Month: January 2010

The business of information

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I have been discussing business models for information-based businesses and in those talks realized how Tim Kastelle’s Aggregate, Filter, Connect model makes good sense. If you’re in the information or knowledge business, which is any media company, then it’s exceptionally important to master each of these three processes.

You need to aggregate from your network and your suppliers in order to have access to just-in-time as well as just-in-case information. Good aggregation means that you can write an article on short notice or summarize a complex event, such as the situation in Haiti. If you only have have access to limited information, your analysis will be poor.

Filtering is the ability to not only find the needle in the haystack of bookmarks, files, reports and blog posts, but knowing which ones are trusted and most suitable for the task at the hand. The perfect picture for a specific context can tell a great story. We can filter with the assistance of our subject matter networks – knowing who to ask about what and when.

Once again, based on the context of the situation, which still requires mostly human skills, we can connect objects, ideas and people. The more complex the situation, the more important it is to connect the right pieces together. Connecting is getting the best information at the optimal time to those who need it.

Here is part of the presentation that I used in my discussions this past week:

Net Work

View more documents from Harold Jarche.

Life, on the Net, is too short

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Hugh Macleod at gapingvoid.com has decided that, after 10 years, he will no longer blog his cartoons:

But like a lot of the folk who have been blogging for a long time, I’ve started to feel that over the last few years, that the blogosphere has just gotten too big, noisy and anonymous. I’ve started longing for the days when things were ‘smaller’, ‘clubbier’, intimate and, well, human. When the people I met were truly like-minded.

Like many bloggers, I’ve used Hugh’s cartoons to illustrate my posts and presentations and today’s reflects the zeitgeist, especially amongst my fellow free agents:

life is too short

Hugh’s decision reminds me of Virginia Yonker’s observations about blogging:

I am feeling that I am coming into the middle of a conversation (or the end of a conversation) that was started somewhere else (such as twitter or facebook). It appears that blogging is the reflective or summary of those conversations. Karyn Romeis still has a very conversational style, but she will refer to other conversations she has had on facebook. Harold Jarche will refer to others at aggregated blog sites where he is collaborating with colleagues. As a result, I don’t feel that there is as much “conversation” on blogs as there used to be. In addition, I have noticed that Michael, Harold, Karyn, and Tony all have easy access to Twitter on their sites. Ken Allan has moved into a different rhelm this year: 2nd life. His posts often include graphics taken from 2nd Life. In fact, some blogs that I have been reading for the last couple of years either took hyatises or have not had posts in months.

It’s amazing that as new as blogging is, it’s already feeling old. These changes in media are only going to speed up and soon we’ll be wishing for the good old days of Facebook and Twitter. I don’t think that the answer is to constantly look for the next big thing, but each person has to find their own rhythm in the digital flow. Life in perpetual Beta is interesting, if nothing else.

Connect, aggregate, filter; then train

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The primary role of the “training” department [or whatever it becomes] for any knowledge-based business is to Connect & Communicate. As workers co-develop emergent processes they need to be supported through updated information, tools and processes to do their work. This model looks at knowledge flows inside the organization:

invert pyramid

Looking at knowledge flows outside the organization, Tim Kastelle says that successful businesses in digital environments need to Aggregate, Filter & Connect:

Connecting is critically important both in journalism and in education. So that makes three value adding activities in the digital economy: aggregating, filtering, and connecting. The lesson to take from the current states of both the music industry and journalism is that you have to have a clear understanding of how you’re creating value so that you build and protect the correct parts of your business model. Perhaps universities can learn this lesson before educational business models are disrupted as well.

Information-based businesses, like education, media, research or consulting organizations, are in the business of working with both information Stocks & Flows. Where revenue is made depends on several changing factors, as many industries are discovering. Understanding the overall flow of sense-making and intangible value creation is important and one framework for success in a digital universe is to create learning networks using social media.

Social media are also the means by which we can share our tacit knowledge through conversations to co-develop emergent work practices. Connecting, aggregating and filtering can be used to describe the cycle of workplace informal learning. This business process does not require formal training other than as a supplementary input. Training is only beneficial when it addresses a clear lack of skills or knowledge, not as a replacement for better work practices.

