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My wife is in sales and I’ve been watching helplessly for the last week or so as she writes/compiles a massive proposal for a potential client.  She’s worked until 5am more than once and is counting on doing it again tonight.  Many of these hours are spent in version control, waiting for others to complete a section and send it in or collecting the edits of multiple people.

I talked to her yesterday about ways to ease the collaboration amongst her team - a wiki being at the top of the list.  She told me they were using SharePoint but it was limited b/c only one person could work on the document at any given time.  SharePoint is a Microsoft product, though, so they have no choice but to use it and don’t have any wiki options.

While the next few weeks are still sure to be hellish for my wife and her team, the future is looking bright.  In this month’s edition of Fast Company, Robert Scoble writes about Microsoft’s Office Live Workspace - their entrance into the Web 2.0 world.  This is great news b/c it’s bringing these technologies to the mainstream and making them accessible to the vast majority of the corporate workforce.

Scoble is “betting Office Live will be a gateway drug for workgroups and companies to explore the full possibilities of office 2.0–and not just Microsoft’s products” and I’m sure he’ll win that bet.  I’m hoping so b/c I would like a greater population to have easy access to the features that will be provided with this.  Some of the roadblocks we’ve encountered in projects that require the use of these informal learning tools certainly include lengthy discussions with the IT department on the compatability of external vendors with their in-house products (usually Microsoft) - not having that as an issue will make the process smoother for all involved. 

Of all of the various groups in which you’re involved, be they social, professional, religious or otherwise, have you noticed that there is typically a core group of people that keep the momentum of the group? 

That’s precisely what Tony Burgess of Company Command noticed was happening in his learning community.  In this community of practice (CoP) with thousands of members Tony noticed a very small group (i.e. 20) were generating most of the activity and sustaining the momentum.  So he decided to dedicate his doctoral thesis to taking a closer look at the inner workings of this core group.

Tony was generous enough to share his findings with some member of CPSquare in an online discussion that lasted about a week and also via a conference call where he talked about his findings.

In his research Tony discovered that the members of a community’s core group have similar characteristics.  He boiled them down into four areas:

• Who are they?  What are their values? 
  • Driven to learn
  • People person
  • Service and ‘giving back’ ethic
  • Hard wired to develop others
• What do they do as core group members?
  • Contributor
  • Connector
  • Facilitator
  • Social Catalyst
  • Steward
• How do they become core group members?
  • Find and use the community of practice
  • Initial interaction in the community
  • Assuming a role
  • Participating
• What is meaningful to them
  • To contribute
  • To connect
  • To develop

Tony’s findings resonated with me professionally - we typically focus our initial efforts just on building a strong core when setting up CoPs with organizations and that foundation provides solid footing for the rest of the community to morph. 

A big thank you to Tony for the insights and generosity of time and knowledge for sharing with us.

Check out a real-time Digg Swarm. 

This is a fascinating view of the chaotic rhythm of a crowd seeking the information it wants.  It’s messy, it’s unpredictable and it’s reality.  And it’s precisely the reason that formal training programs account for (at most) only 20% of how people get the information they need to do their job. 

 If you’re not familiar with Digg it’s a website that allows its users to select (digg) things that they find interesting on the net.  Those nuggets are read and rated by other Digg users and this determines how popular an item is.  This results in a community that relies on the recommendations of the greater whole to select content for the individual.  It’s an effective system at weeding through the reams of information the Internet spews daily.

Watch as people ‘hop’ from article to article on a journey to their chosen destination at the speed that’s right for them.  You’re seeing self-directed learning in its purest form.  How effective would training classes be for these folks?  They’re obviously accustomed to getting the info they want when they want it, is a classroom the best venue for them to get info regarding their job?

With the social network craze and the ‘we are smarter than me’ philosophies we’re hearing about quite often, the way in which we gather, share, find and use information has permanently changed.  Most of us are now full-fledged knowledge workers whether we think so or not and the toolboxes of training and development departments need to reflect the shift. 

Communities of Practice, Web 2.0, and the myriad other learning and development terms that are in heavy rotation are evidence that some progressive approaches need to be thrown into the traditional mix.  Classroom training isn’t dead - it will always serve a unique niche in the learning portfolio - I think it will just diminish to the point that it matches it’s impact on participants (<20%).

 Embracing informal learning in organizations will become a necessity in just a few years due to us becoming a knowledge society.  There are tons of articles out there that will tell you so - if you happen to run across one, Digg it!

Welcome to Orbital RPM’s newly redesigned cyber home.  In our on-going quest to be the information destination to those in the learning and development field we are proud to roll-out some new features on the site as well as some that are enhancements from our last version. 

• Tag Cloud :: scroll to the bottom of the home page for a look at the tags most frequently associated with Orbital RPM content 
• Calendar of Events in the field :: Event Calendar is a consolidated view of happenings in the learning and development arena ranging from conferences to webinars
• Web Blog :: All past blog entries and comments have been ported over and this will be the new home of our blog - all information in it as well as anywhere else in the site is fully searchable via the search box in the upper-right of all pages
• Multi-media resources :: although not yet entirely populated, Media Center will house all podcasts with experts, relevant videos and whitepapers as well as a real-time listing of the content visited most often by fellow viewers
• Interactive Learning Paths :: Orbital Paths is a place to explore what types of learning and development is best suited for different areas within an organization

For any true geeks in the crowd, our new site is built on a WordPress platform.  WordPress is typically thought of as strictly for blogging but the fine folks over at NetConcepts have devised a very sophisticated, yet simple, method for website content mangement using the same platform.  

The learning and development field is changing rapidly and we enjoy having a front row seat - our new site will allow us to provide a steady stream of learning and development info for those that are interested in being part of, or just listening to/reading, the commentary on the wild ride.

We hope to see you back soon…