Managing Subject Matter Experts - How to Deal With Difficult SMEs

Subject matter experts (SMEs) provide the knowledge and expertise in a specific subject, business area, or technical area for a project/program and are an integral part of an instructional designer's work.

There are four critical areas that instructional designers should focus on when managing subject matter experts.

1. Set Expectations

It is the instructional designer’s job to take ownership of the content gathering process. You know what is needed and what it takes to get it done.

You need to clearly articulate to the SME what needs to be done to meet the goals of the eLearning project. At this point, you should discuss the steps involved and the amount of time needed of the SME for researching, reviewing, and providing feedback.

Prior to your initial meeting with the SME, it’s important that you request the course materials as early as possible. This includes a preliminary content outline and a list of high-level objectives. In addition, do some background research of your own to familiarize yourself with the content.

2. Create a Plan

You need to plan your content gathering efforts in detail, as well as for content reviews and approvals. The plan should be reviewed with the SME to get buy-in.

Be sure to highlight with your SME all of the tasks of the project plan, discuss scheduling and how the effects of other tasks can delay the entire project.

Identify with them their roles and responsibilities in addition to the time to arrange meetings. You need to discuss boundaries for your roles an instructional designer, what you will and won’t do, as well as the role of your SME as a content provider, reviewer, and/or approver.

Agreement needs to be made on the project plan, who the project stakeholders are, meeting arrangements, and on the expectations for your final deliverables. This information needs to be communicated to all team members, especially the SME.

3. Connect with the SME

It is the instructional designer’s job to ask the SME specific questions that only they can answer. Build a trusting relationship with them, using active listening, always communicating your appreciation for giving you their time on the project.

You should also help your SME feel more comfortable by considering their communication style. Some prefer answering questions via email, while others might do better answering questions over the phone or in person.

For some SMEs, you might want to consider using a script or structured approach; while others may work better without.

4. Focus on Your SME

You need to communicate with your SME through reflective listening and setting expectations thoughtfully, ensuring that both you and the SME stays on track.

An important role of an instructional designer is to synthesize new, and often foreign, information. You need to be able to depict raw information into well-organized and clearly articulated course content.

All of the content that you’ve collected from your SME should be collected into a document and sent to the SME so that they can review it for accuracy and completeness. This is also the time for you to ask any other follow-up questions or request any additional information.

Conclusion

At the end of the day, you and the SME both want the same thing: to help learners perform at the highest levels. Because people are people, this takes some negotiation and ground rules to meet those goals.