Instructional Design Specialist Jobs
Instructional Design Specialist jobs are open across corporate learning, higher education, healthcare, and government agencies, from entry-level associate to senior and lead roles, with specializations in eLearning development, curriculum design, and learning management system administration. Find a role that fits from the openings below and apply directly.
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Showing 5 of 54+ Instructional Design Specialist jobs
- Ability to communicate effectively with others, whether orally in person, utilizing a telephone or in written format.
- Strong presentation skills and ability to communicate information appropriately to people of varying levels of technical knowledge and expertise
- Ability to effectively interact with administration, faculty, staff, students and outside contacts.
- Ability to handle detail-oriented assignments and maintain confidentiality
- Organization skills necessary to meet deadlines, manage priorities and remain highly responsive to requests
- Strong knowledge of current and emerging learning technologies used in higher education
- Strong knowledge of current pedagogical principles, teaching delivery methods, and course design.
- Experience with learning management systems (e.g. Elentra, Canvas), audience response systems, social media, lecture capture solutions, video editing systems (e.g. Camtasia) and Adobe Creative Suite.
- Experience supervising staff.
- Strong leadership skills with a record of building a successful team.
- Demonstrate a commitment to working in an organization that values and promotes humanism.
- Master’s degree and/or combined experience/education as a substitute for minimum education.
Experience or Training:
- Minimum of 5 years in higher education, and web solutions for teaching required. Experience developing multi-media Experience supervising staff.
- Doctoral degree: education, communications, instructional technology, multimedia teaching and learning.
- College teaching experience preferred.
- Consult with college deans and department chairs to evaluate and analyze curricular and course design needs, incorporating pedagogical best practices and current technologic capabilities.
- Identify, evaluate, report, and recommend current and evolving instructional technologies.
- Collaborate with faculty and staff to identify and classify learning content for appropriate pedagogical delivery, select appropriate course design elements to maximize student learning based upon specific college/program need.
- Develop strategies to optimize course delivery methods in multiple learning environments: online, face-to-face, hybrid.
- Write and edit content using multimedia development tools, software, and hardware.
- May assist with research projects related to new technology and/or teaching implementations.
- Assist faculty and staff to solve issues related to teaching with technology.
- Lead the design, development, and upkeep of the CETL website, including content development and curation of content.
- May act as an instructional design lead for a course or department.
- Formulate documentation and training for faculty and staff on effective use of the technology in the classroom and pedagogical principles to ensure that electronic-based curriculum meets pedagogical goals.
- Partner with the Online Learning department to collaborate on best practices in design and pedagogy for college-specific continuing education websites, and internal university student and employee training sites.
- Share industry and campus “best practices” with faculty and staff.
- Formulate strategy for Learning and Development for faculty and staff.
- Design, and/or lead professional development workshops, deliver seminars and trainings.
- Propose learning and development programs and topics, and develop teaching and technology tools and resources for campus use.
- Schedule monthly calendar of learning and development programs with SME (subject matter experts).
- Advertise CETL-offered learning & development opportunities to the university faculty and staff.
- Facilitate the overall training needs assessment for monthly learning and development programming.
- Monitor and evaluate training activities and program effectiveness.
- Curate and develop asynchronous learning and development opportunities.
- As an integral member of Academic Boot Camp, the annual week-long training for new faculty, plan, support, and co-facilitate ABC sessions and programming.
- Meet and conduct a CETL orientation for new faculty onboarding.
- Monitor employee productivity and provide constructive feedback and coaching.
- Assign and set goals for projects and deadlines.
- Organize workflow and ensure that instructional design team understands their duties or delegated tasks.
- Coach and mentor peers.
- Lead by example and inspire a team to execute and innovate while continuing to meet deadlines.
- Provide ongoing support and coaching in a constructive manner to increase employee’s effectiveness.
- Interface and collaborate with CMS/IT staff to assist faculty with set-up of learning management systems (Elentra/Canvas), course web sites, communication & collaboration tools, and emerging technologies.
- Assist IT staff with the resolution of technology issues experienced by faculty with management and the delivery of course content.
