A Fundamental Shift in the Way we Conduct Learning

There's going to be a fundamental shift in the way we conduct Learning. The smart people have already cottoned on, and the rest need to listen up and get with the program.

Things have changed. Information is right there at our finger tips. Most of it is free. It is available now. Gone are the days of calling all of your staff in to the boardroom for a half day session on how to answer the telephone, or sit at your desk properly. Gone are the days of asking students to attend a class, in a classroom, at a certain time.

Here's one of many recommendations Jay Cross would make to any senior business person right now, in his recent article in Dawn of a New Age from Chief Learning Officer Media :

“Next week, we will close the training department. We are shifting our focus from training to performance. Any remaining training staff will become mentors, coaches and facilitators who work on improving core business processes, strengthening relationships with customers and cutting costs."

The shift is about using what your trainees and students have in front of them already - a computer and the internet. The emphasis is going to be on rapidly developing an affordable knowledge sharing system, tracking performance and results and improving communication between people.

Cross goes on to say companies should move to using just the free services out there, and while I agree with using free services, I see some problems with it. The main one being a lack of cohesion to the learning because at no point do the various mediums come together in one place and connect up.

I believe the answer lies in utilizing free services like Skype and real-time conferencing where you can, for sure. Even develop training modules using them - Jing is perfect for free 5 minute screencasts! But then deliver the overall learning objectives via a professionally managed and hosted online system.

This does not mean great expense. For learners, it translates to a familiar 'home base' where they can congregate to communicate with peers, discuss material and complete assessments. For Trainers, it's the hub where all the hard work is tracked and the results come to life.