Collective learning and self-regulated learning in the workplace.
Most companies link a course’s objectives to the
specific task that individuals need to perform. In essence there is nothing
wrong with this approach, heck learning and development specialist have been
punting this for years. We can prove ROI easily that way... There is however a
portion in learning psychology that we tend to overlook…collective
self-regulated learning in workplace is more powerful then guided learning.
Just look at how quickly you learn something if you need it to complete a task,
you actually want to learn, versus sitting in a class room and being told that
“this and that is important to do your tasks”. Until you actually need the
information or knowledge, do you really “apply” the information. There is this
old saying that “we only retain a small percentage of what we receive in the
class room”.
There is a reason for this, we actually don’t need the information, for now in any case. When we do need to complete a specific task and “we don’t know” we find the ways very quickly to know what we need to, to complete the task. A lot of time we only want the bear essentials. We don’t want looong explanations on it. So we Google, we ask around, we found the the paths that have already been trampled by those before us. Suddenly all the work the specialist have tried to instill are rather quickly discarded, as we fall back on the ways we have always found information. This seems obvious.
Yet we tend to miss this is learning. We ask “what must the individual know to complete the task?” we then establish what the outcome should be, maybe even where to find the information. That is simply not good enough anymore. As learning and development specialist we should really address self-regulated learning in the workplace. If something is interesting to the individual we should allow them to be able to search for this information. Too often companies policies are starting to inflict on search engine’s with “blocked content” messages. So what’s the implications of this? People start to loose interest to find newer ways to learn. As learning specialist we should also advocate ways that we can facilitate true “collective knowledge” sessions. Would it not be great if we can once a week in a informal cafĂ© style setting allow specialist to share what they have learn for that week? Maybe just an hour constructive discussions? Lets build this sort of sustainable activities in our outcomes and lets see what happens.
There is a reason for this, we actually don’t need the information, for now in any case. When we do need to complete a specific task and “we don’t know” we find the ways very quickly to know what we need to, to complete the task. A lot of time we only want the bear essentials. We don’t want looong explanations on it. So we Google, we ask around, we found the the paths that have already been trampled by those before us. Suddenly all the work the specialist have tried to instill are rather quickly discarded, as we fall back on the ways we have always found information. This seems obvious.
Yet we tend to miss this is learning. We ask “what must the individual know to complete the task?” we then establish what the outcome should be, maybe even where to find the information. That is simply not good enough anymore. As learning and development specialist we should really address self-regulated learning in the workplace. If something is interesting to the individual we should allow them to be able to search for this information. Too often companies policies are starting to inflict on search engine’s with “blocked content” messages. So what’s the implications of this? People start to loose interest to find newer ways to learn. As learning specialist we should also advocate ways that we can facilitate true “collective knowledge” sessions. Would it not be great if we can once a week in a informal cafĂ© style setting allow specialist to share what they have learn for that week? Maybe just an hour constructive discussions? Lets build this sort of sustainable activities in our outcomes and lets see what happens.