Headed to DevLearn?

I hope to see you at the eLearning Guild's DevLearn Conference and Expo next week. If you're there, join me Wednesday for a Morning Buzz session on social learning, on Thursday for breakout sessions "What Managers and Executives Need to Know About Social Learning" and, with Kevin Thorn "DesignBoarding: Leveraging Good Treatments for Your Content".  Also on Thursday I'll be on the Strategic Buyers Stage to discuss "Outsourcing Social Media: When and Why".  Also check out sessions from many of my great and learned (and entertaining) colleagues. DevLearn is always a great time, and this year it's in Vegas, baby. Should be a fun and meaningful time! 

"Nuts and Bolts" for Practitioners

Many of you likely know that for the past couple of years I've been writing a monthly column, "Nuts & Bolts", for the eLearning Guild's Learning Solutions Magazine. It's meant to help an audience largely made up of folks who may have found their way to eLearning and instructional design via less-than-formal means. I find that writing this often satisfies my bloggin' urge (and find that people often refer to these columns as "posts"). Some are ID based, some philosophical, some theory. Visit here for all the past columns. 

"Social Media for Learning" Report

I was delighted that the eLearning Guild invited me to write up the results of their ongoing "Social Media for Learning" report. The 2011 version is now available to Guild members. Results showed great enthusiasm for using social media for learning, and widespread (83% of respondents!) belief that social media for learning was worthwhile. 


There's a brief excerpt in my October "Nuts and Bolts" Column for Learning Solutions if you'd like to take a look there. 

Tool Time: To Each His Own

In my work I sometimes need to schedule meetings with people, all at once, who live around the globe: New York, LA, Sydney, London. As I am math-challenged even on the best days I find the time zone issue confounding and almost always get something wrong. I'd tried a number of time zone converters but none displayed multiple cities in just the way I needed. So I was delighted to find out about World Time Buddy, which displays time by cities all at once. I tweeted about this and was almost immediately, resoundingly, hammered with responses like "this is not useful for webinars" and "I don't need to know the city, I need to know the time zone".

Here's the thing: World Time Buddy is useful to me. It is the tool that solves my problem. It is what I need. With literally dozens of time converters out there, no doubt there is something more useful for you, that solves your problem. This is part of the magic of the web 2.0 world: people can find just-in-time, just-for-me solutions. Some of us think that maybe that's supposed to be the point.

I see this happen, too, in discussions of most other tools. People say, "Well, college students don't use Twitter" as if there is some fatal flaw of Twitter that only college students see. Why would a college student use Twitter? Do most undergraduates need to reach out to big online communities day and night? I like Twitter because I am in a very isolating work role and have found it a wonderful way to connect with other L&D professionals and writers. I didn't really need that when I was in college. (And by the way: when I'm in a location with lots of friends nearby, like at a conference, and want to keep in touch via text, I don't really use Twitter for that. I like the Beluga phone app. I bet college students have something they like for that, too.)

And of course it is happening now with Google+. I keep going in to look at conversations, and I'd guess that fully half of them right now are either arguments about how Google+ is better or worse than some other tool, or discussions of which other tool will or will not be put out of business by Google+. I like Google+  fine, and I've enjoyed playing with it for the past week or so. I also still like Facebook and Twitter just fine, too. Others like LinkedIn. Or Ning groups. Or [name your tool]. (As I've said before: Don't like Facebook, Twitter, or Google+? Ask for your money back.)

I don't know why we feel there has to be one magic tool to rule them all. But I do know this, for sure: If tomorrow someone launched the Perfect Social Media Product, which was free, ridiculously easy to use, seamlessly integrated with every other need and tool, and solved every problem we had, then the day after tomorrow there would rise up a group of People Who Hate The Perfect Social Media Product. There would then be another tool, and more discussions, and ... will it ever end?

So my $.02? Find what you need, and use that tool/those tools. Partly that may be driven by where your best connections spend most of their time. But don't be blind to other, newer things, or places where other good connections are spending time, and try to give them an honest chance. And please, if we ever need to have a meeting in Yokohama, be sure to double-check my math.

Join me at eLearn Magazine!

I have recently taken on a new role as Editor in Chief of eLearn Magazine and hope you'll be a partner with me on this new journey. Here is part of my welcome message:

"I’m thrilled to be coming on board as Editor in Chief.  We’ve worked hard to identify ways of keeping the best of the last 10 years while looking for new areas of focus and ideas for reaching a broader community of readers. eLearning has evolved so much since 2001, from “CBT” and the early days of “distance education,” through virtual classrooms and virtual worlds to, now, the brave new frontier of handheld devices and mLearning, in an age with so much being created, shared, and curated through the new channels provided by social media.

The eLearn reader we hope to reach is  interested in and willing to use new technologies and approaches in creating, delivering, and supporting instruction (both academic and organizational) and workplace performance improvement.  This reader sees him- or herself as an educator or workplace learning practitioner interested in professional development, improving practice, and learning more about learning regardless of the vehicle.  He regards professional development and lifelong learning as an obligation for any practitioner in any field.  She is not a schoolmarm with a ruler.

eLearn will continue to publish content for the higher ed audience but will expand material for  those involved in workplace training, instructional design, and performance support.   We’ve already begun this journey with Cammy Bean’s wonderful  “Avoiding the Trap of Clicky-Clicky-Bling-Bling”, Aaron Silvers’ review of Thomas and Brown’s New Culture of Learning, and Tracy Parish’s reportage from Learning Solutions 2011."

We welcome reader submissions and invite case studies, research, app and product reviews, reviews of conferences and other events.

See the full text of my first blog post and writer's guidelines for more details. 

Talking is Easy. Do Your Objectives match Your Strategies?

New "Nuts and Bolts" column today! Do your learning objectives match strategies and outcomes? 

“Talking is easy. Presenting bullet points is easy. Figuring out how to reach the other domains – to provide psychomotor practice or to elicit an emotional response – is your challenge in developing effective eLearning.”

