gram consulting » informal learning

Everyday Experience is Not Enough

Tom Gram — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 20:13:19 +0000

A core tenet of informal and social learning is that we learn through experience. It’s the elephant in the 70-20-10 room. It’s often used as an admonishment to formal learning. Advocates of the most laissez-faire approaches informal learning suggest that given the right tools (social anyone?) employees will do just fine without all the interference by the learning department, thank you very much.

No one in their right mind would argue that experience is not a powerful teacher, or that our most valuable learning occurs while working. But it’s pretty broad generalization don’t you think? Some experiences must be more valuable than others for achieving learning and performance goals. And if so, what makes those experiences more valuable and how do we know them when we see them? Or, from the perspective of the learning professional, how can we help create the right experiences to help people develop their skills? These seem to be important questions if we are to get beyond loose approaches to informal learning…

…Please visit my new blog Performance X Design to read the remainder of this post and others.

Note: The Gram Consulting blog has been discontinued. I post blog introductions here to encourage former Gram Consulting readers to visit the new blog. All the Gram Consulting content, plus a bunch of new posts are on the new blog. Please come on over…

Designs for Natural Learning

Tom Gram — Fri, 03 Jun 2011 15:32:03 +0000

What learning are you designing at the moment?

If you’re a traditional instructional designer it may be a structured e-learning or classroom program. If you have a more constructivist bent you may be working on an immersive “learning environment”. If you prefer humanist OD approaches maybe an action learning program is how you roll. These are all awesome interventions in the right circumstances and each has their place in the learning continuum.

But in addition to these designed programs, I think we have a responsibility to help people learn as they pursue their day to day work. Call this informal learning if you like, but I prefer natural learning. Done well, it typically goes unrecognized as learning at all. But it too can be designed. Instead of learning programs, you are designing work environments, tools, information and feedback systems. The raw materials of this effort is the work itself. Think of it as performance design….

…Please visit my new blog Performance X Design to read the remainder of this post and others.

Mapping Informal and Formal Learning Strategies to Real Work

Tom Gram — Thu, 05 May 2011 15:51:21 +0000

During the Q&A at a recent conference session on Social Learning a retail industry attendee asked: “I have to train 300 store level associates in new product knowledge in the next three months. Is social learning really what I want?” What would your answer be?

I advocate informal and social learning vehicles when appropriate and get as excited about their uses as you likely do, but it’s not a panacea for all our learning woes. The current zeal around social learning solutions can distract from real performance needs (we’ve been distracted before). Social learning gets positioned as the enlightened and “correct” solution for the modern workplace. Formal learning is old, tired, and reluctantly tolerated for the vestiges of the traditional, mechanistic workplace.

But, set aside your biases one way or the other for the moment and simply think of the roles and functions you support in your organization. It will vary by industry of course, but your list is going to be some subset of the following:

..Please visit my new blog Performance X Design to read the remainder of this post and others.

Making Informal Learning Assets Work

Tom Gram — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 17:23:15 +0000

Seeking ways to leverage new social media environments, learning departments are discovering ways to sneak a little formal learning through the informal learning back door. Some of our clients for example, are looking to load up their social learning environments with small bits of learning content related to business goals. The notion being that these informal learning assets will live or die on the strength of their connection to employee performance need. Informal learning assets (or perhaps more accurately formal learning assets designed for informal consumption) are small segments of learning media such as videos, podcasts, documents, animations, short interactive pieces, images, performance guides, job aids, process descriptions, anything with a learning intention that can be posted to a social media environment. They can be created by anyone, from learning designers, to managers and employees and team members…

…Please visit my new blog Performance X Design to read the remainder of this post and others.

The 30 Second MBA

Tom Gram — Mon, 28 Feb 2011 21:18:31 +0000

I came across this interesting resource recently–The 30 second MBA.

It’s a venture of Fast Company Magazine. Leaders and entrepreneurs from a variety of industries are asked to describe their approach to various leadership problems and topics in 30 seconds or less (ticking clock and all). The site describes their mission like this:….

…Please visit my new blog Performance X Design to read the remainder of this post and others.

