It's time for another edition of the Learning and Development Roundup! (See also previous editions at the archive page.)
ASTD ICE Program Guide Now Available! The 2010 American Society for Training and Development (ASTD) International Conference and Exposition is almost here! This event is the largest U.S. event in the training, learning, and development industry, and this year it is being held in Chicago, IL from May 16-19. In recent weeks ASTD released the online Program Guide, which includes both the schedule of conference sessions and a map and details regarding the massive expo hall. Element K will be in Booth 233, which is near the cyber center, in the second row on the left as you enter the expo hall. If you will be attending this conference, be sure to stop by our booth and say hello!
Jane Bozarth's New Column: Nuts and Bolts My friend Jane Bozarth has a new column at Learning Solutions Magazine, called "Nuts and Bolts." In her first two columns, she takes on ADDIE in "When Training Works" and "Principles of Multimedia Learning". Jane writes clearly, sometimes provocatively, but always on topics of great interest to those in the L&D industry. So keep up the good work Jane, I look forward to your next columns!
On Virtual Worlds for One or Many Clark Aldrich, an industry expert on simulations and the use of games for learning, wrote a brief but helpful blog posting titled "How should virtual worlds that are designed for one person differ than those designed for one thousand?" In this posting he makes clear some key design distinctions for several virtual world scenarios: to be used by one person, one person with a coach, a small group of people (say 3-8 people), or a large or very large group.
The New iPhone OS and Mobile Learning Bill Brandon of Learning Solutions Magazine wrote an excellent article that considers the impacts for mobile learning scenarios of Apple's recently announced upcoming 4.0 operating system for its popular iPhone and iPod Touch mobile devices. The mobile learning landscape continues to evolve, and even if your organization isn't doing much in this space at present, you are wise to stay on top of the latest developments.
On Micro-Messaging, Micro-Blogging, Social-Messaging, Micro-Sharing It goes by various names, but so-called "micro-messaging," "micro-blogging," and "social-messaging" is an increasingly popular topic for organizations looking for the latest way to increase internal communications and workforce productivity. Led by Yammer and similar providers, many enterprise organizations are moving beyond the "testing" stage, having found significant value from these "internal Twitter-like" tools. A couple of good articles on this subject recently include:
The Latest Insights on Social Learning I continue to find the flow of good articles, postings, and resources on social learning to be almost overwhelming. So as I did in the last several round-ups, I'll provide some of the latest "gems" for you here.
“Rethinking e-Learning," by Clark Quinn, which makes important points about social learning and more.
“Difference Between Personal and Professional Uses of Social Media: It's All in Your Head," by Kevin Jones, which provides a brief but excellent description of a problem that I know both he and I face often when presenting on social media, social learning, and Web 2.0 technologies. Simply stated, this is the confusion between personal use of public social media tools and how that differs from business uses of the same types of technology (wikis, blogs, forums, social networking profiles, micro-messaging, etc.) but in an internal-to-the-enterprise context.
“Enterprise 2.0: Questions Answered, Part 1," again by Kevin Jones, where he launches a new series of blog postings, starting for now with his thoughts on the questions: “What is the big picture for social media in organizations (for E2.0 purposes)?” and “Is social media replacing something we have, or adding a new thing?”
“Social Learning = New Toolset + New Mindset + New Skillset," by Jane Hart, where she briefly breaks down her previously outlined five types of social learning that occur in organizations by mapping these to what she calls the new toolset, new mindset, and new skillset that each involve. See also her regularly updated webpage on this topic.
“Agility and Autonomy," by Harold Jarche, which follows Jane's thoughts with comments on one specific new mindset (agility) and one specific new skillset (autonomy) that are critical for social learning to flourish.
“Social Learning Unleashed," by Jeanne Meister and Karie Willyerd, who share numerous examples of social learning in organizations, and provide 10 guidelines to consider in "creating, organizing and planning the rollout of an enterprise 2.0 initiative." See also the sidebar article "The Launch of Planet Blue," where Meister interviews Allison Anderson, manager of learning and development at Intel.
Updates from Element K As usual, I'll end this roundup posting with links to our newsletter service that we launched last year. Each newsletter includes several articles of relevance to the Learning and Development field, as well as updates about Element K events and our latest product releases. You can see the latest newsletters here: February, March, April, and May.
It's time for another edition of the Learning and Development Roundup! (See also previous editions at the archive page.)
