This past week, I’ve been reading and referring to Jane Hart’s article The State of Social Learning Today and some Thoughts for the Future of L&D in 2010 quite a bit. As always, Jane combines a wealth of information with some remarkable insights on where organizational learning is (or should be) headed.

One thing that has always been of great interest to me is what I’ll refer to as the integration of social and formal learning content. So when I got to the part of Jane’s article that said it’s time to re-think the design and delivery of formal learning initiatives, I felt we were on to something. Jane nails it when she says:
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Technorati Tags: formal learning, learning content management, Social Learning, subject matter networks, user generated content

Dawn LCM, Social Learning formal learning, learning content management, Social Learning, subject matter networks, user generated content

Time to cast your vote for the 2009 Edublog Awards! Voting closes Tuesday, Dec 15 (tomorrow) at 8pm EST.

Congratulations to all of those nominated. It’s an impressive list of bloggers, Tweeters (is that a word?) and other social media leaders who I plan to now read regularly and follow if I’m not already.

This year, our educational podcast library Xyleme Voices was nominated and shortlisted in the category of Best Educational Use of Audio. I’m very honored and thrilled and if you’ll indulge me, I’d like to give a shout-out to our spectacular team here at Xyleme. While I am the host of this library, there are a number of people in the background who put tremendous time, effort, and pride into researching, recruiting, and producing these terrific podcasts.
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Technorati Tags: CLO, Edublog Awards, learning networks, performance support, podcasts, Xyleme Voices

Dawn Executive Perspective, News CLO, Edublog Awards, learning networks, performance support, podcasts, Xyleme Voices

There is no question that the rise of social networks is creating a profound shift in the way training departments are delivering knowledge to their employees, partners, and customers. According to a McKinsey executive survey, a whopping 71% of enterprises are using Web 2.0 tools for training purposes and this figure is rising fast. While I could write an entire blog post on the reasons for this, I think Clark Quinn summarizes it quite nicely:
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Technorati Tags: LCMS, learning objects, LMS, Social Learning, social media, social networks

Dawn Social Learning LCMS, learning objects, LMS, Social Learning, social media, social networks

I’m going to gloat a little bit. Last week, I had the incredible opportunity to sit down with training industry luminaries Jay Cross, Charles Jennings, Harold Jarche, and Clark Quinn of the Internet Time Alliance or ITA (formerly known as TogetherLearn) to record a podcast on collaborative and social learning in the workplace (if you would like to listen to the podcast, here it is in its 5 parts: part I – managing collaboration, part II – CLO’s and the needs of business, part III – collaborative learning in a corporate setting, part IV – social media in corporations, and part V – integrating learning in the enterprise).
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Technorati Tags: Charles Jennings, Clark Quinn, CLO, collaborative learning, Harold Jarche, informal learning, Jay Cross, Social Learning

Dawn Social Learning Charles Jennings, Clark Quinn, CLO, collaborative learning, Harold Jarche, informal learning, Jay Cross, Social Learning

Talk has been heating up lately regarding the use of open source versus proprietary systems for learning. For example, if you check out Michael Hanley’s blog, you’ll see that he’s dedicated most of his recent posts to this subject. Sophia Peters provides another interesting post entitled Deciding Between Open Source and Proprietary Software? In her article, she makes the following assertions:

• Open source software has grown to include […] an adherence to established standards, which is a high priority for open source software development.
• Proprietary software has closed standards that hinder further development.

The debate regarding open source versus proprietary is one that will rage on for a long time and it is not really black or white. However, I think there is one thing that most people can agree upon:
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Technorati Tags: e-learning, LCMS, learning standards, LMS, Moodle, open source, SCORM

Dawn Learning Technologies, Standards e-learning, LCMS, learning standards, LMS, Moodle, open source, SCORM

I had the honor of interviewing Clive Shepherd a couple of weeks ago for a podcast on the subject of using synchronous online communications for learning or, in more friendly terms, live online learning.

It was a fascinating discussion because it made me realize that we tend to take things like web conferencing for granted and probably don’t dedicate the resources we should to optimize this communication channel.
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Technorati Tags: online learning, Twitter, web conferencing, webinars

Dawn Executive Perspective, Learning Technologies online learning, Twitter, web conferencing, webinars

I recently read a terrific blog post by HBS Professor Rosabeth Moss Kanter entitled “To Master Change, First Dread It.” In it, she argues:

“A counter-intuitive tip for mastering change is to start by wallowing in the feelings of dread it arouses. The sheer nail-biting horror of it all. Get in touch with every negative aspect, all the things that could go wrong. Then figure out a way to get that negative force on your side. In short, Dream your worst nightmare and invest in it.”

Nowhere in the learning industry today are stakeholders facing greater change than in the move towards single-source learning. The dream is grand one: content reusability, multi-modal delivery and real-time customization – all from a single source of enterprise content to meet the requirements of learners worldwide.
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Technorati Tags: content reusability, multi-modal learning, single-source content, training customization

Dawn Single Source content reusability, multi-modal learning, single-source content, training customization