Findings of a study that determined the ways in which practicing administrative course developers utilize instructional design activities in their design projects are presented in this paper. A survey was administered to 30 participants in a training and development group within a large organization and mailed to 43 other practicing instructional designers from a wide variety of contexts. Approximately 47 percent of the mailed surveys were returned. The results of the study were: (1) the most frequently completed design activities were writing learning objectives, developing test items, selecting instructional strategies, and selecting members; (2) the least frequently completed design activities were assessing trainee's entry skills and characteristics, and conducting a pilot test; (3) the most frequently given reasons for not including a design activity were the decision was already made, there wasn't enough time, and it was considered unnecessary; (4) lack of instructional design was seldom identified as a reason for excluding a design activity; (5) years of experience did not appear to be related to how often course developers use various instructional design activities; and (6) while virtually all participants indicated that they usually or always wrote learning objectives, only two-thirds indicated that they usually or always conducted a task analysis. A conclusion is that, in practice, instructional design activities occur on an irregular basis. An instructional development model to guide decision making in a real-life context is needed. Three figures, three tables, and a copy of the survey are included. (Contains 7 references.) (LMI)