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Many thanks to the E-learning Council, members and their readers for the vote of confidence :)
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Learning
Learning
The new knowledge worker
What are knowledge workers? Are they a new breed or just a variation of the 20th century professional class? Neal Gorenflo, co-founder and publisher of Shareable Magazine, has identified (a very preliminary idea) a certain type of knowledge worker:
- Knowledge workers understand information as currency. Sharing is a core strategy for success even in a corporate context. This can bring knowledge workers to the commons.
- Their worldview is informed by systems thinking or is polyglot. It’s not informed by a single political ideology.
- They understand that influence depends on the ability to persuade, and that choice of language is important. They will not use political language that has been marginalized. They’re all in this sense salespeople.
- Knowledge workers can become moderate radicals, meaning they believe that fundamental change is needed but are politically a mixed bag, they borrow ideas from left and right, from religion, from science. And they have friends and relatives on both side of the political spectrum.
- They do not have stable identities or their identities are not wrapped up in a single belief system. They are always wondering who they are. This is a source of angst. But what they lack in identity, they make up for in opportunity. They have options.
My first reaction to this list was how obvious it is that these knowledge workers practice critical thinking; questioning all assumptions, including their own. These knowledge workers are united by networked and social learning and connected more so to the external environment than whatever internal team they happen to be working with. They have the long view, often unencumbered by dogma, but also short on quick, simple answers. They see the humour in H.L. Mencken’s comment that, “For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.”
If this is the new knowledge worker, what could that mean for the 21st century workplace?
- We are already seeing the knowledge worker (creative, passionate, innovative) marketplace becoming more competitive.
- Organizations may have to become more flexible and caring to attract good talent.
- Organizations & corporations may have to become more ethical and less politicized.
In the long run, this should be a good thing; but what about the rest of the workforce? Stories from the economic edge indicate frustration and desperation with a broken system. How do we get to a state of enlightened organizations in a transparent environment providing meaningful ways for people to contribute to society? The new knowledge workers may have some of the answers, if they decide to flex their minds and their networks. As a knowledge worker, with the luck and skill to be in this situation, there are some big responsibilities to shoulder very soon. Is it time to lead, follow, or get out of the way?
Keep your social media in perpetual Beta
When I started blogging, it was one of the few options to share ideas on the Net. There were some utilities like Quicktopic that let you easily make posts and of course we had listservs, bulletin boards and discussions forums that had been around for much longer. After blogs, the next big phenomena were social networks. Ning started by giving out spaces for free and there were many other variations on that theme. Today, Facebook is the general public forum of choice for individuals, businesses, charities, brands and almost everyone else. Facebook beat MySpace and many other contenders to the critical point when network effects drive exponential growth.
I’m still blogging, as are many others, but the conversation is constantly moving:
Blogs are for longer thoughts (at least for me).
Twitter is where you can feel the pulse of the action and are able to follow the most conversations.
LinkedIn is just a place where I hang my hat.
Google+ is becoming the place for deeper conversations as I recently discovered.
This is the current state of social networking, from my particular perspective, but I’m sure it’s different for others and I know it will change. The constant flux makes it difficult to advise others where to start. It depends, says the consultant in me. It really does, when you consider how quickly some of these platforms change and how some go from good to evil overnight. Hedge your bets, I’d say. Own your data when you must. Be flexible. Keep your social media in perpetual Beta.
New Hire Emergent Practices
In May I asked what interesting new hire practices have emerged in the workplace and later re-posted the question to Google+. I also collected a number of bookmarks on onboarding, as some companies call it. There are many good practices, such as:
- Dedicated coaches
- Formal introductions to people in the work network, especially those at a distance.
- Encouraging informal conversations.
- Giving enough time to settle into the work.
- Using collaboration platforms to enable better communication.
Good practices can be summed up with three key lessons:
- Connect People
- Connect with Social Media (less hierarchical than other forms of communication).
- Start the process as early as possible
Here are some of the more interesting emergent practices, in my opinion.
