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| Analysis |
| Informal Learning – the other 80% |
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by Jay Cross
Years ago a start-up commissioned me to write a white paper that would help put them on the map. I wrote the paper that follows. It’s probably the most popular thing I’ve ever written. The start-up stiffed me but the paper morphed into the Informal Learning book. I think it’s held up rather well. I’ll be leading a series of master classes on informal learning and working smarter in Europe.
Execution is the goal
This paper addresses how organizations, particularly business organizations, can get more done. Workers who know more get more accomplished. People who are well connected make greater contributions than those who are not. Employees and partners with more capacity to learn are more versatile in adapting to future conditions. The people who create the most value are those who know the right people, the right stuff, and the right things to do.
It’s all a matter of learning, but it’s not the sort of learning that is the province of training departments, workshops, and classrooms. Most people in training programs learn only a little of the right stuff, are fuzzy about how to apply what they’ve learned, and never address who are the right people to know.
People learn to build the right network of associates and the right level of expertise through informal, sometimes even accidental, learning that flies beneath the corporate radar. Because organizations are oblivious to informal learning, they fail to invest in it. As a result, their execution is less than it might be.
Let’s look at what informal learning is and what to do to leverage it.
“The best learning happens in real life with real problems and real people and not in classrooms.” Charles Handy
Learning is social
Most of what we learn, we learn from other people — parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, brothers, sisters, playmates, cousins, Little Leaguers, Scouts, school chums, roommates, teammates, classmates, study groups, coaches, bosses, mentors, colleagues, gossips, co-workers, neighbors, and, eventually, our children. Sometimes we even learn from teachers.
At work we learn more in the break room than in the classroom. We discover how to do our jobs throughinformal learning – observing others, asking the person in the next cubicle, calling the help desk, trial-and-error, and simply working with people in the know. Formal learning - classes and workshops and online events – is the source of only 10% to 20% of what we learn at work.
Informal learning is effective because it is personal. The individual calls the shots. The learner is responsible. It’s real. How different from formal learning, which is imposed by someone else. How many learners believe the subject matter of classes and workshops is “the right stuff?” How many feel the corporation really has their best interests at heart? Given today’s job mobility, workers who delegate responsibility for learning to their employers will become perpetual novices.
In spite of this, corporations, non-profits, and government invest most of their budgets in formal learning, when it’s apparent that most learning is informal. This stands common sense on its head. It’s the 20/80 rule: Invest your resources where they’ll do the least good.
When I’ve pointed this out in presentations at conferences, members of the audience ask what they can do to improve informal learning. After all, they already have discussion boards and virtual classrooms and videoconference gear. I tell them they need to go beyond dumb technology. Linking me to a chat session is the equivalent of showing me the way to the library. Everything I need is in there, but it’s up to me to find it.
[Today’s teenager] “wants to socialize instead of communicate,” Tammy Savage, group manager of Microsoft’s NetGen division, said in a recent interview. “They want to do things together and get things done–and they really want to meet new people. They have a way of vouching for each other as friends, figuring out who to trust and not trust.” [1]
Achieving the proper balance
Neither investing in only formal training and education nor placing all your bets on informal learning is a good strategy. Extremism is rarely the answer to questions of human development. What you are after is the best mix of formal and informal means.
Achieving balance requires a scale of measurement. The metrics of our scale are the organization’s core objectives: - Reducing time-to-performance - Keeping the promises made to our customers - Improving service and processes - Understanding the organization’s mission and values - Innovating in the face of change - Optimizing the human value chain [2] - Knowing enough to work smarter, not harder - Replenishing the organization’s intellectual capital - Creating value for all stakeholders
In the past, corporate America relied on training and indoctrination to meet these objectives. This worked better in yesterday’s command-and-control hierarchies than in today’s laissez-faire organizations. Now it’s often more effective to take control by giving control, by letting “the invisible hand” self-organize worker learning. The organization establishes the goals and gives the workers flexibility in how to meet them.
An organization named CapitalWorks [3] surveyed hundreds of knowledge workers about how they really learned to do their jobs. - Workers reported that informal learning was three times more important in becoming proficient on the job than company-provided training. - Workers learn as much during breaks and lunch as during on- and off-site meetings. - Most workers report that they often need to work around formal procedures and processes to get their jobs done. - Most workers developed many of their skills by modeling the behavior of co-workers. - Approximately 70% of respondents want more interactions with co-workers when their work changes.
Combining the results of CapitalWorks’ formal and informal learning surveys, here’s how people report becoming proficient in their work.
