Learning and Development: a guide for teachers
By Devin Lewis, Founder of NextGround
- Trains employees
- Runs programs
- Designs learning
- Measures impact
You might like this if
- Teaching adults is your favorite part
- You want corporate pace and pay
- You like building programs from scratch
What the job is
L&D professionals train a company's employees, from onboarding new hires to building leadership programs.
A day in the role
Interviewing a sales manager about what her team struggles with, building a training around it, leading a live session, and checking whether performance changed.
Teaching skills that translate
Needs assessment is what you do at the start of every unit, and facilitation, feedback, and measuring growth are skills you use daily.
How teachers get there
The Bureau of Labor Statistics lists teaching as related work experience for this field, and says some employers accept a master's degree in place of experience. Translate one unit you taught into an adult training sample.
Pay and outlook
Occupation: Training and development specialists
- Median pay
- $69,280 ($82,110 in professional and technical services); training and development managers earn a $133,000 median
- Projected growth
- 11% through 2035, much faster than average, about 46,000 openings a year
View the source. Data as of May 2025 wages, 2025 to 2035 projections, Bureau of Labor Statistics.
NextGround can help you prepare for
Prepare with a NextGround cohort
The Instructional Design path helps you practice the work and build evidence for this role. Cohorts are planned for early 2027.
See the Instructional Design path