Pearson
Lead Specialist, Learning and Development
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Lead Specialist, Learning & Development
This role aligns to the following industry titles - Learning Science Lead, Learning Strategy Lead, Director-level Learning & Development, AI Learning Lead.
Purpose of the Role
Pearson is the world's leading learning company. How we develop our own people must reflect that identity. Learning and Development sits in one of the most disruptive and most exciting spaces in the era of AI, where pedagogy, learning science, and adaptive technology are converging to reshape how humans build capability.
The Lead Specialist, Learning & Development is an emerging expert in learning science and experience design who translates that expertise into practical, AI-enabled development experiences for Pearson's workforce. They apply what Pearson knows about how people learn and how we evidence that learning to help our people progress, grow, and build meaningful careers, and to demonstrate the very approaches Pearson takes to market.
This role is designed for someone who is building depth as a learning science practitioner and is ready to lead defined enterprise initiatives with autonomy and technical credibility, but who is not yet operating at the strategic breadth or the enterprise leadership scope of a (Head of L&D).
Position Summary
The Lead Specialist, Learning & Development contributes specialized learning science and pedagogy expertise to enterprise Talent Development initiatives that build critical workforce capabilities. Working under the direction of the Head of Learning & Development, they design and deliver learning solutions that embed capability building into work, tools, and workflows with a particular focus on Pearson’s Power Skills (Adaptability, Learning to Learn, AI fluency) enabling career growth and progression.
They are grounded in evidence-based learning science, Pearson's differentiator, and are highly adaptive to new mechanisms and systems for learning: modern learning technologies, adaptive platforms, agentic AI, skill signalling, verification, and credentialing (Credly), and the integration of AI into learning design and the evaluation of skills. Their work is integrated into Pearson's Career Navigation System, helping people successfully navigate their careers at Pearson, underpinned by our Career Architecture. They work to bring the D.E.E.P Learning Framework (Diagnose, Embed, Evaluate, Prioritize) into the career experience, ensuring individuals can see where they are today, where they can go, and what to do next.
Success requires strong learning-design judgement, credibility with stakeholders across HR, Product Managers, and Engineering, and the business, and the ability to translate emerging priorities into practical, measurable, adopted methodologies. They help test and evaluate emerging Pearson products and technologies in real-world use, shaping development and generating evidence for broader enterprise adoption.
The Direction of Travel for L&D Professionals at Pearson
This role has been shaped by the four shifts defining the future of Talent Development at Pearson. The Lead Specialist is expected to design and deliver in ways that actively advance each of them:
- From participation to verified proficiency. We are moving beyond activity metrics and self-declared skill proficiencies to evidencing capability through application in role, skill verification, and credentialing (e.g., Credly).
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From learning alongside work to capability embedded in agentic ways of working. Engineering capability into workflows, agents, and decisions.
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From uneven manager quality to manager as multiplier. Equipping managers to role-model AI-fluent leadership, develop human skills, and enable growth conversations that fuel Career Navigation.
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From linear career paths to skills-powered navigation. Designing development paths that support career progression and growth.
Key Responsibilities
1. Learning Science, Pedagogy, and Design
- Serve as an emerging technical expert in learning science, learning design, and behavior change, applying evidence-based pedagogy to enterprise learning solutions.
- Design AI learning experiences that move learners from awareness building to applied skill proficiency in-the-flow-of-work.
- Continuously scan external research and practice; test and integrate new mechanisms and platforms for learning and development, keeping Pearson's own learning practice ahead of the market.
- Act as a technical advisor to peers, HRBPs, and business partners on learning design, quality standards, and appropriate use of modern learning technologies.
2. AI-Enabled Learning, Evaluation, and Verification
- Integrate AI including generative and agentic AI responsibly and ethically into learning design, content development, delivery, and evaluation.
- Contribute to how Pearson assesses capability internally: design and iterate skill-rating, skill-evaluation, and skill-verification approaches that provide trusted signals of proficiency.