THIS is What Social Learning Looks Like

Something really interesting happened on Twitter last night. The backstory: There is a regularly scheduled discussion, #blogchat, that happens on Sunday evenings at 8 pm ET (oops--update, correction: 8 Central). Participants share ideas for generating content, growing readership, that kind of thing. I don't usually participate but I follow several people who do. Last night I happened to see a tweet from @MackCollier with a link to http://mackcollier.com/congrats-to-the-four-blogs-that-will-be-reviewed-at-blogchat/ . Turns out the #blogchat group decided to dedicate some of their Sunday nights to offering critiques of one another's blogs. Participants wanting feedback submitted their blogs for consideration; 4 were chosen this time with a promise that others would be considered soon. 


Those who offered their blogs up for review got a good deal of feedback useful particularly for them, but also for others in the group. For example:
@newdaynewlesson: Make your type left justified. Centered screams amateur.
@Collin_K: Font in the header looks too much like comic sans. Hard to take you seriously.
@blogdash: You want your readers to focus on your content. Everything else is a distraction. Choose your distractions wisely.
@Collin_K:  I've never been a fan of the double sidebar. Takes too much attention off of content.
@TheOnlineMom: I love how you share your objectives of the blog right off the bat.
@MikeHale: You can get a premium template for $100 and tweak it, you don't need to do a whole custom design. 
@AmyAfrica  If you want a new design & are on a budget, get a new header. It's affordable & it will make biggest difference.


I think last night's #blogchat is important for several reasons:
1. So many organizations show interest in Twitter and other social tools, but then worry about making online conversations private, or locking them up inside the company's firewall. I always say that's not really the point, and last night's #blogchat is exactly why. These are people who otherwise don't know each other, or work together, but who share a common interest -- and improving could be quite valuable to some of their employers. Talking about top-secret research on a new drug the company hopes to patent, or a pending indictment of an SVP? Maybe not in public. Talking about making your corporate blog better, or tweaking your leadership academy, or communicating with a global workforce, or finding the best productivity apps for the organization-issued smartphones? Why not a Twitter chat, or a LinkedIn discussion, or a Facebook group open to the rest of the world? 


2. The fact that this happened in public means I got to learn from  it, too. Because I happen to follow some of  #blogchat's regular participants, their tweets started showing up in my feed.  My takeaways: In blogging, content matters more than most anything else, and "choose your distractions wisely". I also found a couple of interesting new folks to follow. How many of us work in organizational silos and have discovered -- often too late -- that employees in other silos were having really interesting, useful discussions relevant to our own interests and work? Or were working on a project that we could contribute to? Or were replicating work that's already been done? Another thing that happens by living out in the big wide world: You may find new things that interest you. Hagel, Brown & Davison's Power of Pull describes this as "increasing your surface areas".


3. Popular talk about  "communities of practice" (CoPs) focuses a great deal on 'community' but rarely on 'practice'.  Per Wenger, a CoP is comprised of people who work together with the explicit intention of getting better at what they do (not just talking about it, or complaining about it, or 'conferencing', or sharing 'best practices'), but to actually apply their new learning and improve their own practice.  #blogchat is a great example of what a CoP does. The community members don't want to just gripe about problems with blog products, or trash other bloggers who don't participate in #blogchat, or complain that someone else's blog is better because that someone else has funding for it. People engage within the CoP with the intention of improving their practice. Most are open to offering up their own work and saying, "How could this be better?" -- if the feedback is given in a spirit of cameraderie from peers or other credible sources. Most people are willing to share what they know. Most people want to help each other. And what organizations often just can't grasp: People can gather based on their own self-identified needs and self-manage to get better at what they do -- without excessive administrative oversight or elaborate procedures.


Here's the thing: What happened in #blogchat last night goes on all the time in workplaces. People say they're having a problem and ask coworkers or others for help. They likely don't think to document it on their TPS reports, or include it on a time sheet, or maybe even mention it to anyone else. They don't call themselves "adult learners"; they call themselves "solving a problem". Last night it happened to happen on Twitter. Where is it happening in your organization? 

There's an App -- or Something -- for That

I remember the day I felt the technology plates shift under my feet. It was maybe 6 years ago: post-Internet, pre-Kindle, and I'd gone into the local library. I was standing in the fiction section thinking how great it would be if I could go online at home and store an evolving list of books I wanted to read, and then pull it up when I got to the library.

Well, it turned out, the library had an app for that. Ok, not an app exactly, but an online catalog/request system that did exactly what I wanted. It was a moment that foretold -- for me -- the coming age of apps, of devices talking to one another, and of  the Cloud. I remember that was the moment I stopped thinking, "Why can't I...?" and started asking "Can I....?" I've had a lot of moments like that since then: I wished there was something that would send an alert when there's a traffic jam to or from the office. I wished I could find out what is the name of that song they're playing in the shoe store. I wished there was somewhere I could just store my music online and access it from anywhere on any device. Well, I have all that now. Some days it's like rubbing a magic lamp: wish, and it appears.

I love these changes in technology, every day. And I love the usual answer now to "Can I...?"

What was your moment?

Building Your PLN

This month's "Nuts and Bolts" column is on building your Personal Learning Network (PLN).

Headed to Learning Solutions?

Headed to the Learning Solutions 2011 Conference in Orlando next week? Lots of great folks will be presenting, including Marc Rosenberg, Patti Shank, Thiagi, Brandon Carson & Enzo Silva, Judy Unrein, Brian Dusablon & Kevin Thorn, Tom Kuhlmann, Michelle Lentz, Ray Jiminez, Mark Oehlert... I'd better stop. I'm going to get in trouble for leaving folks out.

SO: I hope to see you there. I'm onsite all week. Find me on Twitter @JaneBozarth. Even if you're not in one of my sessions, please hunt me down and say howdy. Keep an eye out for my Twitter avatar.




