Last evening I hosted a webinar for the 70:20:10 forum. This organization works to help people and organizations shift to an organizational framework which supports and enables informal and social learning opportunities along with formal learning for the betterment of the workers themselves and the bottom line of the organization.
The topic of my webinar was Demystifying 70:20:10 – Using the Framework to Transform Your Learning Strategy. An important topic as many 1. See the effort as being more about adding informal and social opportunities to formal learning and/or 2. Are tripping over the numbers, taking them literally and trying again to create informal and social in the organizations.
Content aside, I strove to put my beliefs into practice for this event, but make no mistake it was a traditional webinar format with me as presenter, slides, objectives and attendees. My belief? Putting “social at the center” – I see that when we put energy there in our organizations, the openness and transparency it affords can improve formal learning by providing a critical feedback loop with ongoing formative evaluation. Additionally more open social activity can inform experiential (informal) learning through working and thinking out loud about our own practice and efforts. When people engage with others and share their work, peers can learn from their failures, successes and the half-backed ideas to inform their own work.
Although my slides for this webinar, mostly just evocative images, were developed first, the greater energy was in developing the questions to ask in the chat box. I presented a question every 2 or 3 slides and acknowledged and commented on many of the answers given. These were not simple yes/no, I asked about their own experiences, observations and opinions. Not an uncommon or revolutionary practice but maybe the frequency was and several times the attendee’s responses redirected my presentation. When the Webinar officially ended, the conversation really heated up. For about another 20 minutes the flow of interchange was deep and rich. Success of course can only be measured in outcomes and that remains to be seen but many left saying they were energized, armed and inspired.
Putting social at the center of this webinar put the people and their interaction first as the social activity swirled around the the content (object) and not the other way around. The event was informal and relaxed as I didn’t desire to be seen as a content expert but maybe more as a conversational one; guiding and modeling interaction in a virtual environment. The comments and conversation really worked to enhance the presentation as it went along and ideally the experience will inform the attendees future efforts.
I know it has informed mine.