Offering to pay people to leave after onboarding, so that only motivated workers stay.
Have new employees work one level down for a week to see how their work affects others in the hierarchy. (Executive Yak)
Integrating staff into the workflow, culture, and team from day one (in a supportive environment). This reflects the emerging freelance economy that I work in, much more than the traditional corporate environment. As Will Kryski noted:
I jump into companies as a contractor with no hand holding, mentoring, etc and am expected to perform from day one. Huge learning curves, little info or help, even on how to use the timesheet system. I just ask as required or figure it out on my own.
And to which I responded that one advantage we free-agents have is in adapting to new contexts. We change clients more frequently than salaried employees change jobs. We’ve had to learn how to adapt. I remember one client where I got to spend a week in a broom closet.
What I found most interesting is that I did not find a lot of unique or emergent practices. Perhaps these are being kept as company secrets or maybe HR departments in general lack creativity and innovation.
Innotribe at Sibos Toronto
This morning I’m heading to Toronto to participate in the Innotribe stream for the Sibos conference. Peter Vander Auwera invited me and I’m really looking forward to what is already a most interesting conference, as I read the tweets and posts. I’m presenting on organizational models over time with Stowe Boyd and the session is moderated by the always-interesting Mark Dowds.
Peter’s blog has been covering many of the themes that will be discussed – Digital Identity; the new physics of big data; and new economies for example.
Some comments via Twitter so far:
@petervan – Decrease the bank’s AND the customer’s risk should be one of the principles
@dsearls – Has anybody ever drowned in a Deep Dive? Just wondering. :-) Corollary to last tweet: I have been rained out in a brainstorm.
@marovdan – # innotribe has grown and matured into something very important. The future course of finance is being debated and decided. Here.
There should be lots to learn and much to write about, which of course I’ll share here. Hugh Macleod is the official cartoonist for the event, so that should be a real treat!
Informal learning is a business imperative
In Part 2 of Social Learning doesn’t mean what you think it does, my colleague Jane Hart uses a very helpful diagram created by a previous colleague of mine, Tom Gram:
Tom Gram’s diagram [reproduced below] shows that “most work requires a combination of knowledge work and routine work. These characteristics of jobs and work environments call for different approaches to training and development.” [see Mapping informal and formal learning strategies to real work], so the work of the L&D department will be very different in different organisations, depending on the type of workers and work done.
I connected this to the whole notion of simpler work getting automated and outsourced usingTom’s framework.
I then created my own graphic and looked at what happens to work if this is true.
Supporting informal learning and helping connect tacit knowledge in the enterprise are now business imperatives, not just something extra. The valued work in the enterprise is increasing in variety and decreasing in standardization. It is moving to the edge. Organizations that do not optimize informal learning may themselves get automated and outsourced.
Adapting to a networked world
Simon Bostock referred me to this speech that Ben Hammersly gave to the UK’s Information Assurance Advisory Council. The main theme is how the ruling generation (Baby Boomers) are failing to understand how the Internet has changed EVERYTHING.
You’re all the same age, and upbringing, as the people that the digital generations are so upset with. Don’t take it personally, but your peers are the sorts of baby-boomers that have been entrusted with the future, while they are obviously so deeply confused by the present.
For example:
[Moores Law] This is all obvious for us, yes, but Truth Number One, is that anything that is dismissed on the grounds of the technology-not-being-good-enough-yet is going to happen. We have to tell people this.
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Fundamental Truth Number two is that the internet is the dominant platform for life in the 21st century.
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Indeed, a small part of the trigger for the London riots can be understood as the gap between the respect given to peoples’s opinions by the internet, and the complete disrespect given by the government and the ruling elites.
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The government, and the security industry, in this country and elsewhere, have spent the past ten years really blowing it. Time and time again there has been a demonstration of security theatre, or overreaction, or overstatement of the risks in hand. From liquids in airports to invading Iraq, no one believes this stuff any more.
Hammersly likens his role as “translator” between the ruling generation and the younger generations, and given his record, he seems to be doing this with a vengeance. I’m sure it will still take some time to get the message through.
