Elliott Masie's Social Learning Survey

Elliott Masie and his organization recently conducted a survey on "social learning." As he defines it, social learning is "the utilization of social networks and social technology for specific organizational learning outcomes." That definition is important, because as I point out in my presentations on Blending Web 2.0 Technologies with Traditional Formal Learning, the name "social learning" is problematic: much learning is "social" as opposed to "individual/personal," but the intended focus here is learning enabled by social media/technologies.

This survey was sent to readers of his Learning TRENDS blog, and included 1,069 people over a three-day period. It was designed "to take a quick pulse of learning colleagues around the globe on current implementations and plans for social learning." Given the audience, the results must be taken with a huge grain of salt and can't be taken as indicative of the L&D profession more broadly. That said, Elliott has made some of the results available here, including both some of the numbers accompanied by his brief analytical comments.

Here are a few of my own thoughts:

• Broad range of technologies in use. As I've noted before, no single technology or approach is dominant, as several range from 40-57% adoption rates. I'm not surprised that "enterprise" applications (e.g., Microsoft SharePoint) top the list, since those are robust and used for traditional CMS purposes that pre-date the interest in Web 2.0. Nor am I surprised that Twitter appears at the bottom of the list; although it is a fast-growing and hot technology, it is still relatively new and can be difficult for some people to see value in before they try it.
   
• Value in social learning. I'm pleased to see the respondents indicating High Value/Some Value over No Value/Low Value by a 62% to 18% margin. As Elliott notes, there is some self-selection in this survey, but I agree with the majority of respondents: these technologies provide value to learners, and enable greater transparency into the informal learning that is already going on—largely unseen and untrackable—in your organization. Similarly, a later question in the survey shows that few respondents believe social learning is just a fad: 77% either disagreed or strongly disagreed, while only 11% agreed or strongly agreed.
   
• Barriers to adoption. The standout barrier is organizational culture, also not a surprise to me. Nice to see that "Relationship with HR" and "Relationship with Legal" are the least common hurdles overall, though for particular organizations they can be a make or break issue.
   
• Percentage of learning from "social learning." This question is very interesting: "What percentage of your learning would you estimate could be done with a social learning format? (i.e., learning from and with other people versus learning from a instructor, book, e-learning, etc.)" Given that the focus here is on technology-enabled informal learning, the numbers seem about right to me. Even if you believe that most learning in your organization today is from informal learning (a common view is that 70-80% is informal), not all of that will one day take via social learning technology platforms. Much will remain as in-person conversations, mediated by traditional technologies such as email, and so on. So I think in the future, an interesting breakdown will be into three areas: formal learning, informal learning via Web 2.0 social technologies, and traditional informal learning.

See also Clive Shepherd's comments on these survey results. He makes the same remark I did above about the problematic name "social learning," and then goes on to make several insightful points about the survey results.

What is your take on so-called "social learning", as defined by Elliott or otherwise? What successes (or failures) have you had with it in your organization?

— Thomas Stone (Tom_Stone@elementk.com)

Comments

[Regi L. Adams]

Within my organization, social learning is a substantially used phenomenon. However, the trend has not yet been maximized to its full potential, as its use is still within the highly structured confines of curricula. Once this instructional concept has been allowed to permeate the informal aspects of a learner’s life, new levels of learning outcomes will be observed. What is missing currently is the learner-guided aspect inherent in authentic social learning engagements.
I think many educational institutions face this challenge due in part to the conventional view by many educators that effective instruction is something that needs to be controlled and directed. Social learning asks of the educator that he or she let go of the process, allowing participants to shape their own learning outcomes through self-directed dialogue. For those of us with the “action” mindset this request is as counterintuitive as relaxing in a pool of quicksand.

-Regi Adams

[Power Prolines]

Social Learning is very much the path I am embarking on at present. Learning about social media and how your business can profit from getting online & involved is a great journey, and one that I wasn't really aware of when doing our website. A whole new world of limitless possibilities has opened up.