The New Social Learning

1. Social media revolutionizes workplace learning and collaboration

Social learning is what it sounds like—learning with and from others.

Paradigm shift in learning. Social media tools are transforming how people learn and work together in organizations. Rather than relying solely on formal training, employees can now learn continuously through social interactions and knowledge sharing. This approach taps into our natural capacity to learn from others.

Benefits of social learning:

• Enables real-time knowledge transfer
• Connects people across geographic and organizational boundaries
• Allows learning to happen in the flow of work
• Facilitates peer-to-peer and informal learning
• Captures tacit knowledge that's hard to document formally

Cultural change required. To fully leverage social learning, organizations need to shift from a top-down, content-delivery model to a more collaborative, networked approach. This involves empowering employees to share their expertise, fostering a culture of openness and trust, and providing the right technologies to enable social learning.

2. Online communities foster knowledge sharing and trust

Community, the place where we live, work, and do things with other people, is a concept most of us learned and put into use when we were very young.

Virtual communities break barriers. Online communities within organizations allow employees to connect, share knowledge, and build relationships across geographic and departmental boundaries. These spaces foster a sense of belonging and enable informal learning through peer interactions.

Key benefits of online communities:

• Facilitate knowledge sharing and reuse
• Enable employees to find experts and get timely answers
• Build social capital and trust among colleagues
• Capture institutional knowledge
• Onboard new employees more effectively

Success factors. For online communities to thrive, they need active participation, relevant content, and a supportive culture. Community managers play a crucial role in nurturing engagement, facilitating connections, and ensuring the community delivers value to both members and the organization.

3. Media sharing enhances engagement and storytelling

If a picture is worth a thousand words, moving pictures on an endless array of topics are priceless.

Power of visual communication. Media sharing platforms allow employees to create and share rich, visual content like videos, photos, and presentations. This enhances engagement and makes complex information more accessible and memorable.

Use cases for media sharing in organizations:

• Capturing and sharing best practices
• Creating how-to guides and tutorials
• Documenting processes and procedures
• Sharing conference and event highlights
• Storytelling for culture building and brand advocacy

Democratizing content creation. With affordable and user-friendly tools, employees at all levels can now create and share compelling visual content. This democratization of media creation allows diverse voices and perspectives to be heard, fostering innovation and engagement.

4. Microsharing facilitates real-time knowledge exchange

Microsharing is a powerful way to connect people for personal, professional, or corporate benefit.

Bite-sized communication. Microsharing platforms like Twitter or enterprise equivalents enable quick, targeted communication in short bursts. This format is ideal for sharing timely updates, asking questions, and disseminating information widely and rapidly.

Benefits of microsharing in organizations:

• Enables ambient awareness of what colleagues are working on
• Facilitates quick problem-solving and knowledge sharing
• Breaks down silos and connects people across the organization
• Provides a platform for leaders to communicate more frequently and informally
• Captures real-time insights and feedback

Cultural considerations. To be effective, microsharing requires a culture of openness and trust. Organizations need to provide guidelines for appropriate use while encouraging authentic, valuable contributions.

5. Collective intelligence emerges through collaborative content creation

There is a spectrum of knowledge that goes from the most nascent early stages of information up to polished presentable deliverable content—in the form of a report, presentation, web page, and more.

Wisdom of the crowd. Collaborative content creation tools like wikis and shared documents allow multiple people to contribute to and refine information over time. This process taps into collective intelligence, resulting in more comprehensive and accurate knowledge resources.

Key advantages:

• Captures diverse perspectives and expertise
• Enables real-time updates and improvements
• Reduces duplication of effort
• Creates living documents that evolve with the organization
• Facilitates cross-functional collaboration

Overcoming challenges. To succeed with collaborative content creation, organizations need to address concerns about information quality and confidentiality. Clear governance processes, version control, and moderation can help maintain content integrity while still allowing for broad participation.

6. Immersive environments provide safe spaces for experiential learning

Virtual environments can provide more dimensions than physical environments and more social, nuanced ways for people to learn from one another as they face complex challenges.

Learning by doing. Immersive environments like virtual worlds, simulations, and serious games allow employees to practice skills and decision-making in realistic, risk-free settings. This experiential learning approach can be particularly valuable for high-stakes or dangerous scenarios.

Applications of immersive learning:

• Safety and compliance training
• Leadership development and decision-making simulations
• Customer service role-playing
• New product or process training
• Change management and scenario planning

Technological considerations. While immersive environments can be powerful learning tools, they require careful design and often significant technological investment. Organizations should carefully evaluate the potential return on investment and consider starting with smaller-scale pilots before full implementation.

7. In-person events amplified by social tools create powerful learning experiences

An event should be a happening. If nothing happens then it's just boring. Change the energy. Demonstrate you're after something different. Create something for people to talk about and feel in toes.

Blending physical and digital. Integrating social media tools into in-person events like conferences and workshops can dramatically enhance learning and networking opportunities. These tools extend the reach of the event, capture insights in real-time, and facilitate ongoing connections.

Strategies for socially-enhanced events:

• Use event hashtags to aggregate social media content
• Display live social media feeds during sessions
• Encourage live-blogging and tweet-ups
• Create digital artifacts like e-books or video highlights
• Facilitate ongoing discussion in online communities post-event

Evolving roles. Both presenters and attendees need to adapt to this new hybrid environment. Speakers should be prepared to engage with the "backchannel" of online conversation, while attendees can contribute more actively to the event's content and outcomes through social sharing.

Last updated: November 20, 2024