- Any other duties as assigned by the Assistant Vice Provost for the Center of Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETL).
- Evaluate, develop, and/or deliver institutional leadership training and programs.
- Partner with academic and administrative departments to develop specialized training that meets their specific needs (e.g., college leadership training, strategic planning sessions, communication workshops).
- Maintain records of all CETL-administered training activities, including attendance, completion rates, and evaluations. Prepare reports for senior leadership on CETL training outcomes and progress.
- Assist with campus training needs assessments to identify skills gaps and determine training priorities.
- Work with college/department heads and HR to understand the training requirements across the university.
- Assist with CME development and help ensure online courses meet quality assurance standards (e.g., QM, OLC).
- Exempt Position. Typical working hours are Monday-Friday 8AM-5PM
- Occasional nights and weekends are required.
We believe in making an impact in the lives of our employees, personally, and professionally. Every employee has different individual and/or family needs. We offer benefits that are both comprehensive and flexible to address your unique needs. We believe work-life harmony is positive and achievable.
We offer competitive salaries, generous paid time off, insurance plans, reimbursements, and retirement benefits. Additionally,
- Our faculty, staff, and administrators are 100% focused on student success.
- Our University culture creates the context for a nurturing and supportive environment.
- Faculty, staff, and students can expect to make deep, personal relationships within the University community.
- As a Faculty, Staff, or Student at WesternU, you can focus on work that you love, be your authentic self, and lead to the future with innovation in health sciences.
- WesternU’s core value of humanism encourages all to bring their whole self in all that they do.
- We are committed to fostering a culture of respect, equity, collaboration, and fun at all levels for all people!
Physical Demands
While performing the duties of this job, the employee is frequently required to use hands to operate a PC in the performance of job duties, and talk or hear. The employee is regularly required to sit, and reach with hands and arms, and occasionally required to stand, walk, stoop, and smell. The employee must occasionally lift and/or move up to 25 pounds. Specific vision abilities required by this job include close, distance, and peripheral vision, depth perception and the ability to focus.
Duties of the Manager of Instructional Design and Learning Development are normally performed in a typical executive office setting. The noise level in this setting is usually moderate due to the proximity of office machines and light office traffic
To secure employment, successful fulfillment of a background check, including a criminal records check, may be required. Western University of Health Sciences will extend a conditional offer of employment, subject to rescission if the background check unveils disqualifying information or if it is found that the candidate deliberately withheld or misrepresented information. Non-completion of the background check to satisfaction may impact the ongoing employment of a current Western University of Health Sciences employee who received a conditional offer for the position.
Pay Transparency Act- Western University of Health Sciences is required to provide a reasonable estimate of the compensation range for this role. This range considers various factors in making compensation decisions, including but not limited to experience, skills, knowledge, abilities, education, licensure and certifications, and other business and organizational needs. It is not typical for an individual to be offered a salary at or near the top of the range for a position. Salary offers are determined based on final candidate qualifications and experience. The Expected Pay Scale is defined as the budgeted salary or hourly range that the University reasonably expects to pay for this position. Placement within the Expected Pay Scale is determined by internal equity and relevant qualifications.
It is the policy of Western University to provide equal employment opportunity to all employees and applicants for employment as required by law without regard to age, race, color, national origin ancestry, citizenship, ethnicity, creed, religion or religious creed, sex or gender (including gender identity), marital status, sexual orientation, disability (both physical and mental) including HIV and AIDS, medical condition (cancer and genetic characteristics), pregnancy (which includes childbirth, breastfeeding and medical conditions related to pregnancy, childbirth or breastfeeding), age, genetic information, military and veteran status, or any other applicable protected characteristic as outlined by federal, state, or local laws.This policy applies to all employment practices within WesternU including without limitation, hiring, recruiting, promotion, termination, layoffs, leave of absence, compensation, benefits, and training. WesternU makes hiring decisions based solely on qualifications, merits, and business needs at the time.
Applicant Documents
- Resume
- Cover Letter
- Curriculum Vitae
- Letter of Recommendation #1
- Letter of Recommendation #2
- Letter of Recommendation #3
- Portfolio
- Teaching Philosophy
- Additional Applicant Document
- Required License/Certification
- Ability to communicate effectively with others, whether orally in person, utilizing a telephone or in written format.
