What’s New from OpenSesame: August 2025
Article

What’s New from OpenSesame: August 2025

6 August 2025
By Sydney Ward

Ready to shake up your learning lineup? This August, we’ve got bold new IT and sales training, CEU-eligible courses, a powerful Simon update for faster course creation, and inspiring stories from customers and thought leaders to support smarter learning for your organization.

Watch this quick video for a bite-sized look at what’s new this month 👇

Earn CEUs with OpenMind’s newest course

You can now add even more value to your learning program. OpenMind’s latest course is eligible for 1 CEU with ATD, SHRM, or HRCI, giving your team the chance to earn credit while building skills they’ll actually use.

The course is designed to help learners stay focused, retain what they learn, and turn everyday training into meaningful career development. It’s a practical way to improve engagement and outcomes without adding extra complexity to your program.

Add it to your training lineup and give your team credit where it counts.

New in OpenSesame Plus: ACI Learning and The Bolt Labs

We’re excited to welcome two standout publishers to OpenSesame Plus, each bringing a unique approach to building workforce skills and engagement.

ACI Learning delivers immersive, hands-on training in IT, cybersecurity, and audit, helping teams build real skills they can put to work right away. Their unique two-person instruction format and live demonstrations make even the most complex topics clear and accessible. Learners can also prepare for and earn industry-recognized certifications, including CompTIA Security+, CEH, SSCP, and CISSP. 

With their cinematic, talk show-style microcourses that feel more like streaming your favorite show than sitting through a standard training, The Bolt Labs is turning sales training into something your team will look forward to. Each course drives adoption of practical sales skills with energy and storytelling that sticks. The content is subtitled in 10 languages and available in Spanish, French, and soon German audio, making it a great fit for global sales teams.

Explore both publishers now in OpenSesame Plus and discover how they’re making learning more relevant, more engaging, and more effective.

Less Work. Better Voiceovers. All powered by Simon.

Simon now writes your voiceover script for you: automatically generating narration from your slide content using proven instructional design principles. That means fewer steps, faster course creation, and stronger learning experiences, no instructional design expertise needed.

Customer spotlight: How Align Technology is scaling global learning with a learner-first approach

Sabrina Cervantes Villa, Human-Centered Design Specialist at Align Technology, is leading a global learning transformation. In partnership with seven regional L&D teams and powered by OpenSesame, Sabrina uses employee feedback and engagement data to curate relevant, multilingual content for Align’s 21,000+ employees across 47 countries.

Her learner-first approach has delivered big results. Participation in Align’s career development program grew 217%, with over 2,400 professional development certificates issued in leadership, technical, and accredited training.

One standout success: more than 700 employees earned Lean Six Sigma Belts internally, saving the company over $376,000 in external certification costs.

Sabrina works closely with OpenSesame’s curation team to refresh Align’s learning library regularly, ensuring the content stays current and aligned with employee needs. With more than 900 OpenSesame courses integrated into Align’s LMS, she’s helping to build a scalable, personalized learning culture that supports career growth and strengthens organizational agility worldwide.

August-ready content to feature in your training lineup

As summer winds down and sports ramp back up, we’re excited to share new courses from Exclusive publisher ICON, featuring Ryan Harris, Super Bowl Champion, bestselling author, award-winning broadcaster, and keynote speaker. Drawing from his 10-year NFL career, Harris inspires audiences nationwide with lessons on triumph and growth. These courses reveal the timeless leadership principles behind sports excellence: believing in ourselves, staying focused, collaborating deeply, leading with generosity, and becoming who we aspire to be.

Check out his new courses, including: 

August also marks International Youth Day! On Tuesday, 12 August, learn from one of the world’s most inspiring young voices with a TED Talk from Mexican climate activist Xiye Bastida. From leading school climate strikes to addressing world leaders at the United Nations, Xiye shows how purpose and values can drive meaningful action in the face of global challenges.

Webinar: Resilient minds in uncertain times

Headshots of Mike Veny, Certified Corporate Wellness Specialist at Mike Veny Inc, and Liza Mucheru Wisner, Head of Talent and Workplace Culture Portfolio at OpenSesame, with professional credentials and provider logos from SHRM, HRCI, and ATD shown above.

Feeling the weight of constant change? Join us on Wednesday, 20 August, for a webinar with Certified Corporate Wellness Specialist Mike Veny and OpenSesame’s Liza Wisner. You’ll learn practical strategies to manage stress, understand shifting consumer sentiment, and stay resilient in both work and life.

New resource roundup

Before you go, check out these new articles and resources designed to strengthen your L&D strategy.

Two women sitting at a table, focused on a laptop screen, with the text “AI Training for Everyone: Support in the Changing World of AI” displayed on the left against a light background.

AI is already reshaping how we work, and it’s not just for tech teams. Meet the “AI for Everyone Toolkit”: a practical, people-first training path to help every employee build confidence and fluency with generative AI, one step at a time.

Inspire your workforce with TED@Work talks designed for today’s challenges. TED@Work’s 20 new talks in OpenSesame Plus cover essential topics like agility, AI, personal growth, and communication, curated to motivate and build the human skills teams need most. 

No time to read? No problem. Briefly delivers the key takeaways from bestselling books in 15 minutes or less. Explore OpenSesame’s exclusive microlearning series designed to support self-directed growth across your organization.

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