Tell me why
In his new book, Clusters of Creativity [4], Rob Koepp writes “The dot-com craze was often seen in humanist terms — a force democratizing information, building online communities, increasing opportunities for entrepreneurs. Yet dot-com mania’s article of faith was that the technologies of the Internet essentially made human beings irrelevant. People became abstractions, recognized only as hits, clicks and eyeballs that propped up the preposterous market values of e-commerce plays.”
Real people are complex, integrated beings. Each is whole, unto him or herself. Body, mind, intention and emotion are inseparably bound. Situating our brains in our heads oversimplifies the situation; our brains are distributed throughout our bodies. Nerves, eyes, and receptors are all part of the way we think. And emotion? It’s inextricably linked to the other mental and bodily functions. The amygdala shapes the internal movie we call our time-delayed “reality” with emotion before we become aware.
Adapting to one’s environment involves much more than exposure to content. It is a whole-body experience. You cannot learn while someone is stomping your toes. You won’t pay attention unless other people are involved.
Other factors work to obscure the importance of informal learning: - Learning implies school. School is chock full of formal learning — courses, classes, and grades that obscure the fact that most learning at school is either self-directed or informal. - Vendors don’t make money from informal learning. Hence, it’s not promoted at conferences, in magazines, and through sales calls. - The rapid pace of technological innovation and economic change almost guarantees that formal learning will be dated. - One aspect of informal learning that makes it so powerful also makes the informal process forgettable: it often comes in small pieces. - Who’s in charge of informal learning? Most of the time, it’s the individual worker. Another reason informal falls off the corporate radar. - Most informal learning takes place in the “shadow organization,” oft described as “the way things really work,” as opposed to the boxes on the organization chart and their clearly delineated budgets.
Ottersurf’s Clark Quinn [5] notes that corporations invest in formal learning because it’s the one means they know – and know how to handle. “They’re still in the industrial model. Corporate learning lags the knowledge age and its associated technology. Sadly, this is a low priority with most CEO’s.”
“We learn by conversing with ourselves, with others, and with the world around us.” - Laurie Thomas & Sheila Harrie-Augstein
How workers learn now
Think about a go-getter knowledge worker learns something new. [6] The Training Department has been downsized. Even if it were at full strength, it’s unlikely Training would have much to offer on a new topic. So the worker checks Google or SlashDot or other resources on the web to see who’s got books or articles or blogs or case studies on her topic. In my case, I’d probably check the O’Reilly site since I maintain a virtual bookshelf there that gives me access to scads of technical books.
After the worker gets a sketchy framework of what’s to be learned, it’s time to dive in. Try things. Build on knowledge of similar subjects. Ask people in the office who’ve been there. Check with the technical equivalent of the jailhouse lawyer. The goal is not to master a subject area or pass a test; it’s to find out enough to dive into trial-and-error or to get the immediate job done. The worker doesn’t take off for a weeklong workshop; more likely, he picks up bits and pieces day-by-day for months.
This is self-directed learning, and that’s yet another reason it escapes notice. No one is responsible for toting up the learning every worker is engaged in. I wouldn’t be surprised if informal learning always outweighs formal learning in impact. Wonderful book title: All Learning is Self-Directed. [7]
At the beginning of this section, I said we were looking over the shoulder of a go-getter learner. Today, we’re in transition. Many learners are not self-directed; they are waiting for directions. It’s time to tell them that the rules have changed. It’s in their self interest to convert from training pawns to proactive learning opportunists.
Treat people as if they were what they ought to be and you help them become what they are capable of becoming. – Goethe
View the complete article: JayCross.com
*Jay Cross is a veteran of the software industry and the training business, Jay Cross coined the term “eLearning” in 1997. He is CEO of eLearning Forum, a 1500-member think tank and advocacy group, and founder of Internet Time Group. The Group helps organizations learn and perform on Internet time. Breathtakingly fast. Jay helped SmartForce position itself as “the eLearning Company.” He worked with Cisco e-Learning Partners to help them implement and market their initial web-based certification programs. Today he coaches corporate executives on getting the most from their investments in eLearning, collaboration, and visual learning. More than a thousand people visit www.InternetTime.com every day to receive Jay’s insights on eLearning. He is co-author of the recent book Implementing eLearning. Jay has spoken at Online Learning, Training, Online Educa, Image World, Instructional Systems Association, eLearning Guild , eLearning Forum, Learning Objects Symposium, ASTD International, Training Directors Forum, and other events. He delivered the inaugural keynote to the first meeting of the Online Banking Association. He is the author of numerous articles and white papers on eLearning and business effectiveness. He is a founding fellow of the Meta-Learning Lab.
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How organizations, particularly business organizations, can get more done. Let’s look at what informal learning is and what to do to leverage it.
Isn’t this amazing? What on earth has led us to a situation where corporations overwhelmingly invest in formal training but workers overwhelmingly learn informally?