The SME Kickoff Checklist: Questions to Ask in the First Meeting

Turn your first SME meeting from a brain dump into a blueprint

The SME kickoff meeting is the most important hour of any course development, and L&D teams need to leverage it. The key to hitting course milestones lies in the first meeting with the subject-matter expert (SME). If you are armed with the right questions to ask subject matter experts, you’ll have a shared vision and direction. Not knowing what to ask puts you behind from the start and forces you to waste precious time and energy chasing clarity and context you could have captured on day one.

This post is for L&D teams who need a reusable checklist of questions that set the tone for that first SME meeting and let you walk out with everything you need to build the right course. Learn more about how to run that first SME meeting and drive a successful course creation process.

Before the meeting: Do your homework

There are two goals for pre-meeting prep. First, research and gather enough information to ask smart questions. Second, get the SME up to speed and prepared to make the most of your time together. The pre-meeting prep isn’t about becoming an expert in the subject matter. It’s about preparing to have an informed conversation to better collaborate on the project.

Research enough to ask smart questions

Gather and review any existing training materials, product guides, audience profiles, talking points, business case, and learning outcomes. You don’t need to master the information. The review time provides background to help you avoid asking questions about previously documented concepts. Familiarity with the topic shows professionalism and helps you gain new information.

Do research on your SME’s role, how long they’ve been with the company, and their professional background. Someone with more than a decade at the organization will have more institutional knowledge and a different perspective on the content than a recently promoted team lead. Understanding your SME better helps you develop your questions and anticipate potential issues.

Look back at the original training request, which may not have come from the SME. Refer back to the email, request form, or meeting notes that sparked the initial idea for the project and its business case. That initial idea indicates the understanding gap you’ll work on together. Start by confirming the SME’s position to avoid later perspective differences from derailing the project.

Send an agenda and two questions in advance

Provide the SME with a written agenda before the kickoff meeting to show that you respect their time. The agenda will help you both stay on topic and demonstrate your commitment to building a well-researched and relevant course. It positions you as a professional partner and collaborator.

In addition to the agenda, propose one or two questions for the SME to think about ahead of time, such as “Who is this training for?” and “What should learners be able to do differently after completing it?” These questions are designed to guide the conversation. When the SME walks into the meeting having already considered the audience and outcome, you’ll be more productive.

Confirm the meeting length. Generally, 45 to 60 minutes is an ideal time for a kickoff meeting. And be clear about what you hope to accomplish by the end: a shared one-pager at the end.

The SME Kickoff Checklist: Questions to ask in the first meeting

You may not have time to cover all five of these areas at the same depth, and that’s OK. The goal here is to identify where the SME has clear answers. Any lack of clarity will indicate where you’ll need to do a little more work.

1. Questions about the audience

Discuss the audience at the start to avoid designing a course that’s pitched at the wrong knowledge level, delivered in the wrong format, or isn’t motivating.

• Who specifically is this training for, e.g., role, tenure, team? Get specific.
• What does the audience already know, and what do they not know yet?
• Where and how will they take this course? At their desk, on a phone, on the shop floor?
• What’s their motivation level? Is this required compliance, career-driven, or somewhere in between?

2. Questions about the performance outcome

These are some of the most important questions for your SME. Understanding desired outcomes will also reveal whether the SME considers logistics no one has thought through yet. Ask:

• What should learners be able to do after this training that they can’t, or don’t do, today?
• What business problem prompted this project—what’s the gap, mistake, or opportunity?
• If the training works perfectly, what’s measurably different in 90 days?
• What does “not working” look like? What behaviors or outcomes signal that the training failed

3. Questions about content scope and priority

This set of questions helps SMEs focus on the most important information, so you can prioritize course topics and direction aligned with goals. Ask:

• If you only had 10 minutes with a new hire, what’s the one thing you’d make sure they understood?
• What do learners most commonly get wrong? What are the misconceptions or shortcuts you’ve seen?
• What’s “must-know” vs. “nice-to-know”? What can we leave in a job aid or resource library?
• Are there edge cases, regulatory points, or scenarios we need to cover even if they’re rare?

