Thinking openly

Image: osmar01, via freeimages.com

It's finally time to sit back and reflect on the Learning & Skills Group Conference, and I can't think of a better place to start than with David Price's keynote session. This session is particularly important for me since I am involved in both workplace learning and the education system, both of which are experiencing a massive change in the face of technology and the accompanying shift in peoples' attitudes and behaviours. David's book ties in well with a growing number of themes that I have been exploring lately.

For the workplace, we are experiencing a shift in the normal hierarchies, with smarter companies realising that learning has to flow up as well as down. Employees simply have to be trusted to think and adapt in a rapidly changing landscape, one where job security and trust are becoming scarce commodities. Even our relentless drive to get everyone a degree cannot guarantee success, as this actually seems to drive the cost of skilled labour down through the Dutch auction effect. The only skills that seem to have real value are those which are self-taught, and the value of knowledge has changed from economic to social.

The six imperatives of social learning:

1. Do it yourself - we can share information amongst ourselves faster than our institutions can
2. Do it now - immediacy
3. Do it with friends - to share and reinforce learning
4. Do it for fun - playfulness can be used to surprising effect
5. Do unto others - generosity
6. Do it for the world to see - high visibility

There's a lot in common here with the theme of personal learning networks, coupled with a growing understanding of how these diffuse interactions can slowly but permanently change society. In the emerging future, education has to move from pedagogy towards heutagogy, with an emphasis on learning how to learn - content may indeed remain king, but it will be created increasingly by the learners themselves.

With a greater sense-making network around them, people feel more able to take on the 'fail fast and iterate' approach of Google. Companies that operate this way have more in common with the 'machine shop' culture, where learning is social and horizontal, and learners are free to roam and combine their ideas with a 'freedom to fail'.

'Thinking that the role of leadership is to act and make short-term decisions misses out on how well fully functioning human networks can deal with most problems without intervention from above. When managers and executives get involved, they often make things worse for those doing the day-to-day work. This is even more pronounced when those doing the work are connected to their peers in social networks and communities of practice that have established and trusted knowledge-sharing practices.'

Harold Jarche, Good leaders connect

A year of blogging

It's now a year since I first started this blog, and it's been an interesting one for sure.  I started keeping a blog as part of an effort to get my head around the use of social media, but it's starting to feed into all of my learning processes now, especially as I make extensive use of blogging as part of an online course.  So what have been the best things about keeping a blog for the past year?

Having my thoughts captured allows me to look back over the past year and how my way of thinking has changed.  After a burst of short rambling posts centring on my exploration of forums, I found some interesting things to write about, which led to some unexpected highlights:

• My summary of the Learning & Skills Group and Forward Thinking conferences drew a good deal of attention from the associated communities
• I received an entry on Janes Hart's Top 100 Articles of 2011 for a set of three of my articles

These were a real boost to my confidence in using social media generally, knowing that a wider audience would listen to my ideas, but towards the end of last year I did find myself burning out a little, something that gets referred to as social media fatigue.  Sometimes you just want to switch off from the world.  It also reflects my enthusiasm coming up sharply against the wall of reality - you can't do everything at once, and other priorities tend to get in the way.  Since then I've made an effort to write about different aspects of my learning, and I've continued to keep up blog entries within the bounds of my online course too.

Where do I go from here?  I think it's time to bring in a new personal angle on learning, which brings me to my next post...

Reflections on LSG11 - Chris Bones' keynote speech

Long overdue I know, but here it is...

Chris Bones has no small task ahead of him with the Learning & Development Research Project.  He has stated in no uncertain terms that the answer lies with people, and getting them engaged with process from the outset. Concentrating on social interaction and problem solving skills will get us half way there straightaway.  The rest lies in thoughtful implementation and the winning of hearts and minds.  This is something I agree wholeheartedly with.  Too often people are expected to follow the example of leaders without question, but as we move into an era where the case study has become irrelevant, the power of crowdsourcing is about to come to the fore - if only we dare to let it!

One point of contention I had was with his perception that online learning is only useful for updating information, and I noticed that a few eyebrows were raised on Twitter at this comment. Some perceptions need to be changed here...

Reflections on LSG11 - Andy Tedd's session

Andy Tedd's session was of particular interest to me, since I started this blog to help me track what I've been learning from social media over the last couple of months...

We all know how to use social media, don't we?

DON'T WE?!

Apparently not, as many campanies are getting far too friendly with the #FAIL hashtag on Twitter.  So what is stopping us from putting these tools to best use? Usually it seems to be coming down to an unsupportive environment for communications - we're worried that we might look foolish, and sometimes we are right in this because there are consequences for getting it wrong, but too much fear will cripple us.  Companies can be criticised on social networking sites for getting things wrong, even they don't have a real presence there, so what's the difference?  And how can we break the cycle?