- Strong presentation skills and ability to communicate information appropriately to people of varying levels of technical knowledge and expertise
- Ability to effectively interact with administration, faculty, staff, students and outside contacts.
- Ability to handle detail-oriented assignments and maintain confidentiality
- Organization skills necessary to meet deadlines, manage priorities and remain highly responsive to requests
- Strong knowledge of current and emerging learning technologies used in higher education
- Strong knowledge of current pedagogical principles, teaching delivery methods, and course design.
- Experience with learning management systems (e.g. Elentra, Canvas), audience response systems, social media, lecture capture solutions, video editing systems (e.g. Camtasia) and Adobe Creative Suite.
- Experience supervising staff.
- Strong leadership skills with a record of building a successful team.
- Demonstrate a commitment to working in an organization that values and promotes humanism.
- Master’s degree and/or combined experience/education as a substitute for minimum education.
Experience or Training:
- Minimum of 5 years in higher education, and web solutions for teaching required. Experience developing multi-media Experience supervising staff.
- Doctoral degree: education, communications, instructional technology, multimedia teaching and learning.
- College teaching experience preferred.
- Consult with college deans and department chairs to evaluate and analyze curricular and course design needs, incorporating pedagogical best practices and current technologic capabilities.
- Identify, evaluate, report, and recommend current and evolving instructional technologies.
- Collaborate with faculty and staff to identify and classify learning content for appropriate pedagogical delivery, select appropriate course design elements to maximize student learning based upon specific college/program need.
- Develop strategies to optimize course delivery methods in multiple learning environments: online, face-to-face, hybrid.
- Write and edit content using multimedia development tools, software, and hardware.
- May assist with research projects related to new technology and/or teaching implementations.
- Assist faculty and staff to solve issues related to teaching with technology.
- Lead the design, development, and upkeep of the CETL website, including content development and curation of content.
- May act as an instructional design lead for a course or department.
- Formulate documentation and training for faculty and staff on effective use of the technology in the classroom and pedagogical principles to ensure that electronic-based curriculum meets pedagogical goals.
- Partner with the Online Learning department to collaborate on best practices in design and pedagogy for college-specific continuing education websites, and internal university student and employee training sites.
- Share industry and campus “best practices” with faculty and staff.
- Formulate strategy for Learning and Development for faculty and staff.
- Design, and/or lead professional development workshops, deliver seminars and trainings.
- Propose learning and development programs and topics, and develop teaching and technology tools and resources for campus use.
- Schedule monthly calendar of learning and development programs with SME (subject matter experts).
- Advertise CETL-offered learning & development opportunities to the university faculty and staff.
- Facilitate the overall training needs assessment for monthly learning and development programming.
- Monitor and evaluate training activities and program effectiveness.
- Curate and develop asynchronous learning and development opportunities.
- As an integral member of Academic Boot Camp, the annual week-long training for new faculty, plan, support, and co-facilitate ABC sessions and programming.
- Meet and conduct a CETL orientation for new faculty onboarding.
- Monitor employee productivity and provide constructive feedback and coaching.
- Assign and set goals for projects and deadlines.
- Organize workflow and ensure that instructional design team understands their duties or delegated tasks.
- Coach and mentor peers.
- Lead by example and inspire a team to execute and innovate while continuing to meet deadlines.
- Provide ongoing support and coaching in a constructive manner to increase employee’s effectiveness.
- Interface and collaborate with CMS/IT staff to assist faculty with set-up of learning management systems (Elentra/Canvas), course web sites, communication & collaboration tools, and emerging technologies.
- Assist IT staff with the resolution of technology issues experienced by faculty with management and the delivery of course content.
- Any other duties as assigned by the Assistant Vice Provost for the Center of Excellence in Teaching and Learning (CETL).
- Evaluate, develop, and/or deliver institutional leadership training and programs.
- Partner with academic and administrative departments to develop specialized training that meets their specific needs (e.g., college leadership training, strategic planning sessions, communication workshops).
