Informal Learning
August 25, 2008Jay Cross writes:
Corporations need to replace traditional training, knowledge management, and in-house communications with something more informal, interactive, collaborative, self-service, impromptu, and flexible. Instead of pushing content, they need to be facilitating conversation.
What is an online community? – Wrap up and summary
August 19, 2008Prompted by this morning’s foc08 conference call discussion, I feel that it would be helpful to try and summarise my thoughts on the topic ‘What is an online community?’, so I can put it to bed and move on to the next intellectual challenge.
So here goes–a wrap up and summary of my take on the meaning of community:
Not long after my first post, where I was trying to grapple with semantics and definitions, Bron told a story of a personal experience of community, reminding me of the futility of my own approach. Having spent the best part of the last 12 months working with narrative approaches, I should have known better!
I really liked Bee’s play on Wenger’s model of three interrelated components; domain, community and practice.
… to define all other types of community, just change the 3rd component.
a) domain + community + interest = community of interest
b) domain + community + learning = community of learning
c) domain + community + practice = community of practice
In this model community is not a function of the content (domain) or the outcome (practice, interest, learning), which also implicitly means that community is the personal; the interaction; the binding element.
It was Greg’s illuminating post that hit the nail on the head for me:
“while all communities are networks, groups and teams, not all networks, groups and teams are communities. In the same manner that while all teams are groups and networks, not all networks and groups are teams. And while all groups are networks, not all networks are groups.”
No offence intended, but this paragraph reminds me of the poetry of Donald Rumfeld: see ‘The Unknown‘. It’s difficult to grasp, but what he says makes perfect sense to me. Thankfully, he’s also included a diagram.
This morning, I had some further thoughts and a bit of an ‘Aha!’ moment, which has helped cement my thinking on this topic. This thought was related to the traditional distinction made between the activities necessary for groups to effectively operate – group tasks — what the group was set up to do — and maintenance — keeping the group going in order to do it.
I have not been able to trace the origins of this work around task–maintenance, but the following samples are adapted from “Resource Manual for a Living Revolution”, New Society Publishers, 1985.
Task Activities: those activities that assist to achieve it purpose and goals.
- providing direction towards goals
- initiating ideas and tasks
- information collecting and sharing
- consultation
- clarifying and summarising
- co-ordinating
- time management
- practical issues and logistics
Maintenance functions: those activities and behaviours which are needed to build a group and keep it going:
- creating and maintaining an atmosphere of safety
- encourage participation
- equalising participation
- listening
- relieving tension
- social interaction
- creating group ownership
- valuing and highlighting diversity
It occurred to me that the extent to which maintenance functions are performed (and are performed well) are directly related to the sense of community or cohesiveness of the group.
Often there is a tendency to concentrate on the formal task activities and ignore the maintenance activities. Community builders should pay more attention to the less tangible maintenance functions and behaviours.
Phew, that’s out of the way. I feel like this now provides me with a really good sedge way into looking at the differences between teaching, moderating and facilitating. Looking forward to that–and to the weeks ahead.
Whatever happens is the only thing that could have
August 7, 2008Last night I finally got around to listening to Viv’s podcast ‘Whatever happens…explained!’. It’s a conversation amongst Open Space practitioners discussing one of the four principles of Open Space Technology: ‘whatever happens is the only thing that could have’, and what it means to them.
I really like the simplicity, and implications of Alan Stewart’s view that “whenever we treat each other well, something good emerges.” I certainly agree with the sentiment.
For me, the principle is about being present and in the moment, not having any pre-determined expectations and also about the illusion of being able to control what happens.
I’m reading ‘The Power of Now’ at the moment and came across a couple of passages that really resonated with me around this topic.
Whilst this first quote talks about transformational relationships, I think it equally applies to the transformational potential of group work:
“As far as inner transformation is concerned, there is nothing you can do about it. You cannot transform yourself, and you certainly cannot transform your partner or anybody else. All you can do is create a space for transformation to happen, for grace and love to enter.” — p158.
And what is Open Space, if it is not exactly that — creating a space for transformation to happen?