For a start, we have to leave behind our expectation that all corporate information should appear in a polished, professional format.  It turns out that the less complete the information seems, the more people feel invited to comment and leave their mark, and that should start getting them engaged with the process instead of being passive consumers of information.  The next step is for people in positions of influence to let the debate run freely, as they can often inadvertently stifle the conversation.  If this is happening too much, then it's a sign that your culture has to change.

Oh, and one very important point that has just been brought home via @JaneBozarth on Twitter, Social Media is not the same as Social Learning!  Social learning is not something that has been 'discovered', nor is it something to be 'implemented', and anyone who thinks that way will only succeed in throttling motivation (thanks @hjarche for inspiration too!)

Reflections on LSG11 - Cathy Moore's session

The second session I'm looking back on is Cathy Moore's session on scenarios.  What have I learned?  Two equations:

'Let's add a scenario to make it more engaging' = FAIL!

'Let's base it on a scenario to make it more effective' = GETS IT!

Designing a learning experience that has the potential to change attitudes doesn't have to be hard, which Cathy has been tirelessly working to get into the heads of anybody with the wisdom to listen. For too long the field of e-learning has been dominated by foolish attempts to make a 'death by PowerPoint' course seem a little more palatable, not to mention unavoidable with the advent of 'smart' LMSs that can make sure we've looked at every single slide.  Because that proves people have learned, right?

No more!

Powerful scenarios don't have to be expensive or difficult to produce, just get your hands on the tools and dare to experiment.  Ever since I attended Cathy's session at LT11, I've been looking for an opportunity to put this into practice, and I've now got the freedom to explore this in my latest project.  Using the Action Mapping approach with SMEs meant that relevant scenarios came to light naturally, and I was able to work them up into a prototype that I'm currently developing into a finished learning intervention.  My only niggle is I may have to wait a while to put it into practice - can anyone offer me a course in patience please?!

Reflections on LSG11 - Clive Shepherd's session

It's been a while since the Learning & Skills Group Conference, but it's never too late to reflect. The first session I'm going to look back at is Clive Shepherd's 'The Learning Professional'.

Clive has taken a bold step in drawing us closer to a practical model for how learning really works. Breaking down the range of learning interventions into different perspectives and contexts helps us to stop and question our pre-conceptions of what constitutes good learning, since our own experiences will doubtless have pre-disposed us to favour those which we have been exposed to in the past. And those experiences that we thought of as learning have almost invariably been labelled as courses.

We do so love to package everything up as courses, don't we? But does it always have to be that way? And is something you can't describe as a course, any less important for learning because of that deficiency in name? New developments in technology are catalysing changes in the way we communicate and work. As the pace of change begins to quicken, courses will quickly become obsolete if they don't focus on teaching people processes, and leave the information to one side. But that doesn't mean the information isn't important, we just have to change our approach to updating ourselves. If we can find the courage to break away from the familiar and try something new, we can devise new and more effective learning strategies.

Backchannel resources from #LSG11UK

OK, been poring over the Twitter channel and here's what I've found so far....

From the speakers:

• Donald Clark's 7 objections to social media in learning (and answers)
• Cathy Moore's scenario section from the e-learning blueprint
• Laura Overton: Towards Maturity Benchmark
• Craig Taylor's Beyond Bullet Points presentation, which has been featured on SlideShare (plus the visuals only version from his blog), his Bring in the backchannel presentation, his shared resources on Diigo, and blog entries: It started with a Tweet; Getting Beyond Bullet Points with visual and audio; Bringing in the Backchannel
• Andy Tedd's Social Learning Manifesto presentation, plus the link to Keith Sawyer
• Julie Wedgewood's blog entries: Find 15; Content Curation Part 1; Part 2; Part 3; Part 4; Part 5
• Steve Wheeler's blog entry after the event

Links shared through the backchannel:

• Kineo's Twitter report
• e-Learning Whitepaper from Brightwave:
• Looking for ways to keep track of conferences you're not attending? Check out this example
• Questions that lead to learning and co-creation via Maritza vd Heuvel
• How Online Education is Changing the Way We Learn [INFOGRAPHIC] via Lars Hyland
• The Importance of Learning in Real Time (interview with Dr Ellen Pruyne) via Sim Stewart

My Twitter archive is saved as: http://archivist.visitmix.com/jimmy_hob/1

I've also added blog entries about the talks I attended:

• Chris Bones' keynote speech
• Cathy Moore - Learning Scenarios
• Andy Tedd's Social Learning Manifesto
• Clive Shepherd - The New Learning Architect

Back to the blog...

After a week on the road it's time to get back to blogging and the normal routine. Taking part in the Twitter back-channel at the Learning & Skills Group Conference was a novel experience, and I actually felt more engaged with the talks because I was actively listening out for interesting quotes to share with others.  Next task is to look for resources that people put on Twitter, and try to pull them together in one place.