The iPad Is Here! The biggest tech-related news in recent weeks is of course the launch of Apple's latest device, the iPad tablet. Some prominent reviews include those from David Pogue of the The New York Times, Walt Mossberg of The Wall Street Journal, and the popular website Engadget. For a convenient table comparing some aspects of these and other popular product reviewers, see the table at this posting to O’Reilly Answers. And although clearly created for marketing purposes, the Guided Tour videos from Apple are quite powerful and give you a glimpse of what is possible with this new device (and therefore worth watching even if you do not intend to use an iPad anytime soon).
Amongst the many L&D leaders diving right in, Elliott Masie has created an "iPad Learning Lab initiative" at the MASIE Center. As Masie describes: "We'll be doing immediate testing on the 'affordances' for learning that may be created by this new device. Jonathan Kayes (our CLO), Lauren Boughton (our Producer), Tom King (MASIE Fellow for ePubs), Erin Anderson (our recent college graduate editor) and Elliott Masie, will do a series of immediate experiments on the iPad." There are already many good postings at their iPad Learning Lab blog, so be sure to check it out soon and add it to your RSS feed reader.
David Mallon on 2010's Top Training Technology Trends In previous editions of the L&D Roundup (see vol. 9 and vol. 10), I linked to many industry experts who were providing their new year's predictions, top-10 lists, and so on. One that I haven't yet included is quite worthy, and that is David Mallon's 2010 Top Training Technology Trends in the electronic magazine Training Industry Quarterly. Mallon directs research in enterprise learning for Bersin & Associates, and is a keen interpreter of industry trends.
New Blog: Instructional Design By Example With her typical wit, Brandon Hall research associate Janet Clarey started her new blog with a posting titled "Corporate e-Learning needs another blog. Oh yes. It does." While it is true we are blessed with numerous expert blogs already, Clarey is quite focused with her new blog Instructional Design By Example. As she describes, in this new blog "you'll find examples of e-learning courses and details about the instructional design process used in creating them. You'll also find specifics about the logistics of the courses." She is already off and running with several interesting postings, so check it out and add it to your RSS feed reader.
Twitter Resources Galore! Two prominent industry experts have recently put together some outstanding resources to help L&D professionals who are new to Twitter—or even those who use Twitter but want to know more about it.
Twitter for Learning -- 55 Great Articles - Tony Karrer has done us all a service by bringing together links to 55 articles, and then categorizing them for us: Twitter and Teaching; Tips on Twitter Use; Twitter and Conferences, Webinars and Backchannel; Twitter and eLearning; People to Follow on Twitter; Using Twitter as a Learning Tool especially for Learning Professionals; Twitter Guides; Twitter Tools; Yammer; and More on Twitter for Learning.
How to Use Twitter for Social Learning - Jane Hart also has done us all a service, by gradually creating a great set of resources on Twitter. Included are introductory pages, reading lists, and information on Twitter use in contexts such as presentations, events, classes, and training.
The Latest Insights on Social Learning I continue to find the flow of good articles, postings, and resources on social learning to be almost overwhelming. So as I did in the last several round-ups, I'll provide some of the latest "gems" for you here. Since the March 2010 issue of Chief Learning Officer magazine focused on this subject, I'll include only those great articles this time around:
Verifying Virtual Value, by Eric Davidove and Craig Mindrum, takes on the common but challenging question of how to measure the value of social learning.
The Social LMS, by Bill Sherman, provides many insights on changes in the corporate LMS to support social learning. See also the sidebar Sales Training Gets Social at ASM, which provides a good example from Advantage Sales and Marketing, LLC.
Updates from Element K As usual, I'll end this roundup posting with links to our newsletter service that we launched earlier this year. Each newsletter includes several articles of relevance to the Learning and Development field, as well as updates about Element K events and our latest product releases. You can see the latest newsletters here: January, February, March, and April (coming soon).
I've been meaning to once again update readers on some of the latest work from industry expert and fountainhead Jane Hart. I'll start by noting that she has quietly kicked off her annual Learning Tools Survey, wherein she asks industry experts and practitioners to list their top ten tools for learning (broadly defined). I've participated in this survey since 2007, and have already updated my personal list in her index. You can join in as well by visiting the 2010 page. And back in early December I commented on the results of her 2009 survey—see my posting The 2009 Edition of the Top 100 Tools for Learning.
Her tools survey is interesting on its own, and it has generated a massive tools directory that Jane dutifully maintains for all of our benefit. But her focus on learning tools only scratches the surface of her productive output. For the rest of this email I want to focus on a part of her website that has had a few names, but she is now calling the "Social Learning Academy". It is a collection of very well-written web pages and resources for those in Learning and Development positions (whether in workplace organizations or higher education) who need to get up to speed on social media in the context of learning, that is, what is often called "Social Learning."