- Maintain records of all CETL-administered training activities, including attendance, completion rates, and evaluations. Prepare reports for senior leadership on CETL training outcomes and progress.
- Assist with campus training needs assessments to identify skills gaps and determine training priorities.
- Work with college/department heads and HR to understand the training requirements across the university.
- Assist with CME development and help ensure online courses meet quality assurance standards (e.g., QM, OLC).
- Exempt Position. Typical working hours are Monday-Friday 8AM-5PM
- Occasional nights and weekends are required.
We believe in making an impact in the lives of our employees, personally, and professionally. Every employee has different individual and/or family needs. We offer benefits that are both comprehensive and flexible to address your unique needs. We believe work-life harmony is positive and achievable.
We offer competitive salaries, generous paid time off, insurance plans, reimbursements, and retirement benefits. Additionally,
- Our faculty, staff, and administrators are 100% focused on student success.
- Our University culture creates the context for a nurturing and supportive environment.
- Faculty, staff, and students can expect to make deep, personal relationships within the University community.
- As a Faculty, Staff, or Student at WesternU, you can focus on work that you love, be your authentic self, and lead to the future with innovation in health sciences.
- WesternU’s core value of humanism encourages all to bring their whole self in all that they do.
- We are committed to fostering a culture of respect, equity, collaboration, and fun at all levels for all people!
Physical Demands
While performing the duties of this job, the employee is frequently required to use hands to operate a PC in the performance of job duties, and talk or hear. The employee is regularly required to sit, and reach with hands and arms, and occasionally required to stand, walk, stoop, and smell. The employee must occasionally lift and/or move up to 25 pounds. Specific vision abilities required by this job include close, distance, and peripheral vision, depth perception and the ability to focus.
Duties of the Manager of Instructional Design and Learning Development are normally performed in a typical executive office setting. The noise level in this setting is usually moderate due to the proximity of office machines and light office traffic
To secure employment, successful fulfillment of a background check, including a criminal records check, may be required. Western University of Health Sciences will extend a conditional offer of employment, subject to rescission if the background check unveils disqualifying information or if it is found that the candidate deliberately withheld or misrepresented information. Non-completion of the background check to satisfaction may impact the ongoing employment of a current Western University of Health Sciences employee who received a conditional offer for the position.
Pay Transparency Act- Western University of Health Sciences is required to provide a reasonable estimate of the compensation range for this role. This range considers various factors in making compensation decisions, including but not limited to experience, skills, knowledge, abilities, education, licensure and certifications, and other business and organizational needs. It is not typical for an individual to be offered a salary at or near the top of the range for a position. Salary offers are determined based on final candidate qualifications and experience. The Expected Pay Scale is defined as the budgeted salary or hourly range that the University reasonably expects to pay for this position. Placement within the Expected Pay Scale is determined by internal equity and relevant qualifications.
It is the policy of Western University to provide equal employment opportunity to all employees and applicants for employment as required by law without regard to age, race, color, national origin ancestry, citizenship, ethnicity, creed, religion or religious creed, sex or gender (including gender identity), marital status, sexual orientation, disability (both physical and mental) including HIV and AIDS, medical condition (cancer and genetic characteristics), pregnancy (which includes childbirth, breastfeeding and medical conditions related to pregnancy, childbirth or breastfeeding), age, genetic information, military and veteran status, or any other applicable protected characteristic as outlined by federal, state, or local laws.This policy applies to all employment practices within WesternU including without limitation, hiring, recruiting, promotion, termination, layoffs, leave of absence, compensation, benefits, and training. WesternU makes hiring decisions based solely on qualifications, merits, and business needs at the time.
Applicant Documents
- Resume
- Cover Letter
- Curriculum Vitae
- Letter of Recommendation #1
- Letter of Recommendation #2
- Letter of Recommendation #3
- Portfolio
- Teaching Philosophy
- Additional Applicant Document
- Required License/Certification
Instructional Design Specialist Jobs by Experience Level
See All 54 Instructional Design Specialist Jobs
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Find JobsInstructional Design Specialist Job Market
Who's Hiring
Top Industries Hiring
- Education
- Science & Research
- Construction & Real Estate
- Healthcare & Medical Services
What Employers Look For
The qualifications that appear most often in instructional design specialist jobs.