Earlier this year I spoke to HR Executives and Chief Privacy Officers about social media, the most visible part of the world connected by the Internet. After one presentation it was clear that the group (all over 40) knew that things were changing but few understood what they could do within the context of their own organization. Or perhaps they had no real incentive to do so.
While people like Hammersly are needed as translators, we also need pathfinders to show concrete measures that can be taken by the pioneers. Using the tipping point metaphor, Mavens deeply understand the situation, Connectors are needed to get the word out and Salespeople have to convince those in control to take action. That means there’s work for many while we get to the critical mass where a networked way of working (e.g. wirearchy) living (e.g. Shareable) and learning (e.g. MOOC) become natural.
Social learning: the freedom to act and cooperate with others
“Hyperlinks subvert hierarchy“ – Article #7 of The Cluetrain Manifesto, 1999.
The Net, especially working and learning in networks, subverts many of the hierarchies we have developed over hundreds of years. Formal education is one example, as shown in this excellent article by Cathy Davidson:
Grading, in a curious way, exemplifies our deepest convictions about excellence and authority, and specifically about the right of those with authority to define what constitutes excellence. If we crowdsource grading, we are suggesting that young people without credentials are fit to judge quality and value. Welcome to the Internet, where everyone’s a critic and anyone can express a view about the new iPhone, restaurant, or quarterback. That democratizing of who can pass judgment is digital thinking. As I found out, it is quite unsettling to people stuck in top-down models of formal education and authority.
Thanks to Johnnie Moore for pointing out this article, but then that’s how much of my learning happens today. It’s social and comes via my online networks, in this case, Twitter.
Five years ago I wrote that a shift of focus (and development effort) away from the management aspects of learning and more on the social aspects of learning can only be positive for the learner. We need to better understand the social, network aspects of work and learning and build structures that support these. As we become more networked, status hierarchies are being replaced by task hierarchies [thanks to Esko Kilpi for these terms]. In both work and learning, our status in our networks is constantly changing and being renegotiated. We focus on tasks, and in doing these, our status changes. It’s no longer about who we are, but what we do. Isn’t this how our social networks function as well? Social learning, a key part of any community, is a dance with changing partners, each interpreting the music in their own way but influenced by every partner.
Social learning is the lubricant of networked, collaborative work. Therefore we need to redesign work structures that foster self-organized (social) groups for learning and working. If work is learning, and learning is the work, then shouldn’t the workplace be structured as a learning environment? And shouldn’t educational institutions foster this kind of integrated, collaborative, social learning? This is revolutionary. Peter Isackson describes the subversive nature of social learning in the Hole-in-the-Wall (HiW) learning experiments:
It seems to me that the fundamental key to the success of HiW is the notion of “self-organized groups” who learn on their own. If education is to become truly non-invasive, as Jay suggests, it must refrain from defining both the goals and the means to reach them, entrusting the groups with this task. If educational gurus (authorities) notice that a group is neglecting what is considered “essential” in the curriculum (for whatever reason, whether it’s basic security, survival or inculcating an existing set of values), the group could be challenged to account for why they may be neglecting a certain topic or reminded of the interest in pursuing it. Respecting the self-organizing group and its decision-making capacity is the sine qua non of success. It also happens to be the absolute opposite of the organizational principles of traditional education and training.
One current theme in the workplace and education circles is to “blend” social with the formal and structured. But social learning is not a bolted-on component of our formal educational and training programs. It is a sea change. It will disrupt institutions built upon the technology of the printing press – all communication enterprises, including education. Yes, we have always learned and worked socially, but we have never had the power of ridiculously easy group-forming or almost zero-cost duplication of our words and images.