My sessions:
Monday, March 21: Foundations Intensive, "Evaluating eLearning"
Tuesday: Certificate Program : "Better than Bullet Points: Creating Engaging eLearning with PowerPoint"
Wednesday: "Social Media for Trainers"
Thursday: ID Zone, "Social Media: Myths & Magic"
And the closing "Ignite!" Session

The New Learning Architect

Last month at Learning Technologies UK I finally had the pleasure of meeting Clive Shepherd in real life. We vowed to read and to review each other’s new books, a promise he kept right away and on which I was delinquent. I did download The New Learning Architect to Kindle right away – it’s available solely in handy ebook form—and did finally settle down with it last weekend.

Clive does a great job articulating a problem that’s nagged at me for a long while: as one trend surfaces, separate camps emerge and the implication of a winner and loser takes over the discussion. We saw it with eLearning v. classroom learning; we’re seeing it again now with informal learning v. formal. Shepherd argues that learning occurs in several contexts, with formal learning only one card in that deck, but still a useful one. He then offers a nice tour through tools and approaches within each context.  It’s the goal of L&D, he says, to build not classes or courses but environments in which people can learn, and those environments can come in several forms.  Suggesting we are ‘architects’ raises the bar, asking us to move to a more efficacious position above the ‘order taker’ function we’ve been fulfilling for far too long (“Yes, sir! That’ll be an order of Teambuilding with a side of Conflict Resolution!”)

Novices will find this very useful—there is a lot of support here to help them step off on the right foot,and  I think it would be a fabulous resource for those coming to the field with no preconceived notions. Experienced practitioners will likely be more interested in the information around informal and social learning as well as the excellent profiles of several successful learning architects.  Another thing experienced people might need?  Perhaps some new perspective on the place of learning in the learner’s world.  Shepherd talks a great deal about the case for and ways of achieving bottom-up change.  The idea appeals to me, and I admit I’m even more interested and optimistic about it given the recent events in Egypt.  While I was reading I occasionally Tweeted quotes from the book (did you know you can post to Twitter directly from Kindle? Like this). Shepherd’s idea that, "You build a learning culture by building an appetite to learn. This is predominantly a bottom-up, peer-to-peer process” caused a good deal of bristling, mostly from people who seemed to feel this could not happen without upper management control or L&D orchestrating it.  People used words like ‘partner’,  and having upper management involved in culture change, but we’ve seen how that looks so far and, well, it mostly ain’t working.

 Shepherd offers a nice overview of the field, with useful suggestions for current practice and provocative ideas for the future. It’s available as an ebook from Amazon US  and UK . 

Twitter in Training

There's lots of interesting stuff coming out this week on using Twitter as a training tool. First, Terrence Wing is moving like a house afire, first with this nice piece on using Twitter as a training platform, then with this great YouTube demonstration of using the video widget in the new Twitter interface to support delivery of a whole course via Twitter. (You can visit Twitter to see the course, too.)

Then last night I happened to check in on the new episode of Grey's Anatomy, which included a whole storyline about using Twitter as a training tool. The Chief was adamantly opposed to tweeting from operating rooms, calling Bailey's Blackberry a 'litigation machine' (sound familiar?). Meantime, staff were bending the rules and residents from all over the country were following along with surgery backchannels, eventually appealing to the chief's expertise and ego. Learners were able to ask questions and get answers from a master. Everybody won--including Twitter.  The ABC network site doesn't leave these episodes up long, and I fear readers in some countries outside the US will be unable to access the site. The episode's called "don't deceive me please don't go" so keep an eye out for it on subversive channels everywhere.

Readers of Social Media for Trainers will appreciate the challenges of trying to keep print text updated as new approaches and ideas evolve. Keep me posted of new things you run across and I'll do my best to spread the word. Ain't technology -- and the people who use it -- great?

Surprise!

This month's "Nuts & Bolts" column for Learning Solutions Magazine: Surprise!


Incorporating what we understand about the role of surprise can help us overcome several common challenges in eLearning design.

No More Clicky Clicky Bling Bling

This month's "Nuts and Bolts" column for Learning Solutions Magazine focuses on eLearning resolutions for 2011 --- and features the definitive example of Clicky Clicky Bling Bling eLearning. 


Note: Social Media for Trainers has been out for several months now and I am interested in hearing what you've been trying. Please get in touch if you have examples or experiences to share.


Happy new year, everyone! 

It's YOUR Privacy: Own It

We're lucky to live near the fabulous Durham Bulls Athletic Park. This ain't your usual little hometown venue with wooden bleachers, but a big, pretty, sure-fire stadium. I'm not much of a fan but my husband is, and he often goes to games by himself to catch up with friends there. One night last September he was sitting, alone, on a row behind a talkative thirtysomething couple with a young son. In the span of half an hour my husband -- the  "strange lone man" of lore -- sitting behind this family, had learned:

• Where the child goes to school, and his teacher's name
• What time school gets out
• The family's secret password ("Jupiter")
• What color and kind of car the mother drives
• The name of the subdivision where the family lives
• Where and what day and time the child takes karate lessons

The irony: Later in the game the mother was expressing her concerns about... FACEBOOK privacy issues.

It's no secret that I like Facebook; I wrote 1/5 of a book about it. But apart from its usefulness as a tool, I really admire what Mark Zuckerberg has done. After a decade of struggling to drag people into online interactions, someone  popped up with a technology so appealing and user-friendly that five hundred million people voluntarily use it. Grandmas, my high school principal, folks from my dad's neighborhood, and sometimes their dogs, all have profile pages. And while I don't always agree with the changes, I truly do admire Zuckerberg's vision. He is not just trying to build a faster horse -- if he were, he'd have yet another portal site. He is forcing new interactions, new ways of engaging, and along the way redefining the concept of "privacy". He does give users privacy controls, but they are granular and prone to rapid and frequent change, and you'd best keep up. He's tearing down the silos the rest of us just keep talking about. Mark Zuckerberg is changing the world and the way we move in it, even if we're not even on Facebook.