Informal, social learning is the primary way that knowledge is created in the workplace. The graphic below is a start to “put the horse before the cart” and situate training in the supportive role where it should be.

Connect – ongoing conversations while working collaboratively.

Aggregate – tracking, noting or tagging pieces of information while working collaboratively.

Filter – finding the right information, at the right time, in the right format,  from the information repositories of our subject matter networks.

Training – when there is an identified gap in knowledge and skills, then training can augment collaborative work practices and this can inform the conversations of workers.

A-F-C

Social learning and social networking are growing in importance for many businesses, often as customer support, branding or marketing initiatives. However, HR or T&D are not driving social media use in most organizations. Learning through social networks is becoming an integral part of business and many learning professionals are missing out on it.

There is an opportunity for those who can combine an understanding of business, communication technologies and human learning to develop better social business models. We are in a period when learning professionals are needed more than ever but many lack technology and business skills and cannot help their organizations. The challenge is to get out of the traditional training mindset and open up to the 92% of the business that is currently being ignored.

Learning is the Work

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construction

Here are some of the interesting things I found on Twitter this past week.

Learning & Development is still stuck in the course paradigm [multi-way discussion]. via @c4lpt

Are instructional designers like buggy whips? Courses are buggies; obsolete learning vehicles for the Internet. Back-to-front e-learning via @BFChirpy

The situation in the workplace is even worse than most critics of formalized training & schooling say [good references in this article by Gary Wise]:

Training (formal learning) takes place in controlled environs that can include classroom (face-to-face and virtual distance learning) and/or asynchronous on-line, self-paced events. Nothing wrong with any of these methods. Unfortunately, these formal events equate to a mere 5% (+/- depending on your industry) of a learner’s 1,080 hour work year – another Bersin research finding. That equates to about 54 hours per year spent in training.

Work context represents the other 95%. Are we spending 80% of our training dollars on only 5% of a learner’s work year? Work context, therefore, represents our greatest opportunity to leverage informal learning. In order to include the other 95%, it becomes important to include key attributes exclusive to the downstream work context where the learner actually performs their work.

Next time someone asks for the Return on Investment (ROI) of [social learning?] … I’ll kindly ask them to listen to @dmscott’s epic rant on ROI. via @jonhusband @elsua

One of the most effective mechanisms for knowledge transfer which has emerged in human history is the apprentice scheme. via @snowded

Highly ritualised in medieval times with the apprentice walking the boards once they had reached a certain level of competence to become Journeymen. Then, for some the execution of the master work to become one of the company masters. Dress changed at each stage as did obligation. The educational model was also community based. Journeymen also educated apprentices and were often better able to do so than the masters. While in the early stages of knowledge transfer there was a degree of rote learning, increasingly the apprentice learnt by practice and by tolerated failure. They did not copy the master, they adapted with variance and as such the body of knowledge progressed, it was not transferred as a static entity – something all too common in most KM [knowledge management] programmes – but as a living, breathing and changing practice.

@JaneBozarth “How did I miss this before? The fabulously articulate @quinnovator on bridging formal/informal learning.”

@BFchirpy to @JaneBozarth & @usablelearning “Re: Killer Learning Management System – it’s the web, silly.”

Work is learning, learning work

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My Twitter bio reads, “Work is learning, learning work – that is all Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know [apologies to Keats]. That’s pretty much what I believe will be a necessity for the post-industrial and post-information era that we are beginning to enter. Some call it the knowledge economy or perhaps even the learning age. Whatever it will be called, our networks of networks are making life and work more complex. We need to adapt to better ways of working with abundant information and expanding connections, as I said in sharing tacit knowledge:

Our current models for managing people, training and knowledge-sharing are insufficient for a workplace that demands emergent practices just to keep up. Formal training has only ever addressed 20% of workplace learning and this was acceptable when the work environment was merely complicated. Knowledge workers today need to connect with others to co-solve problems. Sharing tacit knowledge through conversations (the only way to do this) is an essential component of knowledge work. Social media enable adaptation (the development of emergent practices) through conversations.