If I were to suggest an order to read her introductory pages, I'd go with the following:
Jane also provides a very detailed comparison of four popular, public social networking tools: Facebook, Twitter, Ning, and Elgg. This is a great place to start and for some use cases in the workplace, these tools themselves will be directly useful (marketing, customer service, and even various learning contexts). Most organizations will of course also want to consider a range of other platforms that provide Web 2.0 / social media technologies, including but not limited to:
Your current or future LMS. Which Web 2.0 / social media tools does it provide your organization? Which are on their roadmap and when do you expect them to be available to you? For instance, in September 2008 Element K's software-as-a-service LMS, KnowledgeHub, added wikis, blogs, and forums, and we have additional collaborative Web 2.0 tools on our roadmap.
Enterprise applications from Microsoft or IBM. SharePoint 2007 added wikis and blogs, and IBM's suite of tools includes social components (notably their Quickr and Connections products).
Additional suites and platforms. Depending on your needs, you might want to consider suites such as Jive, SocialText, or an open-source toolset such as Liferay, each of which provide a range of Web 2.0 / social media tools.
My advice: if you are investigating social media tools for your organization, use Jane's comparison chart not only for its details about the four tools she focuses on, but also as a starting point for the kinds of features you might want from your LMS vendor or other enterprise tool providers!
And finally, if you are looking for a wide variety of examples of the use of Web 2.0 / social media tools in organizations—well, Jane has you covered there too! See her page listing Social Learning Examples in the Workplace.
Keep up the great work Jane, and know that it is much appreciated by everyone taking on the challenge of realizing the benefits of social learning in their own organization!
Are you familiar with the garden metaphor? This is a metaphor for a set of better practices for the use of various Web 2.0 / social media tools (wikis, blogs, forums, social profiles, etc.) in organizations and other contexts as well. I'm not sure who first came up with this metaphor, but I for one will be forever grateful as I've used it often in my conference and other industry presentation. Analogies and metaphors are great for cementing in people's minds new or difficult abstract concepts, because they relate the concepts to more concrete, everyday things they are familiar with. The "garden metaphor" for Web 2.0 / social media certainly does this, so hopefully this post will be helpful for anyone struggling with various aspects of using the latest tools in L&D or other workplace contexts.
A good garden starts with robust, nutrient-rich soil. In my view, the connection here is to the enterprise use of Web 2.0 / social media tools themselves. Your set of tools are the platform on which you will better enable social learning—a form of informal learning in your organization—and support other goals as well (improved internal communications, knowledge management, or perhaps external-facing customer support even). One could alternately consider your overall organizational environment to be the "garden's soil," with the Web 2.0 tools being like the garden tools you use (shovel, rake, clippers, etc.) But I prefer to consider the tools as the overall platform in which you will grow social interactions, social learning, collaborative experiences, idea generation, and all the other benefits that will arise from adopting such tools (growing your garden).
Once you've got a good plot of soil, a successful garden is very much dependent on good seeding practices. So too, in many Web 2.0 / social media uses in organizations, an important practice is to seed the platform with existing content to kick-start interactions between your users. A few examples will be helpful here I think. In the case of a wiki, adopting an "if you build it they will come" attitude will almost never work in workplace contexts. We have had great internal success at Element K with wikis, and I attribute some of that success to the initial seeding of our largest wiki with over a hundred existing documents that people needed to do their jobs. Some were attachments, but many were converted into editable pages in the wiki—and importantly, deleted from their previous portal or database locations. This drove usage of the wiki from day one! Another example would be discussion forums, where sometimes discussions get going right away, but often some "seeding" with some provocative questions can help get people talking. You can even seed questions and answers to demonstrate the kind of exchange that the forum is intended for. In both cases—seed pages in wikis and seed questions in forums—you are teaching people by example, and we know that people often learn best from good examples.
Similar to seeding, a garden of course needs frequent watering. A lagging discussion forum or micro-messaging platform can benefit from provocative questions being asked periodically to help spur conversation. Targeted brainstorm pages can wake up a wiki resource as well, by encouraging visits to the platform and reminding users of the wealth of information it provides.