I'm amused by people who are only too happy to take advantage of everything Facebook offers -- including the inescapable acreage of Farmville --  yet feel they have any right to complain about anything. Let's get clear: We are not Facebook's "customers".  We are its product.  Don't like it? Close your account, then. (Or ask for your money back. That'll show 'em.) I'm reminded of the time years ago when Ted Turner, blasted for announcing that he would be colorizing old Hollywood classics, reportedly replied, "The last time I checked, I owned those movies." Like it or not, it was his to do.  

I also am not in the camp that people need to be saved from themselves. It's the internet, and you can't both share information there and really expect it to be 'private'. Here's something to help clarify, from Dave Makes: 

(http://www.flickr.com/photos/buriednexttoyou/5095255302/lightbox/)

So: If you want it to truly be private, don't put it online.  Don't be surprised if you learn that someone has harvested your email address, or used Google street view to get an idea of your income, or allowed some third-party app to access data it shouldn't.  Don't allow others to tag you in photos. Turn off the geotagging feature on your smartphone. Disable Facebook Places. Don't download every Facebook game and app and gift. Don't announce when you'll be out of the country for 2 weeks. If you don't want Facebook to have it, then don't give it to Facebook.

And maybe don't talk about it so strangers can overhear at ballgames, either. 

If You Force Them, They Won't Learn

A link on Twitter caught my eye this morning: "5 Hallmarks of Good Homework", Much of the content is applicable to L& D (make assignments relevant, have a purpose, that kind of thing). If you're interested in workplace learning I encourage you to take a look. 

One item that struck me: "Our children are now expected to read 20 minutes a night and record such on their homework sheet. What parents are discovering (surprise) is that those kids who used to sit down and read for pleasure … are now setting the timer, choosing the easiest books, and stopping when the timer dings. … Reading has become a chore, like brushing your teeth."(Kohn, 2006, pp. 176–177)


We see this happen in the workplace all the time.  For instance, "Diversity", "Harassment", and "Ethics" can be really interesting, engaging training topics if handled by good designers and facilitators. But nooooo, the HR Department takes over and loads the policy word-for-word onto 73 PowerPoint slides, no one in their right minds would want to sit through the oral recitation on it, and so HR... makes the training  mandatory.  If people don't want to sit through your program on their own accord, then there's something wrong with your program, not your learners.  Making it mandatory does not send the message, "This is important", but, "This is so awful we have to put a gun to your head to make you attend." This topic becomes a chore and, worse yet, learners have had another bad "training" experience. What could be useful learning just becomes more work.


Another example: I used to belong to a vibrant,dynamic community of workplace trainers who gathered formally once a quarter, and informally at other times, with the stated goal of improving their practice. The meetings were fun and exciting, people brought new topics and activities to share, and many deep and lasting friendships evolved. Without fail, at every meeting, one or two people would show up and say something to the effect of "My boss made me come." Sometimes this was the boss's indirect cowardly way of telling the employee there was a performance problem; sometimes the person was sent to see if he/she could "get" something to bring back to the workplace. Either way, the person sent did not enjoy it, did not get much out of it, and saw the requirement to participate as extra work. (And PS: We didn't enjoy having them there, either.) You won't find many articles or discussions on the topic of communities of practice without someone asking how we can control and manage them, how we can make people participate, and when we should enroll our new hires in them. Here's the thing: You can't. See the bibliography in my dissertation for forty-eleven references that say that. 


Katja Pastoors, in particular, offers research that speaks to the matter of voluntary v. forced learning. From my dissertation:  
"Pastoors (2007) found that motivation to participate in bootlegged CoPs was high, that the bootlegged CoPs allowed for sharing of tacit knowledge and provided a welcome arena for those who shared common interests and “passions” (p. 29), and that those involved in bootlegged CoPs were willing to expend time and energy in its activities. The institutionalized CoP was, by contrast, viewed as the organization’s means of imposing additional workload and expecting work outside of regular working hours. Strict communication plans and procedures were viewed as inhibiting effective activity. By their own report, members felt no ownership of the institutionalized CoP."


The full Kohn citation is: Kohn, A. (2006). The homework myth: Why our kids get too much of a bad thing. Cambridge, MA: Da Capo Press. 


Pastoors, K. (2007). Consultants: love-hate relationships with communities of practice, The Learning Organization  14 (1), 21-33.

Blog Book Tour Week 1 Recap

Thanks to everyone who's been following the blog book tour for Social Media for Trainers! It was a great week with contributions from great folks:

Stop 1 was Jane Hart's Centre for Learning and Performance Technologies, where the book received "Pick of the Day" status.

Stop 2 offered comments from Karl Kapp's Kapp Notes on the variety of activities available to workplace training practitioners wanting to extend and enhance their practice with social media tools.

Stop 3 was a guest post for Yammer with a discussion of using these tools for social learning in the enterprise.

Stop 4 Came from someone with a slightly different specialty area, Clark Aldrich, who commented on categories of social media on his Simulations blog

Cammy Bean went beyond the call in doing both an audio interview with me (Stop 6)  for the Kineo blog as well as inviting me as a guest on the fun ID Live program (link will take you to the Elluminate recording).

Stay tuned for more! Up next: Posts from Brent Schlenker, Gina Schreck, Don Clark, Sahana Chattaopadhyay, and Monish Mohan, and a podcast from Eden Tree. See the complete blog book tour schedule here.

Social Media for Trainers is now available in paperback and for eReaders in North America; shipping soon to the UK, EU, and India. Available from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Borders, and other booksellers.Thanks again to everyone helping with this project. It's much appreciated.

 I'm especially interested in hearing what ideas readers are applying/what new ideas the book may have sparked, so please comment here or find me on Twitter (@janebozarth , @SoMe4Trainers) or on my Facebook pages (Bozarthzone ,  Social Media for Trainers).

"Social Media for Trainers" Blog Book Tour Starts Thursday!

The Social Media for Trainers blog book tour begins this Thursday, September 2, with a kickoff post from the Centre for Learning and Performance Technologies' Jane Hart. This will be followed by a constellation of blogging stars from the training and eLearning fields.

