Jay Cross is credited for coining the word e-Learning. In his foreword to the book 'The Handbook of Blended Learning' he makes a case as to why the corporates are still a hard sell for e-learning in their training departments.
"Corporationns seek self-reliant workers they can trust to do the right thing without supervision. Every manager wants self-starters on her team. Yet when it comes to learning, many workers wait for others to tell them what to do. Why don't they take matters into their own hands? I think it's a vestige of schooling.
Several hundred years ago, cumpulsory schools were set up as a seperate reality. Students were seedlings, while schools were greenhouses to protect them from outside elements. The mission of schools was transmitting values and teaching a body of knowledge. The noise of the real world might taint the righteousness and clarity of the lessons.
Many of us equate learning with schooling. That is why we think of learning as something a person does in isolation and that its ideal delivery takes place in the classroom or the library, cloistered from the outside. Group work is by and large discouraged (it's called "cheating"). Authorities choose the curriculum. Self-direction is viewed as rebillion.
As a consequence Senior managers equate learning and schooling; they remember school as an inefficient way to learn. They are not willing to pay for it."
The premise to bring forth this point is to highlight the stickiness many e-Learning business development operators struggle with. Invariably it is observed that business development executives start comparing the school (read as: classroom) and the move from this classical setting of learning to a more technology based platform of e-learning. What Jay Cross says makes sense. Because such a comparision is a sudden death trap for the executives vouching to bring business. Most times this is frustrating.
As rightly pointed by Cross, its learning that needs to be highlighted and not the departure of school or classroom to the technology enabled delivery patform. Essentially its the mindset of the decision makers that is botlleneck. Typically in a corporate setting managers like to have onboard team members who are self-starters and for this to happen in the fast paced business environments access and availability of learning in the 'e' delivery format makes business sense.
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Friday, July 23, 2010
Quickly getting things done
Much of the challenge today is in getting things done quickly. With the inclusion of technology in our lives although many aspects of work and life have been eased, yet the global population is still striving at productivity.
With zillions of productivity themized software and applications for your desktop, laptop, mobile the struggle is still on. What could be the reason? To me its more to do with what we want get done.
In my observation we end up taking up tasks that are too demanding, labourious, time consuming and at best having a lot of dependencies. Be it the prodution of courses that I do for a living or be it simply having a social life and netwroking. In real, we have without realizing increased the volume of things that we wish to get done without realizing that the burden of deadlines that we set on them is generally unrealistic.
Some of this is also because we have lost or at best overlooked the ability to view the world the and its dynamics the way it should be. In an environment when we are talking of social networking and collaboration we are failing to see the real meaning of these words and absorbing less and less of the concept behind them.
I found this good video on the YouTube on time and how we are oriented to it and the way it primarily determines how we function.
What is important to learn from the video is how we get to focus on things that we undertake. Close friends and well wishers tell me all the time that I canstart something but lose out on it cause I fail to finish it. Its true in a way not only for me but for several people. One main reason is the shifting sand of priority that we attach to our daily tasks. What was high priority yesterday is not a priority today but something else is. And we shift our focus and attention. And merely add to to factors of our ever growing list of stress factors.
What should we do? We can make use of the PCF tool. Its a simple way of categorizing the tasks that we have in our kitty to manage them more effectively and likewise make ourselves more productive and have that stress move away from our system.
PCF is short for Past (tasks), Current (tasks) and Future (tasks). Typically its suggested that the sum of future tasks should be 70% of the total task list. In other words, total PCF task should stand in the ratio of 30:70. How to calculate this? Its simple really.
Here is a sample:
Total Tasks = 10
Past Tasks = 1
Current = 2
Future Tasks = 7
Formula = Sum of (past tasks + current tasks) : (Total Future Tasks)
The idea is to have ZERO past tasks; and only future and current tasks.
As a closing thought TOYOTA uses this very effectively.
With zillions of productivity themized software and applications for your desktop, laptop, mobile the struggle is still on. What could be the reason? To me its more to do with what we want get done.
In my observation we end up taking up tasks that are too demanding, labourious, time consuming and at best having a lot of dependencies. Be it the prodution of courses that I do for a living or be it simply having a social life and netwroking. In real, we have without realizing increased the volume of things that we wish to get done without realizing that the burden of deadlines that we set on them is generally unrealistic.