A good garden has people tending to it—the gardeners. So too, an organization will get the most benefit from Web 2.0 / social media tools if they have one or more individuals actively tending to the community and tools in various ways. In a real garden you need to get rid of any weeds that grow, and in social media communities you will want to do the same. The "weeds" here can include undesirable pages created in a wiki, questions in a forum that are inappropriate (e.g., beyond the scope of the forum), or comments to a blog posting that require moderation. Further, in a real garden you will need to prune often, to take care of overgrowth of your plants and nurture the overall health of the garden. Pruning in this context will mean looking for duplicate or overlapping pages in a wiki, duplicate questions in a forum, and so on. The role of "gardener" in your organization need not be time consuming, and the duties can be split up amongst many individuals based on areas of expertise and interest. For very large communities (with tens of thousands of users) perhaps one or more full-time employees will be needed in this role, but for smaller uses of Web 2.0 / social media tools, the gardening role can be a minor time commitment. That said, it should be made an official part of the gardeners' job responsibilities, so that it is given the respect it requires to be done well and not slip through the cracks of everyday work.
A large enough garden will have many gardeners, but should ideally have just one master gardener. So too, in Web 2. 0 communities it is a good practice to designate a single, final authority—someone who can provide benevolent governance when needed, to arbitrate the rare disagreements that might arise. For instance, if two people disagree about edits to a wiki page, it is best to have one person they can go to for a final decision on the matter. Wikipedia at this point has a robust structure in place to handle this—for most organizational uses of social tools, a single ultimate authority for each will suffice. For blogs this can be the blog author, but for group blogs I recommend designating one of the authors as the blog owner. And for forums, obviously the moderator of the forum is the master gardener, the person who guides the conversations and makes decisions on proper etiquette and other matters. In some cases the master gardener might naturally be the initial champion of the particular tool or community, but they need not be one and the same individual.
Even the notion of harvesting has applicability in this metaphor. Content in a discussion forum can often become quite robust, but given their nature, it can be difficult to find such older Q&A gems (ditto for micro-messaging tools). Some platforms let you make critical posts "sticky" so that they appear at the top of the forum's homepage, but this is a limited solution to the problem. An organization using multiple tools can instead "harvest" the best content from the forums, and archive it in FAQ pages in a wiki—a tool often used as an organic, longer-lasting searchable knowledge base. To mix metaphors for a moment, think of the information harvested as being the "greatest hits" of the forum—the best content that you want to make more visible as a page in a wiki. You could also harvest the best content from a popular blog, so that such outstanding entries don't get lost in time.
The "garden metaphor" is a useful way to bring together many key better practices, and I encourage you to use it to educate your colleagues as you move forward. Just keep these words in mind the next time you are describing the benefits of Web 2.0 / social media tools for your organization: soil, seeding, watering, weeding, pruning, gardeners, master gardener, harvesting, and organic.
It's time for another edition of the Learning and Development Roundup! (See also previous editions at the archive page.)
Training Magazine, Goodbye Old Friend A great many print publications are struggling financially these days, with some becoming online-only publications and others closing down entirely -- so each new announcement does not come as a complete surprise. But for many veterans in the training and development field, the recent news of Training magazine folding up shop came as sad news indeed. Over several decades, many have received significant education through its pages, while others were given a platform to share their knowledge or first spread their wings as industry experts.
Karl Kapp has done a good job of bringing together the reflections of a half-dozen people who have blogged at the news of the demise of Training magazine. His blog posting also provides a solid list of alternate resources that remain as outstanding sources of learning, training, and development articles and news. If you aren't subscribed to most or all of these, definitely check them out!
Learning Circuit's February Big Question: Instruction in an Information Snacking Culture? At the ASTD Learning Circuit's Blog, Tony Karrer noted a trend that many of us are seeing lately: "we seem to be snacking on information, not consuming it in big chunks." As the February "Big Question," he then asks us all to reflect on this phenomenon: Are people really "snacking" more? Do we therefore need to think about instruction differently, and if so, in what ways? Is this shift a problem, and if it is, how so exactly? See the blog posting links to the blog responses so far.
Two Recent Articles on Mobile Learning ASTD's T+D magazine has recently had two good articles about the growing trend of mobile learning. In my view, both are worth your time to read:
"Smartphones Make IBM Smarter, But Not As Expected," by Nabeel Ahmad and Peter Orton. Appropriately enough, ASTD has made this article available as an audio podcast so that you can listen to it on your favorite mobile device!
"Can You Hear Me Now?" (PDF), by mobile learning expert Judy Brown. She asks: "Is mobile access to learning and performance support a part of your learning architecture? If not, you may want to re-evaluate."
