focused on the wrong literacy

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In 2018, while working for the government of Finland, I developed a model of network literacies. Today our Prime Minister says that Canadians need to develop AI literacy and he even has a Minister of AI to implement it.

Let’s look back at network literacies —

They could be described as individuals and communities understanding and being part of global networks that influence various aspects of our lives. For individuals, the core skill is critical thinking, or questioning all assumptions, including one’s own. People can learn through their various communities and develop social literacy. Information literacy is improved by connecting to a diversity of networks. But control of networks by any single source — such as Generative AI platforms — destroys the ability for people and communities to develop real network era fluency, which is not good for society in the long run and may kill innovation and our collective ability to adapt.

Mass network era fluency can ensure that networks remain open, transparent, and diverse — therefore reflecting many communities. This kind of fluency, by the majority of people, is necessary to deal with the many complex issues facing humanity. We cannot deal with complex issues and networked forces unless we can knowledgeably talk about them. This requires fluency.

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everything has been said before

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Self-determination theory (SDT) is one of the core pillars of my professional practice. I was glad to see that a past client of mine, the association of certified human resources professionals of Québec (CRHA), has adopted this framework for their profession. In my presentation in 2020 I concluded that while there is a modern HR system today, it is still informed by some old traditions that may no longer be appropriate. All professionals should understand the underlying assumptions of their field, question them, and determine if they are still useful.

The CRHA posted a good graphic on SDT on LinkedIn and I would like to share it here. It is also available in French.

I am posting this here in 2026 because — “Everything has been said before, but since nobody listens we have to keep going back and beginning all over again.” —André Gide (1869–1951)

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mansplaining as a service

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On the last Friday of each month I curate some of the observations and insights that were shared on social media. I call these Friday’s Finds.

Anytime anyone says: “thoughts and prayers” — my response is going to be: “pitchforks and torches” —@Julie Webgirl

Could this be because they can recognize it as mansplaining as a service? — @Diogenes Pontifx
“… women were consistently more skeptical than men that AI benefits would outweigh its risks, and were less convinced that their professional lives would gain because of the technology.” —Fortune

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“trust is flickering”

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Knowledge flows at the speed of trust, I wrote in 2022, further stating that when trust is lost, knowledge fails to flow. This happens in organizations. It also happens at a societal level. Networks of trust are what create value at all levels for human society. The onslaught of generative AI and large language models is destroying our trust in much of the information that informs our knowledge.

My last post on organizational knowledge was based on an article that had been written with the help of AI. It was only through my trusted human knowledge network that I found out. Not only did I lose trust in the author but I think I eroded the trust of my readers here. I will have to be more careful if I continue to blog here and I am wondering what the future of my writing will be.

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organizational knowledge

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Update: Please read this comment from Stan Garfield first and see the comments below to see that I was duped on writing this post.

A lengthy article on organizational knowledge and the people in the field highlights a number of common mistakes, all of which I have witnessed in my almost three decades of professional practice.

  1. Treating organizational knowledge as an IT problem. This is evident in the budget for the technology purchase compared to human implementation. The latter often has no budget.
  2. Focusing on explicit knowledge and ignoring tacit knowledge. This often comes in the form of offering a training course to cover the new knowledge of a system with no thought to helping people discuss how they will use the new system.
  3. Ignoring the need for trust in order to share knowledge. As I have noted for years, knowledge flows at the speed of trust. No imposed system will generate trust.
  4. Launching a KM initiative without visible leadership support. I have often seen organizational knowledge initiatives launched for the good of employees but with no engagement by executives. The lack of leadership by example dooms the project.
  5. Underestimating the knowledge loss that happens during workforce transitions. With knowledge loss not evident in the next fiscal quarter, executives often ignore its impact.

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clever and lazy

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On the last Friday of each month I curate some of the observations and insights that were shared on social media. I call these Friday’s Finds.

The Four Classes of Military Officers (Or Office Workers): Clever, Diligent, Stupid and Lazy

Clever and Lazy: While most senior leaders will deny this classification, it applies well, and not just for the reasons cited by Hammerstein-Equord. These are the leaders who have the breadth of experience and depth of wisdom to ask the right questions, see the future for what it is, and make the right decisions under the greatest duress. They’re also renowned for finding the simplest solutions to the most difficult problems, and that drives a lot of people crazy.

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end of the line

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In 2014 I started the first of the online PKM workshops, based on a model of three activities per week over six weeks to be done as a cohort with a common start and finish date. I would be available to respond to participants and provide support as required, including video calls.

It’s now the end of the line.

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stupid humans

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I have yet to find a use for Generative AI and continue to read about all the problems arising from the major purveyors of these tools.

Drew Wilson provides dozens of examples of AI gone wrong in Drew Wilson was Right: Carney’s AI Push Leads to AI Hallucinations.

Leaving it all to AI and just expecting some magical money saving result that’s better than ever before is a recipe for disaster. It’s burned so many people as shown above and will continue to burn people. This no matter how many times people swear up and down that AI is ‘improving’ and ‘practically perfect’. It’s nowhere near that and requires human intervention.

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stop being an individual

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On the last Friday of each month I curate some of the observations and insights that were shared on social media. I call these Friday’s Finds.

“Grab your pens and shovels, rabble rouser rebels. Take to the streets. Dig in for the long haul! Globally, communities of creative resistance are saying no to bullies. Artists and scientists, homemakers and caretakers, workers and kindreds in kindness and LOVE. — Unite. CREATE! Imagine. Fear not!” —Sheree Fitch

A new world is being born’: author Rebecca Solnit on the ‘slow revolution’ the far right cannot tolerate

A government can take away your rights, but no one can take away your belief in those rights. The first points of challenge to fascism are memory and history.” … “I often quote my friend Bill McKibben [the environmentalist]. We were sitting on a concrete floor at an activist space during the Paris climate treaty process [the Paris Agreement was adopted in 2015]. Somebody walked up and asked him a question he gets asked all the time. ‘What’s the best thing I can do as an individual?’ He said, ‘Stop being an individual.’ You may have your own quirky playlist and eye-makeup techniques, but you also have this solidarity. When you act, you act with others.”

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framing the narrative

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In smarter networks through better narratives, I noted that there needs to be a dominant narrative to counter “folks who’ve got nothing but conspiracies and medieval fantasies to base their arguments upon.” A new frame is required, not factual counter-arguments. This is how George Lakoff explains it, “1) Repetition strengthens the synapses in neural circuits that people use in thinking 2) Whoever frames first has an advantage 3) Negating a frame activates and strengthens it.” Basically, Lakoff states that whoever frames the narrative first has an advantage and that negating a frame only activates and strengthens it. So responding to trolls and conspiracy theorists, which we often feel compelled to do, only makes the buggers stronger — an understanding of my confusion.

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