Note: The Gram Consulting blog has been discontinued. I post blog introductions here to encourage former Gram Consulting readers to visit the new blog. All the Gram Consulting content, plus a bunch of new ones are on the new blog. Please come on over…

Evaluating Training and Learning Circa 2011

Tom Gram — Thu, 17 Feb 2011 20:56:08 +0000

In a recent article in CLO magazine, Dan Pontefract questioned the value of traditional training evaluation, the Kirkpatrick approach in particular (article re-posted here). The article raised the ire of the Kirkpatrick organization and Dan responded in a follow-up post . Others had observations on the post (see Don Clark and Harold Jarche.) I’ve been involved in many evaluation efforts over the years, both useful and ill-advised, and have some thoughts to share.

I’ll paraphrase Dan and (Wendy) Kirkpatrick to summarize the positions (probably incorrectly but this debate happens so often I’ll use Dan and Christy more as archetypal voices for both sides of the argument)…..

Please visit my new blog Performance X Design to read the remainder of this post and others.

Note: The Gram Consulting blog has been discontinued…I post blog introductions here to encourage Gram Consulting readers to visit the new blog. Please come on over…

Management Development Redux

Tom Gram — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 01:11:02 +0000

My last few posts have been related to management and leadership development. In this post, I thought I would bring some of the ideas together in the form of a process or heuristic for a management development process built around defined business challenges, informal learning approaches with less reliance (or no reliance at all!) on classroom learning.

Here is an alternative management development process then…in just 5 easy steps!…built around authentic learning tasks and supported by informal learning assets and small team action learning sessions.

Please visit my new blog Performance X Design to read the rest of this post and others.

Note: The Gram Consulting blog has been discontinued…I post blog introductions here to encourage Gram Consulting readers to visit the new blog. Please come on over…

An Idea List: Using Web 2.0 for Management Development

Tom Gram — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 01:53:17 +0000

At the session I described in my last post, table groups did a short brainstorming session on how web 2.0 tools could be used in a Management Community of Practice to facilitate learning. Each table recorded their ideas and left them for me. I promised the group I would post them here. So here you are folks.

Communities of practice are dynamic social structures that require both initial design and ongoing cultivation so they can emerge and grow. However, through a series of steps, learning professionals and community members can design a community environment, foster the formalization of the community, and plan activities to help grow and sustain the community. But ultimately, the members of the community will define and sustain it over time.

Here are most of the activities listed from the session. Some are slightly edited for consistency or to merge with similar items to create a single list.

Please visit my new blog Performance X Design to see the list.

Note: The Gram Consulting blog has been discontinued…I post blog introductions here to encourage Gram Consulting readers to subscribe to the new blog. Please come on over…

Leadership Development in a Learning 2.0 World

Tom Gram — Mon, 31 May 2010 17:53:37 +0000

Last week I presented a session titled Leadership Development in a Learning 2.0 World at the CSTD 2010 National Symposium. Here is the description of the session from the conference program:

Leadership Development in a Learning 2.0 World

Developing effective leaders and managers is an increasingly important task for the learning function. Leadership development has been slow to adopt eLearning strategies but recent developments in web 2.0 technologies, along with changing perspectives on workplace learning are changing that. The social learning drivers behind learning 2.0 are a natural fit for the learning needs of managers and leaders and provide the learning function with an opportunity for real innovation in leadership development practices. This session will provide an overview of the key concepts, strategies and tools to help transform leadership development practices for the emerging learning 2.0 world.

Learning Outcomes:

Contrast current leadership development practices with learning 2.0 driven practices
Describe benefits of learning 2.0 for transforming leadership and management development
Describe a model of leadership development driven by learning 2.0 principles
Envision a future Leadership Development program for your organization on a by a learning 2.0 foundation
Define strategies for integrating learning 2.0 concepts into current leadership development programs

To read the full post and view the conference presentation please visit Performance X Design.

Instructional Design: Science, Art and Craft

Tom Gram — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 03:29:41 +0000

Happy New Year!

I’ve was reading some Henry Mintzberg over the holidays. His recent books–Managing and Managers Not MBA’s–both question prevailing thinking on management and leadership and present alternatives for effective management practice and development. Both books include a model of management as a balancing act between science, art and craft. His argument is that effective management requires all three and an overemphasis on any one results in dysfunction.

I think it also offers some insight to effective Instructional Design. Much of the recent debate regarding Instructional Design models and practice (see my own view here) seem to revolve around the prescriptive, process based models of ADDIE (and like models) versus more open constructivist approaches, presumably more relevant for our networked and collaborative work environments. The arguments tend to get unnecessarily polarized. The following table is adapted from a similar one Mintzberg created for defined management styles. I believe it works equally well for for Instructional Design practice.

Please visit Performance X Design to read the full post….