On Learning Styles Will Thalheimer writes a good blog called Will at Work Learning, which he describes as being "Will Thalheimer's research-based commentary on learning, performance, and the industry thereof." He recently authored a post titled "Learning Styles Reviewed by Association for Psychological Science AND FOUND WANTING". In short, Will is reporting on a recent review of the evidence (commissioned by the Association of Psychological Science) for the benefits of using "learning styles" in creating instructional content. Interestingly, the review found that "there is no adequate evidence base to justify incorporating learning-styles assessments into general educational practice." Read his posting for more on the findings -- including the scope of what can be concluded from the review and what cannot -- as well as Will's thoughts as both a researcher and consultant.
The Latest Insights on Social Learning I continue to find the flow of good articles, postings, and resources on social learning to be almost overwhelming. So as I did in the last two round-ups, I'll provide some of the latest "gems" for you here:
Updates from Element K As usual, I'll end this roundup posting with links to our newsletter service that we launched in 2009. Each newsletter includes several articles of relevance to the Learning and Development field, as well as updates about Element K events and our latest product releases. You can see the latest newsletters here: December, January, February, and March.
It's time for another edition of the Learning and Development Roundup! (See also previous editions at the archive page.)
More Predictions for 2010 In roundup vol. 9 I linked to several industry leaders providing predictions for 2010. I have found many more such articles and blog postings since then, and they are almost always a fascinating read. Here are some of the best that I didn't link to last time around:
eLearn Magazine has again gathered predictions from a few dozen industry experts, including Stephen Downes, Jay Cross, Clark Quinn, Roger Schank, Jane Hart, Elliott Masie, Allison Rossett, Saul Carliner, Janet Clarey, Karl Kapp, Bryan Chapman, Mark Oehlert, Charles Jennings, and more. In addition, see the bottom right of this posting, where they provide links to their annual predictions from 2002-2009 -- it is fascinating to see how many were hits and misses from years past
"Predictions and Plans for 2010" The January Big Question at ASTD's The Learning Circuits Blog is on the subject of predictions for the new year. There are over 20 response postings from folks like Jeanne Meister, Jay Cross, Clark Quinn, Bill Brandon, Clive Shepherd, and many more.
Tony Karrer, creator of eLearningLearning.com, and author of the eLearning Technology blog, has also posted his predictions for 2010. He writes this as a top-10 list, but with the tenth spot left undecided with a request for readers to chime in.
Mobile Learning in 2010 And speaking of predictions for 2010, with the exception of one of the experts from eLearn Magazine's gallery, many are predicting that mobile device use for learning will continue to grow in 2010, and possibly even (finally) burst out a bit. Mobile Learning guru Judy Brown does a good job bringing together the various mobile learning predictions in her post "2010 Forecasts." And Robert Gadd chimed in the first week of January at his new blog, mLearning Trends, with his mLearning predictions for 2010.
How Has the Internet Changed Your Learning? The latest blog posting from Elliott Masie at LearningTown (login required) is titled "How Has the Internet Changed Your Learning?" Over 30 LearningTown members have chimed in with perspectives so far. If you aren't a member of LearningTown yet, now is a great time to sign up and join this discussion!
Learning in 3D It doesn't get much more cutting edge than considering the various ways learning can occur in immersive 3D virtual worlds. And few if any are more expert in this subject than the duo of Karl Kapp and Tony O'Driscoll, authors of the new book Learning in 3D (Amazon link). They have also been quite innovative in how they are promoting their book, such as launching on a "blog tour" composed of interviews at various L&D experts' blogs. Further, they have created a useful website, www.learningin3d.info to both promote their book and provide visitors with helpful resources on the topic of "learning in 3D." Bookmark this one!
The Latest Insights on Social Learning I continue to find the flow of good articles, postings, and resources on social learning to be almost overwhelming. So as I did in the last roundup, I'll provide some of the latest "gems" for you here:
"Social Learning Strategies Checklist" - Partially as preparation for a great presentation they gave at the Training 2010 conference last week in San Diego, David Wilkins and Kevin Jones have created and made freely available a list of dozens of questions organizations should ask when implementing social learning.
Updates from Element K As usual, I'll end this roundup posting with links to our newsletter service that we launched in 2009. Each newsletter includes several articles of relevance to the Learning and Development field, as well as updates about Element K events and our latest product releases. You can see the latest newsletters here: November, December, January, and February.
When I speak at L&D industry events, one example I give of an organization that is effectively using Web 2.0 technologies -- what is more recently being called "Enterprise 2.0" -- is the large biomedical and pharmaceutical company Pfizer. One of the key things about Pfizer's use of these tools, and one reason that I always use it as such an important example of success, is that Pfizer is, of course, a heavily regulated company -- and the appropriate use of tools in such a context is a valid concern and always a question I am asked when speaking on this subject.
