477: What Learning Business Leaders Need to Stop Doing

Learning businesses are operating in an environment that feels more demanding, more uncertain, and harder to parse than ever. It’s natural to rely on familiar instincts—gather more data, add new offerings, work harder. But those instincts are sometimes counterproductive.In this episode of the Leading Learning Podcast, co-hosts Celisa Steele and Jeff Cobb explore what learning business leaders may need to stop doing. Against the backdrop of BANI, they examine common habits—like optimizing for efficiency and pursuing certainty—that can increase fragility and limit impact. They also offer a set of reflective questions to help leaders make more intentional decisions and create space for resilience, more nuanced judgment, and meaningful progress towards the most important goals.Show notes and a downloadable transcript are available at https://www.leadinglearning.com/episode477.

Many learning businesses struggle with decisions about what to create, improve, and retire. With input coming from committees, volunteers, subject matter experts, and staff across the organization, it’s easy for the learning portfolio to become fragmented, duplicative, and difficult to manage in a coherent, sane way.In this episode of the Leading Learning Podcast, co-hosts Celisa Steele and Jeff Cobb explore what happens when responsibility for the learning portfolio is too dispersed and why that’s a business problem, not just an organizational nuisance. They discuss the difference between input and decision rights, outline the four steps in portfolio management, and share questions organizations can use to bring greater clarity—and sanity—to portfolio decision-making.Show notes and a downloadable transcript are available at https://leadinglearning.com/episode476.

Many associations struggle with pricing their education offerings. Should education be bundled into membership? Sold à la carte? Packaged as a subscription? And how can learning businesses set prices in a way that reflects the value they provide and supports financial sustainability?In this episode of the Leading Learning Podcast, co-host Jeff Cobb talks with Dr. Michael Carr-Tatonetti, founder and CEO of Pricing for Associations. They discuss value-based pricing, the growing use of bundling and subscription models, and why to test pricing before building products. The conversation also explores governance around pricing decisions and how associations can balance mission, market realities, and revenue when pricing education.Show notes and a downloadable transcript are available at https://www.leadinglearning.com/episode475.

In this episode of the Leading Learning Podcast, co-hosts Celisa Steele and Jeff Cobb wrap up their three-part look at reach, revenue, and impact by focusing on impact—often the least clearly defined and measured of the three pillars.Celisa and Jeff explore how impact looks different depending on whose perspective you consider—that of learners, employers, and the learning business itself—and why measuring impact doesn’t have to be perfect to be useful. When learning businesses treat impact data as strategic intelligence, it can inform key decisions about what to offer, what to improve, and what to retire.They also discuss how evidence of impact strengthens marketing, improves learning design, supports smarter portfolio decisions, and deepens business development conversations.When reach, revenue, and impact reinforce one another, learning businesses are better positioned not just to grow but to thrive.Show notes and a downloadable transcript are available at https://www.leadinglearning.com/episode474.

In this episode of the Leading Learning Podcast, co-hosts Celisa Steele and Jeff Cobb focus on revenue and why it—along with reach and impact—is fundamental to the success of any learning business.If you’re unsure which offerings are truly pulling their weight, whether you’re leaving money on the table, or how to decide what to keep, cut, or redesign, this conversation can help. Celisa and Jeff explore why clarity about net revenue on a product-by-product basis is essential—not just for financial health but for strategic focus. Revenue data can reveal which offerings the market genuinely values, where your reach is strongest, and where impact is most likely being felt.They also discuss how pricing, prioritization, and portfolio structure influence both performance and perception and why investing more intentionally in business development and relationship-building can unlock new growth opportunities.If you want greater confidence in your revenue decisions and a clearer path to strengthening your learning portfolio, this episode offers practical strategic insight.Show notes and a downloadable transcript are available at https://www.leadinglearning.com/episode473.

Reach, revenue, and impact are familiar concepts to long-time listeners of the Leading Learning Podcast. But they’re often treated as separate challenges. In this episode, co-hosts Celisa Steele and Jeff Cobb revisit these three pillars and explore why they need to be approached as a connected system rather than isolated priorities.Drawing on recent research, client experience, and conversations with learning leaders, Celisa and Jeff discuss why earning attention has become harder, why revenue pressures are intensifying, and why impact remains difficult for many organizations to measure and articulate. They examine common missteps and highlight how clearer portfolio decisions, better use of data, and stronger business development practices can help learning businesses move forward.If you’re thinking about how to grow reach, sustain revenue, and demonstrate meaningful impact—without treating them as competing goals—this episode offers a strategic lens.Show notes and a downloadable transcript are available at https://www.leadinglearning.com/episode472.

Most learning businesses are rich in content, but far fewer are intentional about which pieces of content sparks collective learning?In this episode, Leading Learning Podcast co-hosts Jeff Cobb and Celisa Steele explore the concept of social learning objects: shared artifacts that anchor attention, create common language, and turn individual consumption into collective learning. Social learning objects can take many forms—frameworks, visuals, podcasts, standards, events—but what matters is that they’re generative rather than inert.Jeff and Celisa discuss what makes a social learning object effective, why simplicity beats complexity, and how questions, visuals, and intentional design can dramatically increase learning impact. They also consider what social learning objects make possible for groups, communities, and learning businesses operating in increasingly uncertain environments.Show notes and a downloadable transcript are available at https://www.leadinglearning.com/episode471.

Many learning businesses know they need to innovate, but moving faster and experimenting can run headlong into culture and the fear of being wrong. This episode of the Leading Learning Podcast looks at why that happens and what to do about it.Elizabeth Engel and Jamie Notter, co-authors of the white paper “Lean at Ten: Culture Eats Methodology for Lunch,” join co-host Celisa Steele to discuss the core elements of lean startup, the cultural patterns that can undermine using the methodology, and how pairing lean startup with design thinking can help organizations build empathy, surface assumptions, and learn more effectively.Show notes and a downloadable transcript are available at https://www.leadinglearning.com/episode470.

Strategy is about making choices—where to focus, what to invest in, and what to stop doing. Data can help bring clarity to those decisions, especially in a complex and competitive environment.In this episode, Leading Learning Podcast co-hosts Celisa Steele and Jeff Cobb share insights from a survey of learning businesses to help you think about strategy in 2026. They explore top strategic goals and drivers, key trends and challenges shaping learning businesses, and three themes that emerge from the data: the tension between mission and margin, alignment with credibility and areas of authority, and a growing confidence gap around achieving both strategic goals and revenue expectations.Show notes and a downloadable transcript are available at https://www.leadinglearning.com/episode469.

Mindset shapes how adults approach learning, challenge, and change—and it has important implications for learning businesses. In this episode of the Leading Learning Podcast, number 468, co-hosts Celisa Steele and Jeff Cobb explore Mindset, the influential book by psychologist Carol Dweck, and the broader concept of mindset.They unpack the distinction between fixed and growth mindsets; examine how mindset affects learners, leaders, and organizations; and discuss practical ways learning businesses can foster conditions that support resilience, effort, and meaningful learning.Show notes and a downloadable transcript are available at https://www.leadinglearning.com/episode468.