Some of this is also because we have lost or at best overlooked the ability to view the world the and its dynamics the way it should be. In an environment when we are talking of social networking and collaboration we are failing to see the real meaning of these words and absorbing less and less of the concept behind them.
I found this good video on the YouTube on time and how we are oriented to it and the way it primarily determines how we function.
What is important to learn from the video is how we get to focus on things that we undertake. Close friends and well wishers tell me all the time that I canstart something but lose out on it cause I fail to finish it. Its true in a way not only for me but for several people. One main reason is the shifting sand of priority that we attach to our daily tasks. What was high priority yesterday is not a priority today but something else is. And we shift our focus and attention. And merely add to to factors of our ever growing list of stress factors.
What should we do? We can make use of the PCF tool. Its a simple way of categorizing the tasks that we have in our kitty to manage them more effectively and likewise make ourselves more productive and have that stress move away from our system.
PCF is short for Past (tasks), Current (tasks) and Future (tasks). Typically its suggested that the sum of future tasks should be 70% of the total task list. In other words, total PCF task should stand in the ratio of 30:70. How to calculate this? Its simple really.
Here is a sample:
Total Tasks = 10
Past Tasks = 1
Current = 2
Future Tasks = 7
Formula = Sum of (past tasks + current tasks) : (Total Future Tasks)
The idea is to have ZERO past tasks; and only future and current tasks.
As a closing thought TOYOTA uses this very effectively.
Friday, July 16, 2010
Rapid LCMS.....(is there anything like that?)
I must confess, its been a hectic week. Sleepless nights and driving to office drowzy and working through for 8-9 hours...Yes! It was worth the pain. And of course the effort.
The fructification of that frenzy is what I call RAPID LCMS. A combine of Rapid e-Learning Development Initiative and an LCMS that must support not only the existing dbase of Learning Objects but also work, manage and build upon the library of assests and Learning Objects needed for and by the Rapid e-Learning efforts.
I must say that my experience in the e-learning field has been limited to Instructional Design. But moving project management followed by quality and now into systems design, policy making & innovation is less a transition and more a departure from the world of core e-learning. And this is happening Rapid(ly) at the benefit of L(earning) C(urve) M(anaged) S(ense making). In short Rapid LCMS.
Rapid e-learning has been around for some time now. LCMSs have been an offshoot of Content Management Systems redesigned and upgraded for Learning material/content. The uncertainty of the matter however, is the point where to start. That precisely gives me the idea that one needs to in fact map it all. And that brings the Instructional Designer's skills here. And of course Project Management skills into play if this effort is taken as a project.
More than heading straight to documenting the specifications and requirements, I feel that putting the concept is more appropriate and build-up fromt here. The concept paper will help me expand and come up with a Work Document, which will act as a solid foundation to the effort.
The initial presentation that I made to the executive office can form the basis of the concept paper. The timelines are short and task(s) challenging, humungous, tiring. Will get going till the next post.
The fructification of that frenzy is what I call RAPID LCMS. A combine of Rapid e-Learning Development Initiative and an LCMS that must support not only the existing dbase of Learning Objects but also work, manage and build upon the library of assests and Learning Objects needed for and by the Rapid e-Learning efforts.
I must say that my experience in the e-learning field has been limited to Instructional Design. But moving project management followed by quality and now into systems design, policy making & innovation is less a transition and more a departure from the world of core e-learning. And this is happening Rapid(ly) at the benefit of L(earning) C(urve) M(anaged) S(ense making). In short Rapid LCMS.
Rapid e-learning has been around for some time now. LCMSs have been an offshoot of Content Management Systems redesigned and upgraded for Learning material/content. The uncertainty of the matter however, is the point where to start. That precisely gives me the idea that one needs to in fact map it all. And that brings the Instructional Designer's skills here. And of course Project Management skills into play if this effort is taken as a project.
More than heading straight to documenting the specifications and requirements, I feel that putting the concept is more appropriate and build-up fromt here. The concept paper will help me expand and come up with a Work Document, which will act as a solid foundation to the effort.
The initial presentation that I made to the executive office can form the basis of the concept paper. The timelines are short and task(s) challenging, humungous, tiring. Will get going till the next post.
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