- Partner with Product, Technology, and OCTO teams to co-design and stress-test Pearson products (e.g., Credly Workforce, Skills Intelligence Engine, CARA, Learning Hub) as Customer 0.
- Translate emerging AI priorities into practical development solutions that build AI fluency and applied AI capability across the workforce.
3. Career Progression and Growth
- Bring the Career Architecture and our Career Navigation System to life for employees and managers, making career pathways clear, visible, and usable in practice, delivering on our commitment to building meaningful careers by connecting learning, skills, and opportunity in one navigable system.
- Embed learning into the flow of work through CARA (our career coach agent) or other new agents so our people can diagnose where they are, evaluate progress, embed learning, and prioritize action (D.E.E.P Learning Framework).
- Design targeted development for cohorts of common roles or job categories to enable progression, productivity, and open more career pathways.
4. Enterprise Capability Building
- Embed capability building into priority work, tools, and workflows to deliver business impact rather than standalone programs.
- Apply behavior-change principles to drive sustained adoption and performance improvement.
5. Impact, Adoption, and Evidence
- Apply Pearson's skills evaluation and verification approach to measure capability growth, behavior change, and business outcomes not just activity or satisfaction.
- Use data and insight to continuously improve initiatives and strengthen enterprise talent intelligence.
- Develop case studies and proof points demonstrating internal adoption and business impact, including externally relevant examples that support Pearson's commercial narrative and product credibility.
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6. Stakeholder Partnership and Delivery
- Partner with HR, business leaders, Product teams to shape and prioritize enterprise capability needs.
- Act as a trusted advisor within their scope, challenging and guiding stakeholders on where to focus to build the capabilities that matter most.
- Drive delivery through complexity, maintaining momentum, and translating ideas into practical, adopted outcomes.
Qualifications
Experience
- Proven applied experience designing and scaling learning and capability-building solutions in complex, matrixed organizations with visible impact on behavior and business outcomes.
- Demonstrable grounding in learning science, pedagogy, and behavior change, and the ability to translate research into practice.
- Experience embedding AI and modern digital learning tools into design, delivery, assessment, and evaluation, moving learners from awareness to applied capability in role.
- Experience of career development, career pathing, credentialing, and internal mobility, with a working understanding of how skills data supports talent decisions.
- Experience partnering across HR, business, Product, and Technology teams; comfortable navigating ambiguity to deliver adopted, measurable outcomes.
- Emerging thought partner in the L&D community, engaged with external research, market practice, and Pearson's own product portfolio.
Skills
Critical Job Family and Role-Based Skills
- Learning and Development / Pedagogy - applies learning science to achieve behavior change and performance.
- Instructional and Experience Design - designs adaptive, in-flow-of-work, and AI-enabled learning experiences.
- Digital Learning Technology - evaluates and applies modern learning platforms, agentic AI, and adaptive systems.
- Program Evaluation and Skill Verification - evidences impact through Pearson's skill-evaluation and verification approach.
- Analytical Skills - uses data to evidence behavior change and business impact.
- Business Acumen - aligns capability priorities to enterprise strategy.
- Stakeholder Management - partners credibly with HR, business, Product Managers, and Engineering stakeholders.
- Problem Solving - turns emerging strategy into practical, adopted, customer-centric solutions.
Attributes
- Emerging expert energy with deep curiosity about how people learn and how AI is reshaping learning, with a bias to test and evidence.
- Strong judgement; prioritizes effectively in a complex, evolving environment.
- Pragmatic and solution-oriented; operates across strategy and delivery, shaping direction while driving tangible progress.
- Defines and advances new areas of work in a rapidly evolving context, comfortable where the path is not yet fully drawn.
- Partners with Product and Technology teams, recognizing Pearson's dual position as both a consumer and a creator of learning and skills products.
- Lives Pearson's culture - customer-centric, raises the performance bar, collaborates exceptionally, inspires as a leader through expertise.
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