- Bachelor's degree in instructional design, education, or a related field
- Hands-on experience with Articulate Storyline or Rise authoring tools
- Proficiency administering or configuring a learning management system
- Demonstrated ability to apply ADDIE or SAM instructional design models
- Strong written communication skills for storyboards and facilitator guides
- Experience collaborating with subject matter experts to develop course content
Tips for Your Instructional Design Specialist Job Search
Tailor your portfolio to the sector
Corporate L&D hiring managers want to see business-impact examples, while higher education teams prioritize pedagogical rigor. Organize your portfolio into separate sections by context so reviewers immediately find samples relevant to their environment.
List authoring tools precisely on your resume
Write the exact tool names and versions you've used, such as Articulate Storyline 360, Adobe Captivate, or Lectora, rather than a generic 'eLearning software' label. Applicant tracking systems filter by these strings, and vague entries get screened out before a human sees them.
Apply early to roles that fit
Migrate Mate lists instructional design specialist openings from across the United States in one place, so you can find roles that match and apply directly to each listing.
Show measurable learning outcomes in applications
Describe course completions, assessment pass rates, or time-to-proficiency reductions you've achieved. Employers distinguish instructional designers who measure effectiveness from those who only produce deliverables, so quantifying impact makes your materials immediately stand out.
Prep for a live design challenge in interviews
Many instructional design specialist interviews include a take-home or whiteboard task where you outline a short module from a rough brief. Practice articulating your ADDIE or SAM decision-making out loud, because reviewers care as much about your process as the finished product.
Negotiate scope before accepting an offer
Clarify whether the role is solo production, part of a team, or involves vendor management before you accept. Instructional design specialist titles cover wildly different workloads, and understanding the actual scope protects you from mismatched expectations on day one.
Instructional Design Specialist Jobs: Frequently Asked Questions
Which companies are hiring the most instructional design specialists?
The companies hiring the most instructional design specialists right now include Tesla, WTW, and Akima, with the largest share of openings in Texas, California, and Arizona, based on current listings on Migrate Mate as of August 2026. Demand is concentrated in healthcare systems, large enterprises with internal L&D teams, and government contractors.
How many instructional design specialist jobs are remote?
About 54% of instructional design specialist openings are fully remote or hybrid as of August 2026, making it one of the more remote-friendly roles in the learning and development field. eLearning development and curriculum writing positions tend to be the most remote-compatible, while facilitation-heavy or onsite training coordinator roles typically require in-person presence.
How do you become an instructional design specialist?
Most instructional design specialists start with a degree in education, communications, or a related field, then build proficiency in at least one major authoring tool like Articulate Storyline. Building a portfolio of sample courses, earning a recognized credential such as the ATD Certified Professional in Talent Development, and gaining experience through contract or freelance projects before pursuing full-time roles is a common path into the field.
Can you get hired as an instructional design specialist with little experience?
Yes, entry-level instructional design specialist roles exist, particularly in higher education, nonprofits, and companies building out new L&D functions. Hiring managers at this level prioritize a strong portfolio over years of experience, so creating two or three polished sample modules that demonstrate your design process, use of a standard authoring tool, and understanding of adult learning principles can substitute for a formal work history.
What does the instructional design specialist interview process look like?
The process typically includes an initial screening call, a portfolio review with the hiring manager or L&D team, and a practical design exercise where you outline or build a short module from a brief. Some employers add a stakeholder role-play to assess how you gather requirements from subject matter experts. Final rounds often involve a panel with HR, a direct manager, and sometimes a business unit leader whose team you would support.
Where can I find and apply to instructional design specialist jobs?
You can find and apply to instructional design specialist jobs on Migrate Mate, which lists current openings from across the United States in one place. Search the listings to find roles that match your experience, specialization, and preferred work arrangement, then apply directly to each one that fits.
See All 54 Instructional Design Specialist Jobs
Find roles that match your experience and apply in just a few clicks.
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