Are you spending your L&D budget in the right places—or just checking a box?

Whether you’re working with a lean team or juggling a fluctuating budget, every HR and L&D professional faces the same question: What should we build in-house, and what should we bring in from outside experts? In this episode of The Learnit Lounge, host Mickey Fitch-Collins chats with Randi Perry, Learning and Development Manager for the City of San Jose, about how she balances outsourced, in-house, and hybrid learning programs for a 7,000-person workforce. Randi shares her strategy-rich insights on what works, what’s worth the effort, and what HR teams need to be thinking about long before a single training is booked.

This Episode Covers:

• When external facilitators help you get more honest feedback from employees
• How Randi’s team transitioned a program from external to internal facilitation—with better-than-expected results
• Why credibility is the true currency of any L&D initiative
• The myth that training can fix everything—and what to focus on instead
• A simple but powerful action step every L&D team should take before outsourcing or insourcing any program

Timestamped Highlights:

00:00 – Introduction to Randi Perry and today’s topic: outsourcing vs. insourcing L&D

01:30 – Strategic upsides of outsourcing: flexibility and access to specialized talent

04:10 – Why San Jose started its L&D program with outsourcing, and how they’re shifting

05:10 – Risks of in-house L&D: resource rigidity and employee job rights in government

06:30 – When in-house L&D becomes a liability in public sector organizations

08:15 – Why Randi believes in a hybrid L&D model—and how San Jose implements it

09:45 – How strategy, scale, and impact guide decisions on outsourcing vs. in-house

10:50 – Government-specific considerations: credibility, permanence, and long-term hires

12:20 – Why employees may be more candid with third-party facilitators

13:30 – The underrated importance of facilitator credibility and rapport

15:00 – L&D as a talent retention strategy when compensation isn’t flexible

17:05 – Which is worse? Bad outsourcing vs. bad internal training (spoiler: internal)

21:30 – What city employees care about most: relevance and quality of facilitation

22:30 – A success story: transitioning a leadership program from external to internal facilitation

24:20 – Surprising upside: employees preferred learning from in-house leaders who “get it”

26:10 – Hidden costs of outsourcing: time, vetting, context alignment, and procurement

28:30 – The importance of customizing content to the public sector environment

31:10 – Long-term relationships with vendors reduce cost and friction

33:10 – Randi’s biggest leadership lesson: credibility is everything

35:30 – The uncomfortable truth: training can’t fix everything—and not everyone wants to be there

37:45 – Final takeaway: Ask your people what they need. Don’t assume—assess.

39:20 – Where to find and connect with Randi Perry on