Emergent practices are developed collaboratively while solving problems for which there are no definitive answers. For instance, what’s the “best” Internet business model? Where once we could document knowledge and develop guidelines and practices followed by most workers, we now need to let workers develop their own practices, according to their particular context, which is constantly in flux. This is a very different approach from the way we designed jobs and training in the past.

Social media are the tools that can help us develop emergent practices. They enable conversations between people separated by distance or time. The organizing framework for using social media for business is the learning network. Learning networks are not just for what we used to call training & development, but can also help us engage (not target) our markets. Chris Koch, marketing and sales strategist, shows no doubt with: There is only one objective in social media: create learning networks

The purpose of social media is to create learning networks that buyers want to join. The enticements are ideas and education. That means social media are extensions of our content development and dissemination processes. By creating content that offers relevant, timely, and useful ideas and education for buyers at all stages of the buying process, we create the incentives for buyers to engage with us in conversation and community. Whether it’s blogs, Twitter, LinkedIn, or private communities that we build ourselves, the common thread is that by focusing on learning we build and retain buyers’ interest.

Social media are the vehicles by which we can share our tacit knowledge through conversations to inform the collaborative development of emergent work practices.

emergent practices

Evolution of the Web

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A client of mine has asked for a description of Web 3.0, which I have kept an eye on, but from a distance, as I didn’t want to be distracted too much by the media hype machine. As I dig deeper into it, I’ve created a Web3.0 tag on Delicious and will continue to add to this. So far I’ve found a couple of good resources. My initial distillation of “Web x.0 in a nutshell” follows.

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Description: Web 1.0: Universal Content, Read Only

What it Did: Basic Infrastructure of the Web, which is still in use

Prototypical Technology: HyperTextMarkupLanguage, UniversalResourceIdentifier

Examples: Websites

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Description: Web 2.0: Universal Participation, Read/Write

What it Does: Mostly social innovations, as we learn how to use the Web to communicate

Prototypical Technology: ReallySimpleSyndication, AsynchronousJavascriptAndXml

Examples: Blogs, social networks

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Description: Web 3.0: Universal Meaning, Contextual

What it will do: Mostly technological innovations as the Web learns (AKA Semantic Web) but more human

Prototypical Technology: ResourceDescriptionFramework, OWL-WebOntologyLanguage

Examples: Wolfram Alpha, Augmented Reality

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semantic web
Semantic Web Rubik’s Cube by Duncan Hill

Context and Community

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Wayne Hodgins raises the issue that information can be both a product and a service.

Information is a noun/product when it is in the form of a report or document created on spec or in advance of a specific use or client. Whereas it is a verb/service when it is a collection of “just the right” information matched to a specific person/group and context. I would posit that information in and of itself has little to no value.  The value of information comes when it is Snowflaked or “just right” as in just the right information for just the right person(s) at just the right time in just the right context on just the right medium/device, etc.

Lee Lefever described this product/service aspect of information as Stocks & Flows:

Flows = Timely & Engaging (e.g. radio, speeches, email, blogs)

Stocks = Archived, Organized for Reference (e.g. web site, database, book, voice mail)

In my experience, I’ve seen that with ‘products’, price tends to zero; or that the same item will continue to get cheaper over time. Services, on the other hand, remain stable, and may even go up in price as they become more popular. Note how famous speakers and consultants charge more money.

For example, generic educational course content keeps getting cheaper, with many free options now available, like wiki-how. Content (information as a product) is no longer king in the online learning world.

For a successful business model, content needs to be combined with both Community and Context — two critical factors in supporting learning environments. For example:

  • Online Courses where Community = your cohort & Context = a relevant (to you) credential
  • Performance Support where Community = your co-workers & Context = current need
  • Knowledge Management (and PKM) where Community = those with shared interests & Context = sense of belonging to a community.

The Chinese Pod model gets this right by understanding the user/learner. Their three step model is a good one for Web learning businesses — Reward Attention, Support the Community, & Keep Tweaking the Business Model.

Taking Wayne’s advice could be the first step in creating a successful online learning business model, by providing “just the right information for just the right person(s) at just the right time in just the right context on just the right medium/device”.

Complexity and change

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Interesting things I learned on Twitter this past week.

