I’m going to make this post quick, because I’m actually supposed to be working on a gap analysis for one of my classes.

A colleague and I have been presenting this presentation:

Basically, remember to:

• Tie this to business needs
• Show how it enables informal learning
• Explain it will still require resources to supportT

July’s big question is very timely for me! Here is the question:

In a Learning 2.0 world, where learning and performance solutions take on a wider variety of forms and where churn happens at a much more rapid pace, what new skills and knowledge are required for learning professionals?

This week my Web 2.0 Learning and Performance started. I’m keeping a blog for the course, as are most other people. Someone is already asking about what are the most important things to know as educators about Web 2.0.

The Technology

I think there are some basic technology tools that need to be mastered. These include:

• Simple HTML: for example creating hyperlinks
• Screencasting software: You should be able to create a screencast (using something like Camtasia) and post it to the web
• Feed aggregation: You should be able to harness information into one feed. Lots of very simple tools exist for this now. I use newsgator as an RSS aggregator, but even tools like FriendFeed can help pull different feeds into one stream

Learning to Surf

You have to be able to surf the web. By this I mean, you need to be able to ride the waves of information that may be connected to a learning topic without getting swamped and pulled under by the sheer volume of information.

You also have to be able to show learners how to surf as well. Teaching someone to surf is not easy at all. OK, let me be truthful I’ve only taught people to body surf, but that is still hard. You can’t get inside their body to make them understand how to hold themselves so that they jump at the right time to catch the wave. All you can do is model your technique for surfing, they have to adopt their own style.

Its the same when you teach someone to web surf. You can show someone how you do it. You can show them the end goal, but they have position themselves so that they are comfortable with the wave of information.

Don’t forget about ID

I think ID is very important in the case of Learning 2.0. There is so much information to be consumed that there has to be some design involved to ensure that learners don’t become so overwhelmed that they aren’t able to master tasks.

All of the rules of doing analysis of what the end results should be are still very important, as is doing formative and summative evaluations during learning events to be sure that learners are at least moving towards catching a wave.

This month’s Big Question from ASTD is “what will workplace learning be like in 10 years?”. If you go to their post, there are already some really interesting thoughts and comments about this topic.

Byron said “The best prophet of the future is the past”. I’m a firm believer in that notion, so I’d like to answer the Big Question with a question of my own: what happened 10 years ago to workplace learning?

I’ve been doing some sort of training since I came into the professional workplace in 2001. I just started studying education for my graduate degree in 2007. I have some very experienced, patient folks in my department who kindly talk with me when I ask them about something I am studying or something I have read on a blog that pertains to eLearning. They seem to appreciate my enthusiasm, but they always have this weary look on their face when I tell them about all these “new” ideas. They tell me they were trying to implement some of these very things 10 years ago!

Besides having these discussions with co-workers, there is literature that goes back 10 years or so that talks about CSCL, communities of practice, and all of these things that are the underpinnings of what people are talking about doing today. So I have to wonder, are some of the ideas being bandied about today really that new? Or are they rehashed from 10 years ago? If these are old ideas given new life by improved technology, what happened 10 years ago that got these ideas pushed to the back burner? What can we learn about our past so that we can execute these ideas in the present, so that in our future we’re not going through this exercise yet again?

I also want to say that I do not agree with the idea that the training department should go away completely. For one thing, work is social. Work gets done based on the relationships we have with others, and based on the social capital that we have. This means that there will always be “others” in the workplace. This otherness will be categorized just like it is in general society: by race, gender, nationality, disability, religion, etc.

Knowledge is a form of social capital. I believe very strongly if there is no guidance, “others” in the workplace will not have access to knowledge that they need to have to do their work. This will happen either because they don’t have access to the correct network, or because they are purposefully excluded from access to that information based on their position in the social ladder.

I believe this because of my status of other (a woman in a predominately male field), and my daughter’s status of other (Asperger’s Syndrome). Training departments can be the mechanism that provides each worker with access to the information required to perform his/her job duties successfully.

If we as training groups are aligning to the business and the true competitive advantage of knowledge workers is how fast they are able learn, we owe it to the business to ensure that every worker, no matter their access to social hierarchies in the workplace,  has access to all the tools they need to help them learn.