Is the book right for you? The publisher asked specifically for activities and ideas to help trainers and instructional designers develop an understanding of social media tools at "eye level": What are they, how are they best used, and how can we use them to extend and enhance current practice?  The book is available from booksellers in North America now, with UK and EU releases due in the next few weeks. Check out the "look inside" feature on Amazon.com to get a peek.

Take a look at the blog book tour schedule  and watch for the posts from my colleagues. Many thanks to them for their help with this project!

More? Follow "Social Media for Trainers" on the book's Facebook page and on on Twitter @SoMe4Trainers  (use #SoMe4Trainers).

Microblogging in the Enterprise: Tips

Twitter not quite right for your organization? This came up in #lrnchat last week, and in a Twitter discussion yesterday. Here are tips mostly from Aaron Silvers (Twitter: @mrch0mp3rs) on using microblogging in the enterprise:

-Remember, the practice is more important than the tool. This gives flexibility to change tools later on.

-Having said that: Choose the right tool in the first place.

-Make sure someone is a registered admin. Don't do this with no one in charge.

-If you're using a free account, do your org a favor and link to digital files in these microsharing tools instead of uploading into them.

-There ARE reasons why email works. Use the right tool for the task.

-You want leaders to contribute consistently -- even if it's just once a day, a reply to an employee.

- Write up the "rules" or expectations for your boss person to distribute. Fear is often not knowing what to say.

-Give examples of the kinds of things to use it for to get people acclimated/started.

-With any new communications medium, patience and consistency are keys to adoption. Modeling how to use is important.

-Start w/ a core group, and make sure at least one big manager is involved and posting daily.

And from @ldennison: if you're bringing it into the organization, you're the person responsible for it.

See also: Comparison of Microblogging Tools

What's Your Objective?

[Note: This originally ran on Training Magazine’s former “Training Day” blog on 2/12/2010]

Discussion of objectives in training could be a topic for a book all by itself, but lately I’ve run across 2 excellent examples of problems with learning/performance objectives. They provide a good basis for looking at just a couple of common problems.

Example 1: One summer afternoon my friend Jo left her son, 5-year-old Max, in the care of his grandmother. While Max was napping Grandma found a dead rattlesnake in the yard and thought to herself, “This is a good time to teach Max about snakes.”

Her objective: “Max will understand about snakes.”

So when Max awoke from his nap Grandma took him outside and said:
“See, Max, this is a rattlesnake. Some snakes are very dangerous so you must be careful if you are ever near one. They can be hard to see.” Using a hoe, grandma moved the snake into high grass, then onto a bed of pine straw, to show Max how the snake’s colors tended to blend with the setting. Grandma talked about being careful when running around outside barefoot, not bothering or teasing snakes, and taking care when playing near places snakes might be found, like fallen logs or warm rocks.

At the end of Grandma’s lesson she said, “So, Max, do you understand about snakes?”

And Max looked up at her and said,

“Oh, yes, Grandma. I love snakes.”

In the example with Grandma and Max, the problem was an objective too vague: “He will understand “ can be interpreted in more than one way, which is exactly what happened, and Max did not understand in the way Grandma meant him to. This is a common problem in compliance and policy training, where it’s more usual than not to see objectives like, “Learner will know the policy”, “Learner will understand the rules regarding unlawful harassment”. And regarding Grandma, well, as we say here in the American South, bless her heart. She did intend to help Max “understand” (learning) but she didn't specify actual performance. She tried to make the snake training meaningful and engaging. She did not read PowerPoint slides to Max. She included important information (they are hard to see in the ground cover) and offered some helpful tips (don’t tease). But the training did not accomplish what she’d intended.

I’ve seen the opposite problem as well: Objectives (and performance this time, not just "learning") so detailed and specific that the real point of the thing is lost. Which brings us to Example 2: A contractor charged with developing online tutorials on the new employee timekeeping system listed the desired performance objectives (below).

At the end of the training, the employee will be able to:

• Log on and navigate to the employee section of the portal

• Record and review time

• View time statements

• Display leave quota overview

• Generate leave requests

• Access system help resources

• Assign charge object numbers

• Report premium pay hours

The objectives were certainly detailed and specific. The contractor had thoroughly delineated desired performance. After weeks of tedious wordsmithing, next-level management finally signed off on the objectives. Senior management likewise approved of the plan. Everyone involved agreed that, yes, these are the outcomes we’re after.

Several million dollars later the training was launched, and several weeks after that the new time sheet software “went live” to 30,000 workers. And the critical problem with the tutorials quickly, and loudly, and in a most dramatic way, became evident. The list of objectives had not included:

At the end of this training, the employee will be able to
complete his or her time sheet.

[This is not to oversimplify the other problems here, including the evidence that no one ever thought to ask even one potential learner to try the material out, or that much of the training content, like charge object hours, was relevant only to a fraction of the target audience.]

So: Before developing the instruction don’t just write objectives. Write the right objectives. What is this person really supposed to do back on the job? What does “understand” mean, and what evidence will show you that understanding has occurred? Devotees of Bloom’s taxonomy will argue that learner performance like “listing” and “describing” can constitute what he called ”enabling” objectives. That may valid, but they should not be the only objectives: Employees are rarely asked to “list” or “describe” anything, so it’s critical to move on to behaviors closer to desired performance, not just knowledge. And: Enabling objectives are easy to write, and to develop bullet points for, and to develop training around, and to write a quiz to assess. If you feel the training really must address these, fine, but be sure to push past them on to things that more closely resemble real performance. In my train-the-trainer course I don’t want my learners to describe strategies for engaging learners, I want them to deliver a piece of instruction in which they demonstrate the ability to apply those strategies. It’s more work for both learner and me, and much more time consuming, but it moves us far closer to the actual desired performance. And it makes the training worth doing.

Think Goldilocks. Not too little, not too much. And remember in developing objectives to keep an eye on the rock-bottom performance goal: Don’t get eaten by bears.

Other problems with training objectives? I asked Twitter training/elearning/ID folks and here are some of their answers. Perhaps we’ll expand on some of these in a future column.

