Welcome back to our Member Spotlight series! At the Learning Network, we’re proud to be a community full of passionate, curious, and committed professionals working across all areas of learning. This series shines a light on some of the brilliant people who make up our network, and the journeys that brought them here.
This month, we’re delighted to feature Paul Matthews, a well-known figure in the L&D world and a passionate advocate for practical, outcome-focused learning. Paul’s work centres around a deceptively simple idea: that learning only matters if it leads to behaviour change.
Paul’s connection with the Learning Network started after we rebranded from the eLN and solidified after our most recent Connect conference. “It wasn’t all about eLearning,” he says. “There was an atmosphere about it that was far more friendly and easy to be with than some of the other big events around”. He’s looking forward to being part of this year’s event and appreciates what the community offers to others.
As with many of our members, Paul’s path into learning and development wasn’t linear. Paul initially started his career in engineering, travelled the world and held a director’s role in a multinational IT company before founding People Alchemy in 1999. Over the years, he’s carved out a reputation for making complex ideas simple and actionable. His work is grounded in a central question: how do we create real impact? For Paul, that impact comes from helping people not just know more, but actually do things differently. He quotes Robin Hoyle: “That’s what learning really is, people doing things differently, and doing different things.”
We asked Paul what advice he would give to someone just starting out in L&D. His answer took us back to 2011, when a friend moving from HR into a learning role asked him the very same question. Paul responded with a list of a dozen practical tips. That email ended up being shared widely, and eventually grew into a downloadable guide that has since gone through multiple editions. “It kind of went a little bit viral,” he laughs. Now in its fifth version — with 17 tips — the booklet remains a go–to resource for many. Remarkably, Paul points out that most of the original advice has stayed the same. “It’s either because I was clairvoyant,” he jokes, “or because L&D hasn’t really changed all that much.”
That might seem like a surprising statement, given the pace of technological change in recent years — particularly with the rise of AI. But Paul’s view is refreshingly balanced. “Pay attention to AI,” he advises, “but don’t let it eat your lunch.” It’s easy to get distracted by the latest tools and trends, but the fundamentals of how people learn — and what drives real change — remain constant. “We still learn the same way we did 1,000 years ago,” he says. “What’s changed is the environment around us, not the way our brains work.”
When reflecting on his own professional focus, Paul sums it up in one phrase: “impact from behaviour change.” That’s what he’s passionate about, and it’s what he believes should sit at the heart of every L&D strategy. Whether that change is driven by formal training, workplace culture, leadership, or something else entirely, the goal is always the same — supporting people to do things differently, better, and more effectively.
We’re thrilled to shine a spotlight on Paul and his work, and we look forward to hearing more from him when he joins us as a speaker at our event in November.
You can download Paul’s Tips for Learning and Development booklet free from his website.
Want to be featured in a future Member Spotlight article – or suggest someone we should interview? Drop us a line at contactus@thelearning–network.org.