The network effect of the Web is explained in detail in Yochai Benkler’s The Wealth of Networks. Benkler describes the changes that a networked society can have on our governance, economic and cultural structures [bold added]:
The networked information economy improves the practical capacities of individuals along three dimensions: (1) it improves their capacity to do more for and by themselves; (2) it enhances their capacity to do more in loose commonality with others, without being constrained to organize their relationship through a price system or in traditional hierarchical models of social and economic organization; and (3) it improves the capacity of individuals to do more in formal organizations that operate outside the market sphere. This enhanced autonomy is at the core of all the other improvements I describe. Individuals are using their newly expanded practical freedom to act and cooperate with others in ways that improve the practiced experience of democracy, justice and development, a critical culture, and community.
One final note for all those managers, directors and others in status hierarchies: social learning is about giving up control.
Mimi & Eunice cartoons by Nina Paley.
Making sense of our world
I define Personal Knowledge Management (PKM) as a set of processes, individually constructed, to help each of us make sense of our world, work more effectively and contribute to society. It’s sense making + getting things done.
George Siemens has made this rather succinct statement about knowledge:
When I externalize something, it’s information.
When someone connects it in some manner, it becomes knowledge.
Knowledge is essentially relatedness/connectedness.
PKM is about making connections, with ideas and with people.
As I keep developing my own processes and work with clients to promote a networked learning culture I look for clearer ways of describing what this PKM stuff is all about.
The image below is an attempt to state the Seek-Sense-Share framework as simply as possible.
To be effective networked learners, we need to seek information; pulling, instead of having it pushed to us by others. We can use human (e.g. Twitter) and mechanical (e.g. Google) filters to help us do this.
We connect to this information by making sense of it in a variety ways, such as validating it with our own experiences and observations (e.g. blogging). We have to be more than just information filters. Our experiences inform us and our environment gives us feedback. Making sense of the present prepares us for the future.
Sharing information about what we have learned by narrating our work (e.g. activity streams) and making it transparent (e.g. Intranets & Web) can create serendipitous network effects through social learning. As Hugh Macleod says, “The network is more powerful than the node”.
It's about networks
Rob Paterson writes at FastForward Blog on how the UK riots show us that everyone needs to be plugged into the Web to get things done; for good and for bad:
The Police and the community are learning also in real time how to help each other – by also using social media. Citizens are using Twitter and Facebook to help the police have better intelligence and the police are learning this week how best to respond and to monitor.
I noted in a post on Agility & Autonomy that a culture of perpetual Beta is critical. Perpetual Beta means we never get to the final release and that our learning will never stop. Agile organizations realize they will never reach some future point where everything stabilizes and they don’t need to learn or do anything new. Networks are in perpetual Beta too. Unlike hierarchies, they continuously change shape, size and composition. Our thinking needs to continuously change as well.
Euan Semple talks about the power the Web gives us:
This is why I am so passionate about the web and the ability it gives us, to quote David Weinberger, to “write ourselves into existence”, to see the world as made up of connected individuals with the ability to shape their shared future rather than as a mass or ideologically driven herd.
This is also why I feel so motivated to work with the large corporations and institutions that so dominate our modern world. If I can help any of the individuals who make up those organisations to feel a little bit more self aware, a little bit more capable, and a little bit more able to think for themselves and speak for themselves, and to do so as part of networks of others doing the same – then I will have done my job.
I’ve observed that one of the biggest hurdles facing organizations, and people working in them, is to stop thinking of hierarchies and start thinking of networks. Asking, “What do you do for a living?” shows hierarchical thinking, as does “What is your job title?”. Network-centric questions would be, “What is happening?” or “What are you learning?” or “Who are you learning from?”. No wonder Twitter asks, What’s happening?; Socialcast asks you to share something; Google+ prompts you to share what’s new and Yammer asks, What are you thinking about?
Both Rob and Euan posted their thoughts online today and I have woven them together with my own perspectives. My thinking is a product of my networks. Understanding networks, weaving networks and contributing to networks (the integration of learning & work) are now critical skills in all organizations. Like Euan, I am making progress one person at a time, and there has been progress. I hope it’s fast enough to deal with the increasing complexity and violence.
It’s about networks, stupid, or, as Searls & Weinberger conclude in World of Ends, “We have nothing to lose but our stupidity.