• Gina Minks @gminks, EMC: “When objectives relate to what someone wishes the performance was, even though that may be a fantasy.”
• Jeffery Goldman @minutebio, Johns Hopkins Healthcare LLC: “Not setting them at all, not measuring whether they are met in the final assessment, and not providing content to meet objectives.”
• Guy Wallace @guywwallace, EPPIC, Inc: “Objectives are not systematically ‘derived’ from solid analysis of ideal performance/gaps & are best guesses.”
• Kevin Bruny @row4it, Chesterfield County VA Government: “Once used for design and communicated in training, we tend to forget about them and never return to validate.”
• Kara DeFrias @californiakara, Intuit: “People get so wrapped up in objectives they forget to take time to make the actual learning meaningful & engaging.”

--JB

Updates to "Social Media for Trainers"

Many thanks to those who have preordered Social Media for Trainers or purchased it for Kindle. A challenge with writing a book about technologies—particularly those that are continually morphing and evolving – is keeping content as up-to-date as possible. Since the book went to press several things have changed:

1. Correction to p. 59: While Facebook terms of service have always been clear that having fictitious accounts was a terms of service violation, it is now clearer that having multiple accounts is forbidden, too. Those wishing to maintain “private” space on Facebook (for instance, to have one’s personal account but also to use Facebook for hosting a course) can do this via the use of groups and fan pages. For instance, I have a main account but a "Jane Bozarth Bozarthzone" page. I post training/learning related information there; my "fans" don't have to friend me or vice-versa. Facebook offers many options for setting limits on who can see what: Be sure to learn about using lists and other privacy settings. (July 30, 2010)

2. Google has just announced that it will no longer support development of Google Wave and plans to support the service only through the end of 2010. Be on the lookout for new tools from Google. (July 30, 2010). Update to an update! September 4, 2010: Google has now announced that it WILL continue to support Wave. See details .

3. A new tool, HootCourse, has recently emerged in beta testing and is so far proving a useful, friendly space for aggregating conversations. Hootcourse assigns a unique URL. Learners can access Hootcourse via either Twitter or Facebook. Conversations can be kept private if so desired. See http://hootcourse.com/ . For an example, visit a bookchat I recently led at http://hootcourse.com/course/523/ (August 8, 2010). I've also used this as an introduction to Twitter for new users. We spend half an hour or so working privately in HootCourse, practicing using @replies, RTs and #s, then move into the bigger Twitter feed. Think "training wheels".

4. Tweetie2, a Twitter iPhone app discussed in the book, was purchased by Twitter and is now the Twitter-branded iPhone app Twitter, available from the iTunes app store. (June 2010)

5. Enterprise social networking is rapidly expanding and evolving. Here's a comparison of 7 enterprise products, including Sharepoint and Jive. Also, Yammer (previously regarded as a microblogging tool) is moving toward becoming a full-fledged networking tool. (September 5, 2010)

Keep up with more frequent updates by following me on http://twitter.com/SoMe4Trainers or on the book's Facebook page

Best,

Jane

Look Inside "Social Media for Trainers"

Amazon has just added the "look inside" feature for Social Media for Trainers so be sure to go take a look!

I'm offering daily tips and ideas on social media for trainers via Twitter @SoMe4Trainers and weekly-ish tips via a Facebook page.

Check "Where's Jane?" at right for my speaking schedule. Most upcoming events are on the topic of social media for trainers, and several of them are free.

Book Chat on Learning-in-Practice: Join us!

Some Twitter folks are getting together to discuss "how people learn" as evidenced in King's On Writing and Gawande's Complications. Both books are examples of adult learners who learn through practice/reflect on learning.

Interested? Details are at the Training Book Review blog.

Getting Management Commitment to Training

"One of the frustrations in Learning & Development is the reality of what happens when the worker returns to the job. A thousand things stand between a learner and performance; among the biggest of these is the learner’s manager."

This month's "Nuts and Bolts" column for Learning Solutions Magazine offers tips for getting management commitment to training.

Review: Trainer's Handbook

A look at the 2nd edition of Karen Lawson's Trainers Handbook on the new Training Book Reviews blog sponsored by HRDQ.

Consider Your "Loose" Connections This Memorial Day

Monday is the US Memorial Day holiday, set aside for remembering those who gave their lives in military service. For me it has additional meaning. On Memorial Day 2003 my brother and his wife were hosting a holiday cookout, and some of the young men there started playing basketball. My nephew Ryan, without warning, collapsed and was taken to the hospital. That evening it was determined he'd suffered an aneurysm, with a prognosis that included a long rehabilitation period. The next morning he was pronounced brain dead. Doctors kept Ryan alive long enough for his little brother to rush home from Iraq to see him while he was still breathing, even if not on his own. We buried him the next weekend.

I was at the time working in a small HR shop for a state agency, and office protocol in the event of a death was the gift of a potted plant. They sent a small hydrangea in full bloom, which the family gave to me and I took home. I hated to let it die so, when it outgrew its pot, planted it in a shady spot beside the garage.

That $20 hydrangea is now taller than I am. It's thrived despite my inattention and appallingly un-green thumb. It's leafy and green for most of the year, and loaded with huge blue blossoms in late spring and summer. It bloomed again this week, just in time for the Memorial Day weekend:



I see the plant every time I pull into the driveway. Apart from reminding me to think of Ryan, the plant -- a $20 token gift sent per policy -- represents much more. It's a reminder that little things do matter, and small gestures sometimes carry great meaning. It's a reminder of how important it is to maintain memories. I left that job not long after Ryan's death but often remember it, and my former coworkers, fondly, prompted by the view of the hydrangea.

And what I'm trying to get to: Small connections matter, sometimes in unexpected ways. I think this is why it disturbs me to hear some people who are so dismissive of social media and online interactions and distant or "loose" connections. Through social media, especially Twitter, I have cultivated a network of smart, funny, interesting people who have never failed to come through when I asked for something. My reach with some is fairly close, with interactions nearly daily; others I may directly connect with only sporadically.