I like this one too, which also speaks to the transformational nature of groups and the ‘magic’ that can emerge:
“Do what you have to do. In the meantime accept what is … acceptance immediately frees you from your mind dominance and this reconnects you with Being. As a result, the usal ego motivations for ‘doing’ — fear, greed, control, defending or feeding the false sense of self — will cease to operate. An intelligence much greater than the mind is now in charge, and so a different quality of consciousness will flow into your doing.” — p179
It’s not something that I considered or perceived when I first entered into the world of faciliation, but there’s quite a spiritual dimension to group work, which is something I now find quite fascinating. At first I thought that perhaps this was an unintented consquence of my own search for work that was more meaningful or at best coincidental. Or perhaps it’s the only thing that could have happened?
Update: This podcast was actually recorded by Chris Corrigan at OSonOS. It is also available from Viv’s Winkipod site.
Facilitating Online Communities
August 2, 2008I’m taking the Facilitating online communities course offered by the Manukau Institute of Technology and led by Leigh Blackall from Otago Polytechnic. It kicked off earlier this week with an online meeting (via elluminate), and is off to an interesting start.
As part of the course we’re asked to blog our reflections and thoughts, so I figure that I might as well do that here. Apologies to regular readers if you consider this off-topic. For your benefit, and for those specifically wanting to subscribe to these posts, I’ve added category feeds and will tag all course related content as foc08. That way — you get to decide.
Why am I doing it?
Last year I worked on a project to develop an online resource for learning and skills development in knowledge management. It involved setting up a Wiki and working with a small number of contributors to improve the content and encourage wider participation. I learnt a lot. One of the most important things I learnt is the importance of encouraging good practices. I wish I had had more time to cultivate the community and to assist others to learn about using wikis at a deeper level.
I really loved working in the space where technology and collaboration intersect. And whilst my business is currently focussed on face-to-face facilitation, I’d also like to help groups translate their collaboration and knowledge sharing needs into usable technology solutions. This fits nicely with my purpose to discover more human, more productive, and more creative ways for people to work together.
So, this seems a step in the right direction.
What do I hope to get out of it?
Essentially, I want to better understand the role of an online facilitator, and some of the tools and techniques at their disposal for designing and managing healthy group processes.
Although I have a vague, intuitive understanding of what the answers might be, I’m hoping that the course will answer the following questions:
- What are the characteristics of good online faciliation? Do these differ from face-to-face? If so, how?
- How do group dynamics differ online? If so, how?
- What collaborative frameworks and processes work when facilitating online groups?
- How does is power, rank perceived online and how do you encourage diversity
- What is the role of facilitator in relation to technology stewardship?
Beyond the more specific, task-oriented objectives, I’m also hoping to have some fun, to be present and engaged. I want to meet new people, make new friends, to take more risks and to stretch myself.
Questions and concerns
My main concern is about being overwhelmed by the volume of information and being able to ‘keep up’. I find it difficult to follow threaded conversations online — I guess because of the asynchronous nature of the discussion. Apologies for the stereotyping, but I also put this down to being a mere male. Apparently we find it difficult to concentrate on more than one thing at a time! To be honest, it’s more to do with my learning style. I’m not particularly quick off the mark articulating my thoughts. I need time to ponder and to process. This is not really afforded in the fast-paced environment of the Interwebs.
I’m also very inquisitive, and as a learner, I need to explore and delve deeper. The challenge here is to try and not chase the rabbit too far down the hole!
Week one has been interesting. Mostly I’ve been setting up a feed and reading other participants blogs. I’m looking forward to delving a bit deeper.
Open Space eBook
July 21, 2008This morning I read “Living Peace: the open space of our lives.” edited by Raffi Aftandelian.
This eBook is Raffi’s attempt to look at the question: what have we as Open Space Technology facilitators learned about living in Open Space? It’s a wonderful collection of heart-felt anecdotes and honest reflections of OS practitioners from around the world. In typical open space style - he has trusted the resources of the group (contributors) to get the work done in the time and space available.
In terms of presentation and style it chops and changes from narrative form to poems, to lengthy reflections on practice, to the short missive. But that adds to the sense of the emergent nature of the editorial process and trusting that whatever happens is the only thing that could have.
What strikes me most about the book is the extent to which practitioners are really ‘living open space’, rather than simply using it as a facilitating tool. The more I learn about facilitation the more I realise that it is yourself that you must facilitate first.
Sincerest thanks to Raffi and to all of the contributors.
You can now download the e-book here.