Complexity

The State of Social Learning Today & Some Thoughts for the Future of Learning & Development (L&D) in 2010 via @c4lpt

If it seems too complex for L&D to take on the “responsibility” for enabling learning across the organisation, then bear in mind that this role will probably be assumed by others, e.g. Bus Ops, IT or Internal Communications departments as their own interests widen. If this takes place, what is likely to happen to the L&D function? As the desire and need for formal training diminishes, L&D will probably become more and more marginalized. 2010 is therefore the year for L&D to take action! So who can help?

via @finiteattention “Seen on a colleague’s noticeboard: If everyone is doing it …” [Dilbert’s point hits the core of the “best practices” problem]

The Cynefin Framework Mindmap via @johnt

Classroom instruction is complex but do we treat it as such? Is “sensing” a priority of teacher education? How would an instructor who waits for “patterns to emerge” be viewed by their supervisor? As laid back? Aloof? And does outcome-based education (unintentionally) result in educators treating complex situations as complicated, or worse yet, simple in nature?

Networking reconsidered via @jonhusband

In a rapidly changing world, the knowledge that matters the most is tacit knowledge — the knowledge that we have all accumulated from our experiences that we have a hard time expressing to ourselves, much less to each other. The challenge is that this type of knowledge — in contrast to the explicit knowledge that can be written down and broadcast to the world — does not flow very easily. Accessing this kind of knowledge requires long-term trust based relationships and a deep understanding of context. Large contact databases don’t particularly help in this quest and, in fact, can subvert our efforts to build the kinds of relationships that matter the most.

Changing Practice

Tom Gram: Instructional Design: Science, Art & Craft: in balanc:

Effective learning designs then,  happen most when that elusive combination of art, science and craft come together. Where the three approaches coexist, through a skillfully assembled learning team the result is usually effective, motivational learning grounded in the realities of the organization.

Evidence that change does not come from within, in this ASTD article via @JaneBozarth

Old favorites dominated in our study. E-learning today appears to be mostly about delivering assessments and designs, testing, personalization, scenarios, and tutorials. All these are familiar, and they all have deep roots in the training and development community. Should we lament that the habits identified in this study are not much different in 2009 than they were in 1989 (although, of course, enabled by technology)?

Group photo of some of the ASTD survey respondents:

changethesystem

Your product may no longer be your product

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When I started this blog six years ago I knew that I would be “giving away” my thoughts for free. Some might say that’s all they’re worth. I’ve also kept the site ad free for a couple of reasons – ads don’t pay much, they get in the way of readers and I want people to focus on the conversations here or just get the information they need. No ads sets me apart from many other sites, so that’s a good thing in the long run. I make my money mainly by consulting and less from speaking and writing. Externally, this blog is one big business card. Internally, it’s my knowledge base that informs my work. In addition, it’s a way to communicate with my peers.

I would like to be paid for my writing on this blog but the economics of that are not really possible. On the internet, information wants to be free. That can be a good thing. Free has let me become much better known than I was seven years ago when I started this business. As Seth Godin says, on the internet, piracy is not your problem, obscurity is. The internet is changing a lot of business models. I’m interested in business models, especially since I’ve been personally affected by several failed ones.

Janet Clarey talks about the changes that have happened to her work as a researcher/analyst:

Now, I seem to work with hundreds [of people] and that brings me to a conflict I’ve had for the better part of a year: sharing. I share what I can and have taken some criticism for not making all knowledge available for free. Some seem to think that’s the way everything should be. Free. But research is our product. You might sell insurance. I’m not going to ask you for free insurance. So I’ve reconciled that in my mind. If anyone wants more than free, I’d be happy to be your analyst : )

I would surmise that ten years ago it was easier to sell a research report than it is now. There was less information available online for free. However, I think there is still a growing market for mass customization. That means a customized research report for me that’s different than one for somebody else. That’s pretty well what I sell: customized strategy & analysis for the specific context of each client. The challenge for Janet (and all of us in the custom information business) is figuring out the 90% that we should give away for free and the 10% that has market value and that we can charge for. The problem is that this sweet spot keeps changing so we need to keep tweaking and reinventing our business models. This is like determining what degree of centralization works best for market and technology conditions.