TrainingPros Wins Brandon Hall Group Award for Best Association Professional Development Program in 2026
Quick Answer:
TrainingPros earned a 2026 Brandon Hall Group Excellence Award® for Best Association Professional Development Program for its work designing a program for a Professional Services Company. The four-day virtual professional development experience reached more than 1,100 participants and earned an average satisfaction rating of 4.74 out of 5.
TrainingPros has earned a 2026 Brandon Hall Group Excellence Award® in the Best Association Professional Development Program category for its work with a Professional Services Company and its association of independent accounting firms.
The award recognizes a large-scale professional development initiative designed to move learning beyond traditional self-paced offerings and create a more immersive, interactive experience focused on leadership, professional growth, business development, change, and emerging capabilities such as AI.
The Brandon Hall Group category recognizes professional and executive development programs offered by industry associations to their members or the general public through live, online, or hybrid delivery.
Expanding Professional Development Beyond the LMS
The Professional Services Company and its association already offered members access to technical and non-technical training, leadership development, webinars, roundtables, and CPE-accredited programming.
But as the association grew, its members were looking for something more.
They wanted immersive learning experiences, opportunities for real-time collaboration and peer learning, and development that addressed broader business needs—not simply annual CPE requirements.
Many member firms also lacked the budget, infrastructure, or dedicated L&D teams needed to create sophisticated professional development programs on their own.
The organization responded by creating a new four-day, live virtual learning experience that could bring enterprise-level professional development to employees and association members across multiple firms, roles, and levels of experience.
Creating a Multi-Track Learning Experience
The program was built around five learning tracks aligned with business priorities: Business Development, People Leadership, Navigating Change, Professional Development, and Emerging Trends, including AI.
The curriculum was informed by surveys, interviews, focus groups, and benchmarking against other CPE-accredited programs.
Rather than relying primarily on presentations, the experience incorporated internal subject matter experts and external thought leaders along with polls, Q&A, group activities, real-world business scenarios, and fireside chats with senior leaders.
The program also met NASBA standards, allowing participants to earn CPE credits while developing leadership, business, and professional capabilities.
That combination allowed participants to choose learning experiences aligned with their individual goals while giving the organization a scalable way to address broader capability needs.
TrainingPros’ Role in the Award-Winning Program
Creating a four-day learning experience with multiple learning tracks, facilitators, audiences, and delivery requirements required significant instructional design and development capacity.
TrainingPros provided instructional designers and developers who worked alongside the Professional Services Company’s L&D team, organizational leaders, subject matter experts, and facilitators to bring the initiative to life.
Organizational leaders defined the vision, business priorities, and subject matter. The instructional design team helped translate those priorities into structured learning experiences with clear objectives, engagement strategies, and supporting materials.
This type of initiative illustrates an important use for L&D contract talent.
An internal learning team may have the strategy, subject matter expertise, and organizational knowledge needed to launch a major initiative but not have enough instructional design and development capacity to execute it within the required timeframe.
TrainingPros can provide experienced L&D practitioners who integrate with an existing team for the duration of the initiative, adding the specialized expertise and capacity needed without requiring the organization to permanently increase headcount.
More Than 1,100 Learners Reached
The inaugural program reached 1,125 participants across multiple firms, roles, and experience levels.
Perhaps even more notable, 71% of survey respondents were first-time participants, suggesting the initiative reached employees who had not previously engaged with the organization’s professional development programming.
Learner response was also strong:
- Average satisfaction: 4.74 out of 5
- Expectation score: 4.02 out of 5
- 80% of respondents rated the experience a 4 or 5.
AI, leadership, coaching, change, and well-being sessions were among those participants identified as most memorable, while learner feedback also provided direction for future iterations of the program.
Building a Learning Experience and a Learning Culture
The impact extended beyond participation numbers.
The program helped shift professional development from a primarily self-paced, transactional experience toward a more interactive, community-driven model. It also increased the visibility of senior leaders in learning and reinforced the organization’s message that employee development is a strategic business priority.
For association member firms, the model provided access to enterprise-level learning experiences without requiring each organization to build its own L&D infrastructure.
For the Professional Services Company, it created a scalable way to support leadership development, business development, professional capability, AI readiness, and continuous learning across a much broader professional community.
Scaling L&D When the Initiative Is Bigger Than the Team
Large learning initiatives can create a particular challenge for internal L&D organizations.
The team may know exactly what it wants to accomplish but simply not have enough people or the right mix of specialized skills to design and develop everything required within the available timeframe.
That doesn’t necessarily mean the organization needs permanent employees.
TrainingPros helps L&D leaders add experienced instructional designers, developers, facilitators, learning strategists, project managers, and other learning professionals when a major initiative requires more capacity than the internal team can provide.
The award-winning professional development program demonstrates what that model can make possible: an internal team retains ownership of the strategy and organizational knowledge while experienced L&D consultants provide the additional capability needed to turn an ambitious idea into a scalable learning experience.
About TrainingPros
TrainingPros is a woman-owned Learning and Development consulting and staffing company. Since 1997, TrainingPros has helped Fortune 1000 companies connect with highly skilled consultants in instructional design, eLearning development, facilitation, leadership development, performance consulting, sales enablement, and emerging learning technologies.
TrainingPros helps organizations find experienced L&D consultants who can support sales enablement initiatives ranging from individual learning projects to large-scale program design and development.
By combining industry expertise with a personalized approach, TrainingPros helps organizations find the right L&D consultant to start their projects with confidence.
Working Successfully with Contract L&D Professionals
What to Read Next:
Are you interested in learning more about working with freelance instructional designers? These articles continue the conversation:
Ready to Scale Your Next Learning Initiative?
Does your L&D team have more projects than people?
Many organizations in this position turn to contract instructional designers to scale training without overloading internal teams. If you’re exploring options or comparing eLearning development companies, you should learn more about how organizations design and scale these solutions.
TrainingPros is a learning and development company that connects organizations with experienced instructional designers, eLearning developers, and performance consultants. We’ve been named a Top 20 Staffing Company by Training Industry and a Champion of Learning by the Association for Talent Development (ATD), recognition that reflects our commitment to delivering high-quality, tailored learning solutions.
To hear ongoing conversations with senior learning leaders, listen to our Learning Leader Spotlight podcast: Apple | Spotify | YouTube
If your learning initiatives require additional support, whether for a single project or a large-scale rollout, our relationship managers can help you find the right expertise quickly and confidently.
When you have more projects than people™, let TrainingPros find the right consultant to start your project with confidence.