Maybe in the future learning organizations won’t be the “givers of knowledge”, maybe we become more like librarians that help people find resources (and learn to do their own searches) as they are needed.

ASTD’s Learning Cirtuits Blog Big Question for January is What are your Challenges, Plans and Predictions for 2009?

Since I haven’t done my New Year’s post yet, I’ll just talk to this question.

Challenges

I’ll talk about the challenges from a personal level. How do I incorporate what I am learning about connected learning into my “day job”? How do I weave more of the connected learning concepts into my graduate studies? How do I move away from straight up developing technical courses into doing more of what I am learning about (designing), especially in a down economy?

I think that latter question is the hardest one for me right now. I do pretty well influencing my peers, or maybe one level up from where I am organizationally. How do I learn how to influence people who can really make the decisions to change things? How do I know when I am pushing to hard and when I need to back off? How do I convince my organization to take a chance on some of the ideas that I have? These are the things that I want to get better at this year.

Plans

I am about half-way through my graduate program. I need 6 more classes and one internship. I think I want to try and finish this year. I am taking 2 classes in the spring, that means I need to do 2 in the summer, and then 2 in the winter plus the internship. I am planning on walking at graduation, so that means I’ll be back home (well Tallahassee, close enough) in December. I can deal with that.

I plan on continuing to expand my network using this blog and twitter. I plan on continuing the Knowledge Worker Competency series I started at work, helping folks understand how to use these social tools for learning and sharing so when my organization starts using them for training everyone will be comfortable enough with the technology that it won’t be a barrier to instruction.

I haven’t forgotten about using these technologies to assist adults on the autism spectrum. I’d like to do some work on that this year.

I also want a paper published. If that doesn’t happen, I want my organization and my grad school advisor to realize that this blog has a bit of reach too. Why can’t it carry the same weight that getting published carries?

Predictions

I predict my organization will start using social media tools as part of our instructional offering. OK maybe I am really hoping we are able to do this!

Here’s my dire prediction: some organization is going to be hit by a data loss caused by social media. Then everyone will clamp down on all these activities, and we’ll be back to square one. I hope I’m wrong about that one.

I predict that I will lose my 4.0. But not by much.

I’m looking forward to 2009. Lots of things to try, lots of things to learn. Plus hopefully a year from now I’ll have my master’s degree!, and my son will only have 3 semesters till he graduates!

This month’s Big Question from ASTD’s Learning Circuits blog is What did you learn about learning in 2008?

I started grad school in the Fall of 2007. So this year I took the following courses:

• Introduction to Instructional Systems
• Trends and Issues in Instructional Design and Technology (I wrote a couple of papers for this class on social networking sites as a form of Instructional Technology)
• Designing for Online Collaborative Learning – My group produced this site as a final product. I also have a work project based on what I learned from this class
• Introduction to Instructional Design – Module, pre-test and post-test are here. The report will get published there soon.

One thing I have learned from my graduate studies is how much I already know about instructional design from work. We do a really good job of writing instruction based on learning objectives. It’s given me a better appreciation for my department, and my current skills.

I have been explaining the hows and whys of social media to my management for over a year now. I have learned how to communicate and work with a group of people who have to be concerned with things I never really thought of. It has forced me to slow down, think about why using these tools will solve problems, explain again, and just keep repeating that process. Being forced to tie things back to the business has been a huge learning experience for me.

I also participated for most of CCK08. I learned that you can learn alot from other people you don’t necessarily agree with.  I can’t even list all the ways I have used things we discussed as part of that class at work. I also made lots of new twitter friends.

I learned people love to open up and share. Once I got past the scariness, I learned that letting go and opening up is a great feeling.

The Learning Circuits Blog Big Question for October is about E-Learning, specifically:

What advice would you give to someone new to the field (of E-Learning). Where do you start?

• Particular tools you should explore?
• Resources you should read? Videos/screencasts you should watch?
• What would your To Learn List look like?

I’m a current grad student in the Instructional Systems program at Florida State University. I can’t bash my program, because it’s great.

