Peter Henschel leads a conversation about informal learning. Keeping with his 12-step program not to use PowerPoint, he’s talking off the cuff. (But here are his planned slides.) Peter had the pleasure of “herding cats” for 17 years as director of the Institute for Research on Learning.

Peter will help us remember what we already know. The fundamental bumper-sticker point here is that learning is social. We learn from and with others.

Learning in general still retains a strong sense of I teach/you learn. Apprenticeship, on the other hand,  is more about membership, wanting to be part of a group and learning how to gain membership. We’re not yet at a point where we recognize that we learn by and through others.

IRL invented the term community of practice. Alludes to a barn-raising.

How will eLearning support pull rather than push?

1. CEO of StateFarm brought entire leadership team to IRL. Six anthropologists researched the company. They were about to pour money into a bricks-and-mortar university. Job one was designing the new building. Epiphany. The anthropologists found that StateFarm’s DNA was a rich, apprenticeship, helping environment. Don’t mess with it.

2. Xerox found they had 6,000 people in call centers, often in small pockets, staffed with lower-educated people. This was the individual dealing with the customer. They found they were abusing their customers. They decided it was their responsibility to help the customer find what he or she needed to know. *** IRL observed what was working best. They found enormous amount of learning. But if they’re not allowed into the social network, they depart. Made it easier for people to see one another and interact, to move from one center to another. No need to go off-site to accomplish this. Once Xerox became a true learning organization, morale improved, turnover decreased, people learned.

The more you participate the more you learn.

How-to & expertise

Hal Richman comes in via phone from New York. We’re on PlaceWare. Hal’s picture comes on screen and is talking with the group. Elise Olding starts the introduction in Menlo. Hal comes on with the “how-to.”

Knowledge Enablement (tacit and explicit knowledge)

Informal Learning (outside the classroom. If nurtured, this knowledge can move from people’s heads into semi-structured (Knowledge nuggets) and structured knowledge (knowledge bases)

Peter Henschel. Problem with tacit knowledge is that because it’s not measurable, we overlook it.

Arjun: How to we encourage people to share knowledge?

What’s the business problem?

Companies’ intellectual capital is tied up in its business processes.

“How To” walks out the door every night.

How much can be lost before competitive advantage is lost?

Elise: Schwab. High touch is a component of the culture. Follow the customer, not the competitor.

What are the benefits of enabling knowledge?

How do you get people to share? How to avoid redundant efforts? Co-location.

Tacit knowledge. What we can’t talk about.

Bruce Karney: Leaner and faster organizations. Incentive

Hal ceasing to take notes. He can’t understand the words. ..

Knowledge Enabling Functionality

technologies: search, eLearning, web meetings and virtual project rooms, expertise profiling, community, content management, personal knowledge tools. IM.

Knowledge continually at the periphery.

Thoughts from the crowd: tip-sharing; the reward is recognition. Self-organizing communities. Stimulation. The least intrusive tools possible; don’t over-control.

Melissa: no one sharing knowledge among the Fortune 50.

Gunar Bruchner of the United Nations Development Program adds that lots of the issue revolves around the democratization of knowledge. Give them a place to go for the knowledge they’re looking for without actually predetermining what they’re trying to find.

Market segmentation

• Personal knowledge tools – purple yogi, myplaceware, the brain, groove, kenjin
• User and Expertise Profiling: tacit, orbital, autonomy, idea exchanges
• Information Collection and association: knowmadic, skila hummingbird
• Concepts and communities: lotus, autonomy, intraspect

Peer-to-peer technology simplifies all

Informal learning. Unstructured learning, in the hall. Importance of context. Looking through two tubes.

Elise demonstrates the tubes. Auf wiederbye-bye context.

Subtle shift of the tubes shifts away from focus of attention. When you put the tubes on, you lose context.

Hal: We’re talking about informal learning because it’s a big deal. Educational Development Corporation has done deep research into this. 70% of employee learning is informal. Informal learning can be nurtured by identifying and implementing the factors that lead to success, including management blessing

Proprietary research shows that 80% of learning for professional designers will be through informal channels.

(Glitch in discussion. Hal, speaking remotely, overruns local speakers. It’s off-putting.)

Gain control by giving control. Let it go.

John McKee: an evaluative process is going on within the individual learner. I don’t listen to everyone in the coffee-room; I pick those I respect. Hal: The ability to entice knowledgeable others is key here but not much work has been done in this area. Also, authentication is key.

Peter Henschel: Xerox has found that authentication is vital – because many of the stories are not true.

(Discussions. But the discussions were too short. Insufficient time to really get anywhere.)

Lance: We’re trying to structure this. Think of culture first. Napster took off on its own. The real issue is how to set up an organizational culture.

What can we do? Resistance causes Pain. How do we create opportunities that attract and encourage change? How do we enable adaptability and agility?

The answer lies in understanding and forstering informal learning.

Jay: organizational update. Thanks to Vis-à-Vis for their work on the logo, to Sherrin Bennett of Interactive Learning Associates for her wonderful graphics and Lee Richter for brining the nametags and table tents. Thanks also to Convene, for offering their software, and to SRI LoD for the room and sandwiches.

We separated into tour task forces. More about them on the web site.