4. Questions about what already exists

Find out what source material already exists. It could be a manual, a slide deck, a positioning document, a video recording, or a one-pager. Find out what resources you can build from with these questions:

• What training, documents, or job aids exist on this topic today, and what’s working or not about those assets?
• Are there real examples, stories, or case studies you can share? It’s OK if they’re anonymized.
• Who else has tried to teach this? How did it go, and what would the SME do differently?
• Is there any data, like support tickets, performance reviews, or audit findings, that point to where learners struggle?

5. Questions about process, stakeholders, and working style

These logistics questions save time, prevent miscommunication, and avoid frustration later as you build and launch the course. You can often trace scope creep, review bottlenecks, and missed deadlines back to early miscommunication. Ask:

• Who else needs to review or approve this? Who has input, and who’s the final decision maker?
• How much time can you commit each week for reviews, questions, and revisions?
• What’s the deadline and what’s driving it? Common responses include compliance date, leadership request, event, or product launch.
• How do you prefer to give feedback: written comments, live walkthroughs, or async video?
• What’s the one thing that would make this a great project for you to work on?

The wrap-up question that saves the most time

Before you end the meeting, ask: “What’s the one question I should have asked but didn’t?”

This single prompt surfaces assumptions, hidden stakeholders, and political nuances that no checklist will catch, such as assumptions about company information that can’t be included, an important stakeholder who needs the project briefings, or previously created content that has worked or failed. It allows the SME to provide full context and make you aware of additional issues and concerns.

Close the meeting by reading back a one-paragraph summary of the audience, outcome, and next steps. Ask the SME to confirm the summary for accuracy. This recap catches misalignments before they arise and hold up course creation and revision.

After the meeting: Turn the conversation into a working document

The best way to keep the momentum going after the kickoff meeting is to capture the conversation right after you step out of the meeting room and before you jump back into other projects. Secure your shared success with these after-meeting steps.

Send a recap within 24 hours

Create a one-page document that outlines the audience, learning outcomes, top-3 content priorities, success metrics, review cadence, and open questions to help shape every decision that follows. This document becomes the project’s source of truth and the artifact you point to when scope creep hits.

Share it with your SME and ask for written confirmation and feedback. Something as simple as “Reply, ‘Looks good’” or “Flag anything that’s off” is an easy ask and doesn’t require a lot of time from the SME. The reply shows meaningful alignment, indicating that you are both working from the same understanding of the project.

This working document isn’t bureaucratic paperwork. It creates a shared reality that your L&D team and the SME can refer to. It’s the source of truth and helps future requests that could derail your course launch, such as adding new modules or adding another industry or audience persona to the content. It’s a record of what was agreed to in the kickoff and can keep everyone focused on the original goals.

Build a standing cadence, not a one-off

Either at or immediately following the kick-off, schedule the next two or three SME checkpoints while everyone’s calendars are open. Trying to coordinate meetings later, when the urgency has subsided, and the SME’s priorities have shifted, wastes time and causes delays.

The follow-up meetings should be short and outcome-focused. Use them to quickly review a content outline, approve a script, or confirm knowledge check accuracy. Between meetings, an asynchronous review helps move the project along and respects the SME’s time.

A shared open-questions document where either of you can make notes or capture open questions is a great tool for project management. It gives you a space to write down issues, address urgent concerns, and raise blockers that could stall the course creation process.

The kickoff is the project

A structured first meeting with the right questions prevents the most common failure modes: a vague audience, a fuzzy learning outcome, and an undefined scope. The questions to ask subject matter experts aren’t just conversational; they’re diagnostic. They identify what’s clear, what’s contested, and any gaps that haven’t been thought through yet.

Treat the SME kickoff as a designed conversation, not a content download. You’re there to establish a shared direction between the subject matter expert and the learning and development team. When you arrive at the kickoff prepared, have the right questions, and end with a clear summary, the dynamic shifts from a note-taking meeting to a collaboration between two professionals. That shift sets the stage for a smooth course-building process rather than a project that stalls during review.

Ready to get started after a successful SME interview? Learn how to build practical assessments that measure true workplace abilities with this blog from Tom Kuhlmann.