From what I've read and from talking with Pfizer employees, the company has incorporated into the daily workflow a range of Web 2.0 or more "social" tools, including:
But perhaps the most effective description of Enterprise 2.0 at Pfizer comes from a SlideShare presentation called "Meet Jessica." This set of slides walks you through the daily life of a typical Pfizer employee ("Jessica"), focusing on how she uses the various Web 2.0/social learning tools. (See also the earlier "Meet Charlie" presentation as well.)
This "Meet Jessica" presentation has been available for a few years at this point, but if you've not seen it yet, I strongly encourage you to do so -- you'll likely get some great ideas for how "Enterprise 2.0" communications, knowledge management, and social learning tools could help your organization.
It's time for another edition of the Learning and Development Roundup! (See also previous editions at the archive page.)
Videos from recent L&D Industry Conferences Did you miss some or all of the major conferences in the Learning and Development industry in the month of November? Well, the good news is that a few of these have made some video content available for free:
The eLearning Guild's DevLearn - Provided are a summary video of the event, plus a recording of the webinar delivered on Dec. 18th that highlights five of the 30 demos from DevLearn's "DemoFest."
LearnTrends - Provided are nearly 20 videos from this online "virtual conference."
Looking Back on 2009 The December "big question" from ASTD's Learning Circuits blog was "What Did You Learn About Learning in 2009?" This has by now generated over a dozen response postings, including items from top industry bloggers such as Tony Karrer, Karl Kapp, Michael Hanley, and others.
And over at Tony Karrer's eLearning Learning site, his list "Hot Topics for 2009" and the many links to articles from throughout the year make for an interesting read. The top eight areas are:
Twitter
Social Media, Social Networks, Social Learning, and Informal Learning
Google Wave
SharePoint
Video
Mobile, Mobile Learning, and iPhone
Changes in Design and Instructional Design and our Roles
Looking Ahead to 2010 Bersin & Associates has released their annual report, "Corporate Learning and Talent Management Predictions for 2010" (free, registration required). This includes 12 predictions, which Mr. Bersin summarizes at their blog here.
Jeanne Meister has also provided us with a top five, with her posting at New Learning Playbook titled "Five Words To Describe Corporate Learning in 2010." The five words are not a surprise (Social, Mobile, Collaborative, Engaging, Fun), but read her post for her insightful explanations for why she chooses each.
And finally, Jay Cross shares some words of wisdom for 2010, nearly two dozen classic quotes that he describes as follows: "The following ideas help me get out of the daily rut to renew my commitment to make the world a better place. Perhaps they’ll move you, too." A quick but very motivational read!
A New Journal Late in 2009, a new and valuable resource joined the ranks of the many journals, magazines, and blogs available to L&D professionals. This new resource is a refereed journal named Impact: Journal of Applied Research in Workplace E-Learning, and it comes to you from ElNet, the E-learning Network of Australasia. All of the contents from the 200+ page inaugural issue are available for free download online, so take a look!
When Will 3D Virtual Worlds Really Take Off? Koreen Olbrish shares some very sensible comments about 3D Virtual Worlds and when they will finally go mainstream for learning and other uses. Read her posting "Virtual Worlds 2.0…a few humble predictions."
The Latest Insights on Social Learning Every day, more industry experts and bloggers speak and write about the importance of "social learning" and "enterprise 2.0" -- I've done so many times here at Element K Blog as well. Here are some of the recent highlights you don't want to miss:
Updates from Element K As usual, I'll end this roundup posting with links to our newsletter service that we launched earlier this year. Each newsletter includes several articles of relevance to the Learning and Development field, as well as updates about Element K events and our latest product releases. You can see the latest newsletters here: November, December, and January.
It's time for another edition of the Learning and Development Roundup! (See also previous editions at the archive page.)
ASTD Employee Learning Week is December 7 - 11 The American Society for Training and Development (ASTD) is again celebrating employee learning in organizations with their Employee Learning Week (ELW) program December 7-11, 2009. As their website indicates, "Employee Learning Week is an awareness campaign highlighting the important connection between learning and achieving organizational results." Learning and training are more important now than ever before, as "the growing skills gap and the increased need to compete in today's economy require organizations to develop a knowledgeable and highly skilled workforce." See their list of ideas for how your organization can get involved and read about the ways that dozens of your peers celebrated ELW in 2007 and 2008.