Little things matter. Connections matter, no matter how they cross time and space. You can't predict in 7 years, or 20, or 50, which small connection will still be important. So this Memorial Day I urge you to take a moment to connect on Facebook, or Twitter, or LinkedIn (or if you must, the telephone or even in person) with someone perhaps not part of your daily orbit. Perhaps, as with my former coworkers, the connection will provide a fond or poignant memory on some future Memorial Day.

Review: Figuring Things Out

Revisiting Zemke & Kramlinger's wonderful Figuring Things Out, a must for any trainer's shelf--if you can find it. On the new Training Book Review blog sponsored by HRDQ.

Travels With My Kindle

My husband and I spend 2 weeks in the Caribbean every spring, and while I don't unplug completely I do spend the bulk of my time unwinding. This usually takes the form of sitting by (and often in) the pool with a book. My undergraduate degree is in English Lit, so I've always been an avid reader. But between a life spent in front of a computer and writing assignments (first for Training Magazine, now for Learning Solutions) requiring business-related reading, I find I have little time in my "real life" for novels and other non-work related books. This annual trip is my chance to catch up.

In years past I've usually brought 14 books, a heavy and now, with fees for checked bags, an expensive proposition. I've always liked my Kindle and find it great for business trips, but had some concerns about taking it out in bright sunlight & heat/reading in the pool/keeping it safe at a resort. But this year I decided to give it a try on the long vacation, with great results:
1. I am taking it into the pool in a ziploc bag, which has worked very well. Lesson learned: Some ziploc bags have writing/white label on one side, making them half as useful for reading purposes, and I have found that ziploc bags, after being handled for a day or so, start showing their age by wrinkling. This makes it harder to read through them, so if you plan to try it, bring backup bags.
2. The size, with "next page" buttons on either side of the screen,is a perfect fit for my hands, and I can hold the device and turn pages with one hand. This is great for keeping the Kindle from getting wet.
3. The no-glare screen is fabulous in bright sunlight!
4. No running out of books. One year I didn't like several of the 14 I brought and was just miserable: There's no bookstore here, so except for souvenir-shop titles I was out of luck. (I agree with Stephen King on this: The lending library in hell is filled with nothing but Danielle Steele and Chicken Soup titles.)

I realize that electronics are electronic, and disaster could lurk around every corner. Once the Kindle is dropped, or stepped on by the pool, or gets wet, or something, it could stop working altogether, whereas a paper book, unless set on fire, will probably always be there. Overall, though? Kindle is a fabulous travel companion. I've resisted the idea of so many devices, advocating for consolidation into one, but now am rethinking that. I've been eyeing the iPad, but can't foresee ever taking it by or in the pool, so kind of hope the predictions that iPad will kill Kindle and other reading devices are wrong. (Although to compete I do think Amazon will need to rethink Kindle pricing.) In this instance, having another machine (bigger than my iPhone, less cumbersome than my netbook, smaller than the iPad) did fulfull a need.

My favorite titles so far this trip? Cutting for Stone (hands-down), Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie, and Fool.

What are you reading?

And ADDIE wasn't even there to see it...

There's been lot of talk in Twitterland lately about the usefulness of the ADDIE process model often used in instructional design (much on the theme of whether ADDIE is dead), and the validity/existence of "informal" learning. I saw it all hit overlap this week in 2 separate encounters with service employees.

In the first, I was purchasing a prepaid gift card at a drug store. The transaction brought the place to a halt, with the register giving off that dull 'thunk' sound as unhappy computers will. The cashier fumbled with the register, pressed a number of keys to no avail, said she "wasn't sure" if the card was activated, and finally called for a manager, who quickly took care the problem. As I left -- after a one-item cash transaction that took maybe 5 minutes -- the cashier said, "They told me that in training but I hadn't done it before. Sorry, but I forgot."

In this first instance, performance support could have supplemented, or likely replaced, training simply by programming help screens and prompts. Training for future use of a skill is pretty much pointless. It would be like not training at all, but for adding the maddening "I think I heard something about this" factor to an already frustrating situation. The solution here is not based in designing-implementing-evaluating instruction, but in identifying places for, and deploying resources toward, good performance support.

In the second instance, last night, my husband and I were at a restaurant. A new server appeared in the company of the more experienced server charged with training him. The training pretty much took the form of job shadowing, with the experienced guy modeling good (in fact, breathtaking, exemplary) performance. Occasionally he would ask the new guy something like, "What do we always ask when someone orders coffee?" (Answer: "Would you like cream?"). They stayed together most of the time we were there, merging into what my husband called The Waiter with Four Arms, and appeared to be having both a good and successful time. We enjoyed them, and had no complaints with the service. By the time we left the new server was taking his first steps at working on his own, and as far as we could tell he was doing just fine.


In this second scenario, we see something on the learning continuum between formal (in the sense of an intentional,planned event, either live or online) and informal (in the sense of an employee at the point of need accessing help)learning. Basically:

--the 'trainer' (more experienced server) was the performance support
--as a peer,actually doing the same job, the trainer was able to provide real-world suggestions
--the learning experience appeared to be a successful one
--as a side effect, the experience appeared to be forcing better performance from the trainer
--and I'm afraid ADDIE wasn't anywhere to be found. There was no deliberate process, no 'steps'. The new guy followed the more experienced guy around, and the more experienced guy demonstrated and explained. And it worked.


I'm not interested in the dead/undead discussion of ADDIE so much as concerned about the desire on the part of many to apply it to every situation. As L & D professionals we need to have many items in our toolkits. ADDIE is one. What others do you use?

How the Snake Got Its Oil

There's been a flurry of activity this week on the topic of snake oil: First Harold Jarche said: "“As soon as the software vendors and marketers get hold of a good idea, they pretty well destroy it." Jane Hart weighed in with “social learning is being picked up by software vendors and marketers as the next solution-in-a-box, when it’s more of an approach and a cultural mind-set”. And today Jay Cross added to the discussion, using the word "hijack" in terms of both what happened to elearning and, now, what we're seeing with the concept of "informal learning".

