L&D Then and Now: What’s Stayed The Same

A training manual that once took 18 months to build now takes five minutes. That single fact captures how far learning and development have traveled since the early 1990s, when instructional designers created courses one acetate slide and one three-ring binder at a time. Back then, knowledge moved at the speed of a printing press and an overhead projector. Today it moves at the speed of an AI prompt. 

But speed is only half the story. For all the tools that have come and gone, the questions that defined great training three decades ago still shape it now. Does the learning actually stick? Can the person apply it on the job? Do individuals and organizations truly grow because of it? The technology has been reinvented many times over. The mission behind it has not moved an inch.

To find out what has changed in learning development (L&D) and what has stayed the same, SHRM sat down with practitioners who lived through the shift, and enterprise leaders building the next chapter to create a two-part series. In this first part, SHRM explores what stayed the same in L&D.

L&D Remains Durable

For all the visible transformation, the foundations of good learning have proven remarkably durable. Additionally, the function itself has grown over time. In 2025, 78% of organizations provided skills training resources.

This growth is, in part, due to CHROs increasingly focusing on skills development, particularly when it comes to AI. Over 8 in 10 CHROs (84%) anticipate upskilling for AI-specific skills to become more prevalent, according to SHRM’s 2026 CHRO Priorities and Perspectives report. 

Adult Learning Principles Endure

Adults still learn best through engaging, activity-based facilitation that respects the life and work experience they bring into the room. Lori Oviatt, a learning solution consultant, poses a grounding question from decades ago that remains just as sharp today: if you never observed the learner, how did you know your content had any impact? The tools for observation may have multiplied, but Oviatt’s broader point is that L&D still has to determine whether learning is actually taking hold.

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The Human Need for Connection

Empathy, active listening, and the ability to ask good questions remain central to the craft. Oviatt described the expectations she held for herself in a series of questions. “What can I do to make a difference in the lives of others who are coming to this training, who need to do their job well?” she said. “What did that mean to me? It meant I didn’t need to know their job, I needed to know how to ask really good questions and I need to listen well.”

Outside the classroom, Chris Wortmann, director of global talent management at Carnival Corporation, stressed that long-term buy-in depends heavily on middle managers understanding their role in developing employees. “L&D no longer owns your development. We are responsible for helping enable it,” Wortmann said. Technology may advance the — between facilitators and learners and learners and their managers.

The Core Mission Holds

As Oviatt framed it, learning and development continues to exist to help people do their jobs more effectively and efficiently. That mission has outlasted every tool built to serve it. 

Learners themselves have maintained many of the same motivations for learning — personal growth, career enhancement, and discovering new opportunities. However, there is a language around learning that is different for organizations and people. Employees don't talk about skills the way the industry does. "Employees do not talk about skills naturally," said Matthew Daniel, senior talent strategy and mobility principal at Guild, an education benefits company based in Denver.. "They talk about career, growth, and opportunity." They finish programs when they see a clear path forward. Coaching, peer-to-peer learning, and genuine executive sponsorship still carry the weight they always did. 

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What’s Next for L&D

The central purpose of L&D remains remarkably consistent: to help people grow, perform, and adapt in ways that strengthen both their careers and their organizations.

That tension between transformation and continuity defines the state of L&D today. The tools are smarter, the expectations are higher, and the pressure to close skills gaps has never been greater. But the fundamentals still matter most — relevant content, meaningful practice, thoughtful measurement, and human connection. 

In the next part of this series, SHRM will examine what leaders must do now to build L&D programs that meet the demands of a changing workforce while staying grounded in the principles that have always made learning effective.