Celebrating 50 Years of Four Levels There is another celebration going on in our industry, a birthday of sorts for a key L&D industry model: Donald Kirkpatrick's Four Levels Model for evaluating the impact of workforce development initiatives. The November issue of Chief Learning Officer magazine focused on this, starting with the great article "The Kirkpatrick Model: Past, Present and Future" by Jim and Wendy Kirkpatrick. Additional articles in the same issue include "The Father of the Four Levels" by Daniel Margolis, "Simplified ROI: Measuring What Matters Most" by Howard Prager and Susan Vece, "Emerging Issues in Measurement" by Jeffrey Berk, "It's Time for Measurement Strategy" by Chris Moore, and finally a closing column by Donald Kirkpatrick himself "Same Model, New Challenges." For anyone who either wants to get up to speed with learning measurement and the history of the Kirkpatrick model, or is in the middle of implementing any sort of evaluation or ROI-measurement system, this issue is a goldmine.
Two Key Recent Industry Reports The L&D industry has seen several new and important reports released in the past few months. ASTD recently announced their 2009 State of the Industry report, "a comprehensive look at the training and development investments, practices, and trends for 2008." This report for ASTD members provides data for from 301 organizations, including members of the ASTD Benchmarking Forum and ASTD BEST Award winners.
Also, industry analysts Ambient Insight have released their latest study, "The U.S. Market for Self-Paced E-Learning Products and Services: 2009-2014 Forecast and Analysis." Their press release notes that the U.S. E-Learning market will reach $16.7 billion in 2009, with demand growing by a five-year compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 7.4%, with revenues reaching $23.8 billion by 2014. I highly recommend that you read their free executive overview.
2009 Brandon Hall Excellence in Learning Awards Announced Also announced recently were the 2009 edition of the Brandon Hall Excellence in Learning Awards. Element K is proud to have garnered two of these coveted awards: Best Custom Content (Silver) for the course "The Green Grid Measures and Metrics" and Best Innovation in Learning Technology (Bronze) for our incorporation of Web 2.0 collaboration tools into the KnowledgeHub LMS to support informal learning. Selections for the Brandon Hall Awards are based on potential impact, applicability, ease of adoption, and overall value for learning professionals.
Learning Circuits Big Question: What is the Value of Social Media for Learning? How do I communicate the value of social media as a learning tool to my organization? That is the question that ASTD's Learning Circuits asked the L&D blogging community for the month of November. As always, the "big question" generated plenty of interesting responses, including perspectives from folks such as Jay Cross, Jane Hart, Karl Kapp, Clive Shepherd, Clark Quinn, Tony Karrer, and many others. If you are trying to convince others in your organization (or yourself!) of the value of social media for learning, this series of blog postings is a great place to start.
Jane Hart on Five Categories of Learning Most people recognize the high-level distinction between what is called Formal Learning vs. Informal Learning. In considering how social media can be used for learning in an organization, Jane Hart wasn't comfortable with just these two categories, so she set out to get a bit more precise in how we conceptualize the learning that occurs in our organizations. She arrived at five categories, which she named at her blog as follows:
Intra-Organizational Learning (IOL)—Keeping the organization up to date and up to speed on strategic and other internal initiatives and activities.
Formal Structured Learning (FSL)—Formal education and training like classes, courses, workshops, etc. (both synchronous and asynchronous).
Group Directed Learning (GDL)—Groups of individuals working in teams, projects, study groups, etc. Even two people working together in a coaching and mentoring capacity.
Personal Directed Learning (PDL)—Individuals organizing and managing their own personal or professional learning.
Accidental & Serendipitous Learning (ASL)—Individuals learning without consciously realizing it (aka incidental or random learning).
While its not likely that this set of acronyms will catch on in our industry right away, I think Jane has done us all a great service in clarifying these five distinct concepts. Jane's colleague Harold Jarche then assisted by providing a useful visual of these five concepts, that clearly identifies each on a grid representing Individual, Group, Organization on one axis and Undirected, Self-Directed, Directed on the other axis. Then Jane took her analysis a step further and provided dozens of examples of how social media can be used for each learning approach. This mapping of examples to concepts is a great resource for you as you consider learning in your own organization, and how best to blend the use of social media tools.
Harold Jarche on Train Speeds and Bridging the Adoption Chasm Harold Jarche's blog had several great postings this week, and I'd like to draw your attention to two of them. First he draws your attention to an analogy found in Alvin and Heidi Toffler’s book, Revolutionary Wealth, which compares various societal structures and institutions and their willingness to change. This is very instructive given the amazing pace of change facing L&D professionals today. He also wrote about the need to bridge the chasm between early adopters and the early majority, and provided an insightful table that suggests the average current stage for many of the Web 2.0 and other new technologies L&D professionals are integrating into their learning programs. Where is your organization in the practical adoption of some of these innovative learning approaches?
