was still in school, I was trying out for a secretarial pool job when a recruiter heard my fingers flying over the keyboard during my typing test and rushed me across town to be trained to work on a word processor. Within a month I was working extra hours performing backups on huge floppy disks and automating little processes to make the work more efficient. After college, I took a job in sales for the summer, fully expecting to teach highschool English in the fall. I soon discovered that all those slick “techniques” my trainer taught me weren’t nearly as useful as my psychology and education classes. I simply sat down and started teaching my customers how the product would change their lives. After being the top salesperson in the region for five years in a row, I was invited to start a sales training program. At the time, it never occurred to me that I was putting my education training into practice. It was just a nice, new job. And when I took advantage of the company tuition assistance program to earn a master’s degree in adult education technology, I never thought I’d be writing about neuroscience and artificial intelligence 10 years later.

When I left my corporate training leader job to start my own consulting business, I didn’t realize that the same people who were my bosses would soon be hiring me as their newly minted learning consultant. And then, a few years into a successful consulting career, I wrote that blog post about intelligence. Then someone invited me to speak at a training conference, and another and another. After I wrote a book, more speaking opportunities followed. I designed a course, “Essentials of Brain-Based Learning,” for ATD and started talking about the AI-neuroscience connection in my webinars. One day, I was talking to a friend at ATD about an idea for a book, and he encouraged me to pursue it.

Today I’m showing companies how to use chatbots to deliver learning content and assess knowledge, how to deploy AI to build truly personalized coaching tools, and how to design any learning experience with the brain in mind, using models that come directly from machine learning experiments.

It may seem that I was just bouncing from job to job, and it certainly felt that way sometimes. But now I look back and see that I wasn’t taking random sideways steps; I was following a path—my path. A meandering, leisurely journey toward my realization that I have something unique to offer, and that gift is wrapped up in my ability to translate the complexities of science into practical changes we can make today to improve the way we live, love, and learn.

And then I wrote this book.

About This Book

AI in Talent Development was written for you—human resource managers, trainers, instructional designers, and talent development professionals—to share what I know about the benefits, uses, and risks of artificial intelligence technology in our field. I describe specific actions that can be implemented now to take advantage of innovations in AI-powered talent development and help prepare you and your organization for the evolving AI revolution.

Here is a description of the chapters.

Chapter 1: Wake Up and Smell the Coffee

In this chapter, I share some everyday applications of AI that you may not have even noticed, yet they are all around you. We’ll explore a brief history of man’s endeavors to build a digital version of himself and clarify a few terms that I will use throughout the book.

Chapter 2: Reboot Yourself With a Robot

One of the most practical advantages of deploying AI is how it can make us all more productive, by automating repetitive tasks, streamlining processes, and helping us keep track of our busy days. Rebooting yourself might sound a bit frightening, but this chapter is really about simple, fun, and practical ways to ease into AI that will yield big benefits for very little effort.

Chapter 3: Have a Chat With a Machine

One of the most immediate use cases for the learning profession is deploying chatbots to help people learn. The applications range from using intelligent bots as simple user interfaces to deploying engaging, “lifelike” coaches and role-play partners.

Chapter 4: Make Your Learning Management System Smarter

For decades, the holy grail of education has been to deliver truly customized learning experiences, education, and training that are shaped by the needs of each individual. The irony of the explosion of big data is that the more we know about all the learners in our system, the more we can discover about each individual, and the more effectively we’ll be able to tailor our content to what each person needs, just when they need it.

Chapter 5: Do the Right Thing

This chapter is about the ethical considerations of deploying AI. Along with its many benefits, every new technology creates new risks, forcing us to recognize our responsibility to take care in how we deploy that technology. In the case of artificial intelligence, it can be hard to tell right from wrong, because so much is still unknown, and the consequences of our decisions don’t always appear until some time has passed. However, with great risk comes great reward. I believe that teachers, trainers, and others who are drawn to the learning profession have a responsibility to lead in this regard. We’ll talk about a few practical ways to do that in this chapter.

Chapter 6: Where Do We Go From Here?

As your guide through this book, I have a responsibility too. I can’t just dump a lot of information on you and tell you to go out there and make things happen. I promise in this last chapter to do my best to pull this all together and perhaps show you your own meandering path toward who you are becoming.

Appendix

In this section you will find an annotated list of recommended online and print resources, and fillable and printable templates, planners, and tools. There are also several ways to help you stay in touch. You’ll find links to my blog, podcast, social media accounts, and online courses. On my website, learningtogo.info, you’ll find links to all these resources, as well as a schedule of my speaking appearances, publications, and workshops.

Resource Page

Because the fields of AI and learning technology are so fluid, I’ve included a separate resource page online. This page will give you access to additional tools mentioned in the book, such as worksheets, reading lists, and templates. You’ll also have a chance to join in an ongoing discussion about the use of AI to advance learning.

Contact Me

If you have questions or comments on anything relating to the book, please get in touch so we can continue the conversation. I’ve put several suggestions for getting in touch in the Appendix and online Resource Guide. I hope this is the start of a lively discussion. I want to hear from you—the person reading this book right now.

As with all conversations, someone has to make the first move, so let’s get started.