Hi Harold.  I also shared your experience with military training.  In hindsight purpose of the formal training I received in school environments was to provide me with the ability to participate in informal (collective) at the unit.  The exception of this was specific skills training, which would fall into the 'simple' category described in your 'Three Principles of Net Work' post (http://jarche.com/2012/04/three-principles-for-net-work/).

As you indicate in one of the graphics in the latter, as a principle can we posit formal learning - training and education - as suitable for simple and complicated tasks, and informal as best suited to prepare staff to develop solutions for problems in the complex-chaotic zone?