David Mallon on Back to Basics in 2010 And finally, at this time of year most magazines, bloggers, and others will set out to either give a wrap-up look back at the year that was, and/or make some predictions about what we might expect in learning and development in the year ahead. One of the first to do so this year is David Mallon of Bersin & Associates, in his blog posting Back to Basics in '10. After noting the tough year that was 2009, Mallon notes that "The learning industry as a whole seems to get that it has reached a point in its history where it must evolve or face rapid obsolescence." He then clarifies what he means by "back to basics" as "cutting through the distractions, asking ourselves hard questions about where and how we can add the most value to the organization, and optimizing our processes to leave no possible question of underutilization or inefficiency." He notes that L&D departments need to be focused on two key questions: "Are we truly working on the right things to help the business get where it needs to go? And, are we as good at the business of learning as we must be in order to succeed?" In discussing these two questions, Mallon argues that a focus on social learning is anything but a distraction, but rather a means to get "back to basics" by giving the L&D group a way to better enable informal learning. In other words, given that informal learning has always been around, isn't it high time you took the reins and started to better support and enable it?
Updates from Element K As usual, I'll end this roundup posting with links to our newsletter service that we launched earlier this year. Each newsletter includes several articles of relevance to the Learning and Development field, as well as updates about Element K events and our latest product releases. You can see the latest newsletters here: June, July, August, September, October, November, and December.
At this time of year, many magazine writers, bloggers, and analysts do one or two things: they take a look back at the past year's ups and downs and/or they make predictions (bold or otherwise) about the year ahead. As a blogger—and more generally as a human conditioned my entire life with a January through December calendar year—I can't help but find myself thinking along these lines as well.
I have many thoughts on both the year 2009 that we are wrapping up, and the year 2010 ahead of us (and beyond), so I'll share one such prediction with you now. This is a topic that I often touch on during my conference and webinar presentations on the topic of "Blending Web 2.0 Technologies with Traditional Formal Learning." Although each presentation instance is unique, many questions are asked regularly. One in particular I think is not only a sensible and good question to ask, but is particularly pressing these days because of the very difficult employment situation in the United States and in most of the world.
The question goes like this: "You say that Web 2.0/Social Learning technologies will not replace the use of classroom training or traditional e-learning, but will rather most often (and properly) be used to supplement these standard learning modalities, in order to better enable informal learning in our organizations. But with limited L&D budgets and resources, won't this mean a cut-back in classroom training and e-learning development, and thus job layoffs for some instructors, instructional designers, and subject matter experts?"
This is a good question, but I think the concern largely relies on a false assumption: that the people in those job roles will not have important roles to play in the realm of social learning. Tools such as wikis, blogs, forums, social networks, and so on most often work best when they have people performing specific supporting tasks. These tasks take time, and so should be part of the job descriptions of the people performing them. So the idea here is that people who today work entirely as instructors or instructional designers, or spend a lot of their time serving as subject matter experts within an organization, will continue to spend a lot of their time in those roles (perhaps most of it), but will also take on new roles such as:
Blog author
Forum moderator or discussion generator
Wiki contributor and/or gardener (seeding, pruning, weeding, etc.)
Podcast host/interviewer
Significant ink bookmarker
Significant micro-messaging contributor
Social networking site profile administrator (and participant of course)
In this way, such key L&D team members will continue to provide formal learning (whether teaching, designing, or consulting) but will now also provide crucial support in enabling informal learning. This kind of learning has always been occurring in organizations, but by using Web 2.0/social media tools, at least some of that informal learning will become even more commonplace and powerful, and also become transparent to the organizational leaders, rather than staying largely hidden, untrackable, unsearchable, etc.
As an example, some of Element K's instructional designers—specifically those on our Business Skills team—continue to use our single-source authoring process to create outstanding e-learning and print courseware training materials. But a year ago they also started serving as forum moderators and blog authors for their respective areas of focus. It does require the right combination of aptitude, interest, and motivation to take on new tasks such as these, but fortunately our IDs have what it takes!
What about your organization? As your mix of learning approaches shifts to include more social learning, how are you going to provide the support necessary for it to succeed and truly have a positive impact on the organization? Who from amongst your current L&D team—whether instructors, instructional designers, subject matter experts, or others—will you rely on to take on new challenges in this arena?