I agree with my colleagues but would like to twist the conversation to why the hijacking keeps taking place. Time and time again I see Training/L & D allowing this to happen. When "learning" started happening online, Training/L & D resisted and let elearning be co-opted by vendors and IT departments. Now that "learning" is finally recognized as something that often happens informally and via social connections, Training/L&D is letting "social media" decisions be made by everyone but Training/L & D. Learning is happening everywhere in organizations, but unless it looks like "training", then Training/L &D stands aside and lets it belong to someone else.

Mark Rosenberg has used the metaphor of the railroads: They saw their business taken over by the trucking industry because they defined themselves as being in the railroad business, not the transportation business. And the training department is going to go the way of the railroads if it doesn't start seeing itself as being in the learning business, not the classroom business.

So: I really can't begrudge the vendors for acting when they see a chance, even if they end up peddling a snake-oil version of a better concept. As my work email account signature says: "Opportunities are not lost. They are just taken by others."

RIP Training Magazine

I apologize for the length of this, but eulogies bring out the wordiness in me. Tuesday morning brought the sad, but not surprising, news that 41-year-old Training Magazine will cease publication with its March 2010 issue. From my view, the magazine had been in a downward spiral since its sale by Lakewood Publications to VNU Business Media and then again to Nielsen Business Media. Every sale saw new staff, less and less knowledgeable about (or, as far as I could tell, interested in) workplace training and learning. The struggle was evident: Those who subscribed to the print edition over the past few years can attest to its shrinkage from magazine to something more akin to newsletter. I don't know how it held on for as long as it did.

Since Tuesday's news many people, familiar with my 10-year participation as a member of the "In Print" book review column team and my other sundry contributions, have reached out to express surprise, conjecture about the reasons for the closing, and sympathy for the loss of work. Magazine work is just an add-on for me; I am among the fortunate in the training/learning business to have good, full-time employment complete with retirement plan and health insurance. The shutdown will have no effect on my livelihood, but I am sad to say some friends are now out of work. I hope that among the many supporters I've heard from will be someone in a position to help these folks find new employment.

I owe Training Magazine a great deal. As a new trainer, armed with an undergraduate English degree and assigned to a training department led by a former registered nurse who broke out in hives when she had to speak in public (no, I am not kidding), I had no one to help me learn how to do this. My coworkers taught canned programs like CPR and First Aid, and all came from the third-grade-teacher approach to training adults, so weren't much help when I was assigned things like developing supervisory training. I was fortunate that we had an office subscription to Training (and I'm pretty sure I'm the only one there who read it). Jack Gordon and Ron Zemke were still in the house then, and the magazine was about training. It's the first place I heard about things like adult learning theory, ISD, and ADDIE; it's the first place I saw someone question venerated training idols like the MBTI; it's where I first saw someone try to pull back the curtain on high-priced consultants peddling "packages" (as I recall, this was a piece titled "Ship of Charlatans"). The magazine then had heart and a sense of humor: One of the funniest things I've ever read was a piece by Zemke (or was it Gordon?) about frustrations with personal computers. Among the points made: "When I am driving along at 60 miles and hour and the car sounds funny, I don't just shut the ignition off." The help Training provided in the early days of my career is so significant that I discussed it in my doctoral dissertation.

Back then the magazine had a final page, "My Turn", open to 1000-word contributions from readers. The first national piece I ever published was a "My Turn" column on problems with customer service training (the gist: Smiling does not make make up for utter incompetence). I did a couple of these, and when the magazine was looking for people to staff its new book review column, editor Martin Delahoussaye recruited me to help. The book review column was a great gig, giving me piles of new books every year and putting my name and picture in a national publication every month. Martin left the magazine for Pfeiffer publications, where he became the push behind my first book. And when that book came out in 2005, new Training editor Holly Dolezalek ran a feature article about it, along with a banner on the magazine's cover.

Apart from the magazine proper, I want to note that I especially loved the Training conferences (ending with a year: "Training 2004", 2005, and so on) and the people who organized them! Leah Nelson, Julie Groshens, and Kris Stokes were fun to work with, competent at what they did, and adept at turning a lot of spinning plates into a well-oiled machine. In addition to giving me a lot of exposure and letting me try new things, the events are where I met in person people like Susan Boyd, Thiagi, Bob Mosher, Patti Shank, The Hortons, and my dear friend and valued colleague Jennifer Hofmann. These gigs, in turn, led to Training's online certificate programs and webinar work. (Those are still on, by the way, as is the online community.)

The magazine seemed to slip away under its latest ownership. The field was changing, with much emphasis shifting from training in specific to learning in general, but that wasn't all. Content seemed less and less focused on anything related to training and learning, some of the freelance contributors clearly knew little about what they were discussing, and there seemed to be a widening disconnect between the interests of readers, who paid for the subscriptions, and the content catered to the advertisers, who paid the big bucks. I was rarely sent anything training-related to review. (Heck , they wouldn't even review my books. I mean, seriously, what's a girl gotta do?) In earlier years I reviewed works by people like Mark Rosenberg, Mel Silberman, Alison Rossett, Patti Shank, and Michael Allen. Along the way there were occasional leadership books, including the dreaded Little Animal or Dairy Product Metaphors, but the books mostly were one way or another tied to learning. The last book I read for Training was something called Jenga, which was really quite interesting -- all about getting a product manufactured, trademarked, and distributed for sale -- but had not one thing to do with training or workplace learning. Yes, in considering the magazine's demise, there were lots of red flags. While I don't know all the details, I do know that the problems weren't all connected to the economy.

I'm sad to see Training go and am sure other industry publications are taking heed. It has brought me back to the reality that the shift from training to learning, and the proliferation of content via free Web 2.0 means, are going to bring big changes for all of us, some of them perhaps painful.

I will be back in print soon in another publication, likely with both book reviews as well as a new training/learning related column, so stay tuned for news of that. Thanks to all who have expressed their interest and concern, and reached out with offers of new opportunities.