I also create E-Learning as a technical course developer at EMC. My list will include the things I have learned on the job as well as in my studies:

1. Learn and practice a systems-based approach to education (work and school)
   This involves needs analysis of your audience, determining the best method of delivery, knowing how to identify learning objectives, making instruction that enables the learner to “do” whatever it is you are teaching, having a feedback loop so instruction can be updated as needed.
   Where I work, the course developers are expected to be SMEs on the technology for which they write instruction. We have a pretty good system in place for creating very solid technical instruction that meets the needs of our audiences.
   I was so impressed when I started grad school at how “by the book” (literally!) our organization is about creating instruction. The course I am taking this semester is actually like a course we developed for new developers (I wish I could have tested out of this one!!). My classes also have me studying the learning theories in depth, so I am getting a very rounded view of the field.
2. Understand how to use tools (work)
   We use Saba, Centra, Articulate, image capturing software, image creating software (and have someone who can create nice images, especially  for people like me who are challenged in the making of nice images!), etc.
   For my job, we also have to understand how our software and hardware works and how to make labs available to audiences all over the world. We are starting to use VMware ALOT!!
   I am taking a class next semester that focuses on using Flash for building courses – so hopefully I am going to pick up some awesome new skills!
3. Learn collaborative online learning theories (school)
   I had a great class about Computer Supported Collaborative Learning last semester. As much as I hate to admit it, I learned a lot from that class. We used tools like Diigo, wikis, Google Docs, and concept maps to collaboratively construct a class. Although some of these tools wouldn’t work in a corporate environment, there are concepts from the class I am trying to incorporate into the courses for which I am responsible.
4. Use Collaborative “Web 2.0″ tools (school, sort of)
   This is the place I am having the hardest time getting real experience. My school is starting to teach some of these concepts. At work, we’re starting to talk about how to use Learning 2.0 technologies to promote collaborative learning.
   My undergraduate degree is Information Studies, so I have a bit of training in thinking about how information flows, and how to use technology to enable information seeking behavior between groups.  I think this sort of background helps me understand how social media can be used to build and promote collaborative learning environments.

This month’s Big Question over on the Learning Circuits Blog is about To-Learn lists. Here are the specific questions:

• If you have a to-learn list and are willing to share, and willing to share how you work with that list, that would likely be helpful information.
• As Knowledge Workers, work and learning are the same, so how does a to-learn list really differ from a to-do list? How are they different than undirected learning through work, blogging, conferences, etc.?
• Are to-learn lists really important to have? Are they as important as what Jim Collins tells us?
• Should they be captured? Is so how?
• How does a to-learn list impact something like a Learning Management System in a Workplace or Educational setting?
• What skills, practices, behaviors do modern knowledge workers need around to-learn lists?

I don’t have a specific to-learn list. What I do have is a skills-I-need-to-get list. It’s not written down. I have my eye on a career shift of sorts. To make it happen, I have been looking at job ads for this particular place I want to get to in my career. From the job ads, I take note of the common skills or accomplishments a person in that position would have. Those common skills go on my skills-I-need-to-get list.

Then I work on ways to get the skills:

1. Is there a way to get attached to a project at work that will give me the skill
2. Do I need to take a class to beef up my skillset? I felt a Master’s degree was something I needed, so I am in grad school
3. Can I get the skill from volunteering? There are a couple of organizations where I volunteer my time, and they always appreciate the sort of work I do (techie stuff, training, web stuff)
4. Can I get the skill by practicing it at home? I blog, I play with code, I set up websites…etc. Practice Practice Practice

Here’s something I think would be cool. This is actually part of my entry to EMC’s Innovation Conference. What if there was a way for me to traverse opportunities in my company, and compare the skill set needed for that position to my current skill set? Then I could make an action plan, at work, to advance my career and fill needs in the company. I wouldn’t feel I need to leave the company to advance, and the company wouldn’t loose their investment in  me.  We’re all happy, we all grow together.

I think knowledge workers need that sort of feedback – a snapshot that shows where they are right now with skills, and a road map of how to get to where they want to be at the next level.

If you had all of those sorts of skill sets attached to every open position, wouldn’t that lay bare all the training gaps in your organization? You could attach a way to learn to every skill set in your LMS.