The story of Jess, a Subject Matter Expert
Disclaimer: the following story is totally fictional (yet not totally unreasonable!)
Hey there! I’m Jess.
I’m the #1 performing data analyst at one of Australia’s top L&D tech companies. I’ve been working for the company for 10 years and know the business like the back of my hand.
I’ve been a math whiz as long as I can remember. I'm so into numbers that I’ve spent my whole life (and 60k in HECS debt) dedicating myself to learning all about the humble digit and its uses in life.
However lately, my passion has begun to overlap with one of the hottest terms of recent years…two short words that now make me wince at the sight of them.
Big. Data.
Creatives, sales, marketing and management alike have begun to get excited about reaping the benefits of using real evidence (sorry, guys) in their day-to-day roles. And for most, they need to learn about what data is, and how they can really take advantage of it.
So, here I am - unofficially pronounced the go-to gal for all things stats and number-intensive decision making.
Not that I don’t love the responsibility. I really do! There’s nothing I like seeing more than people getting a kick out of what most consider boring and totally un-creative before they’ve even looked at a spreadsheet and crunched a few numbers. I’m always more than willing to chat about my expertise with anyone willing to listen and eager to learn.
But since the company has grown massively, what was once fun becomes an interruption, a grinding chore, and has begun to seriously impact my productivity and my stress levels. Most of my day feels a little like this:
I just don’t have the time to answer every single support request from my colleagues and managers. The phrase “I don’t know, maybe you should ask Jess?” is probably uttered ten times a day (that I’m aware of!).
Why Jess is worth her weight in gold (bit)coins
Jess started her career at the company because of her ability to work with data. However, she quickly grew from an ‘entry-level business analyst’ into a key role in working with the company database and high-stakes decision making.
At least, that was what her job description said. More reflective of her actual role would have been ‘Solves problems for every business function whilst still managing to do her job’.
Her knowledge of the data the platform housed was second to none and soon more and more departments relied on her to pull custom reports and help with analysis, assist with client services, identify business opportunities and troubleshoot internal data related problems.
The knowledge that Jess holds includes valuable IP and company knowledge that, if she were to leave, would leave the company scrambling for answers that she may have been the sole keeper of.
Employees like Jess are super valuable for the L&D function. The learning team in any organisation is often tasked with creating training in areas they don’t know a great deal about. Being able to share knowledge with relevant subject matter experts can help L&D provide the most effective, factual and targeted training possible.
But as we’ve heard from Jess, being a subject matter expert certainly has its downfalls. So, how can managers best manage the wealth of knowledge of the company’s subject matter experts?
How to take the pressure off SMEs
Make helping others a specific part of their job
If Jess’ manager had acknowledged the time and effort she put into helping others succeed at her job, she may also have realised that going above and beyond meant doing 120% of her workload.
If teaching others about her area of expertise was a clear, documented part of her role, it would be easier to plan for anticipated time for that work to be done.
For example, if they’d acknowledge that 20% of Jess’ time is spent providing feedback to the writing team even though she’s an analyst, it’s going to help remind her team that she’s actually only got 80% of her time remaining for her actual job.
Formalising social learning by adding some structure to the process is a workaround for this issue. Creating a central repository or similar would reduce double-ups of questions people want to ask. This may have positive flow-on effects, too, by allowing other employees to share their knowledge and provide differing viewpoints!
Be clear about priorities
Jess a may provide huge value to the company by spending that 20% of her time helping out different teams, but if it leaves her team short of hands on its own important work, that’s an issue that needs to be dealt with quickly.
Do the other teams need to hire their own staff member to handle what Jess is helping them with? Maybe her team needs an extra member? Is it okay that her team will get less done because Jess is providing that help?
There are many possible answers to these questions, and the right one for each team will be different. The key is for managers and SMEs to be clear on what’s reasonable and whether there are better options available.
Make sure they know it’s ok to say no
It’s important to make sure the person doesn’t feel pulled in too many different directions. One way to do that is to make sure they know that they are allowed to say no sometimes. If subject expert requests are compromising their top-priority work or their ability to keep to their schedule, they should feel comfortable enough to raise the issue when it arises - not when they’re close to burnout.
SMEs should be able to ask for help too. Just because they’re an expert in the field, doesn’t mean they’re infallible in their knowledge. ‘Experts’ should be given, and encouraged to take equal opportunities to learn.
More likely than not, there are a tonne of SMEs in your company that have a wealth of knowledge just waiting to be shared. There’s just got to be the right arena for them to do so.
At risk of sounding too cheesy (I’m doing it anyway), any company is the sum of the people and the knowledge within it - so it just makes sense to create the best possible environment for that knowledge to flow.
