learning re-imagined

Be The Market Surprise

Much of the conversations we get engaged in with customers often involve discussion of “How did other companies do it?” - discussions around benchmarking processes.  Yet most of the emerging ideas in leadership and talent development we hear from eminent thinkers, researchers and writers warn of benchmarking to mediocrity.  Stuart Hart, author of Capitalism at the Crossroads, has a dynamite quote buried in the middle of his book:

“A smart strategist gravitates toward ill-defined and ambiguous opportunities.  That is because once everything has been defined and reduced to standard operating procedure, there is no money left to be made.” - Stuart Hart

The point he is making, and the same point Jeffrey Pfeffer, Jonas Ridderstrale, Lynda Gratton and others have made in our interviews, is the same - to be the market surprise, instead of be surprised, you need to create unique and original ways of conducting your business.  Lynda Gratton calls this “signature processes.”  Red Hat is a great example.  We were chatting with a senior executive at Red Hat and I explained part of a presentation we could provide which would showcase companies with leading implementation practices and he stopped me and said, “Look I don’t mean to interrupt but I can’t bring that story in here.  At Red Hat we do it the Red Hat Way.”  He went on to say of course they don’t ignore the market landscape or operate in some creative oasis, but that once they make a bet on a product or service, they execute their way.  By doing it the Red Hat Way, they also build great culture and engagement because everyone feels they are part of true creation.

A lifetime ago around 2001, while leading a small start-up we got together our customer research and stories and dreamed up an online system which could aid the learner and leader to use, apply, track, and campaign on our video learning assets.  Then we built the system and when we took it on the road test, people said, “Oh you’ve built an LMS.”  A what?  “You’ve created a a Learning Management System, although it’s got some stuff we haven’t seen before.”  We had indeed built an LMS before we had ever heard of one.  Instead of benchmarking LMS vendors (whom we didn’t know existed), and listening to our customers instead, we created something unique and did it with passion and energy because we believed in our originality and our ability to create a killer app.  The tip coming from emerging leadership is this: pay attention to the market yes, but be bold and original in what - and importantly how - you execute.

By: Shawn Hunter

 

Epiphany on iTouch

OK, let’s first establish the context – I am a Baby Boomer (well, really, on the very youngest edge of that generational divide).  My peers think that I’m a technology genius since I work in elearning, after all – but really I feel that I’m falling behind every day.  I asked for an iTouch ^TM for my last birthday so that I can read MapQuest on the big screen to find my way around, and because I love the way you can zoom in on photos with that finger-stretch action.  Last night, after a ten hour day of working on my laptop, I shifted from my home office to the living room sofa to transition to “leisure time.”  (There really is a connection to learning coming soon.)

The home page of my iTouch has a YouTube icon.  As a way of getting acquainted with my iTouch, I was systematically  tapping all the icons and menus, including YouTube.  I’ve launched very few YouTube videos, because I’ve not been too interested in the Dancing Babies and other “educational” subjects you hear about on the evening news.  But I eventually tapped the “Most Viewed” icon and what came to the top of the list was a video called “Carl Sagan – A Glorious Dawn” (Cosmos Remixed).  Now this title appealed to my passion for academic inquiry, and so I launched.

The music, the images – captivating.  I mean, a DJ re-re-remix, you know? But within, the pearls of wisdom: “If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe.”  I’m mesmerized by the quality of the image on the screen, the clarity of sound through the ear-buds: “A still more glorious dawn awaits, not a sunrise, but a galaxy rise – a morning filled with four hundred billion suns, the rising of the Milky Way.”  Science, poetry and thought, together in the palm of my hand: “The surface of the earth is the shore of the cosmic ocean; recently we’ve waded in, and the water seems inviting…”

Leisure, learning, recreation, learning, music, learning, imagery, learning…blended til the boundaries are impossible to discern.  (This being my own poetry, almost as mystical as Carl Sagan’s.)  The point, dear reader, is that the immediacy of the learning opportunity is what drew me into my learning moment.  And so we observe the very equal importance of content and delivery.

This is the idea behind SkillSoft learning portlets.  Portlets bring access to learning out of the Learning Management System and into the familiar online sites where employees already spend time.  In the course of day-to-day work, an employee is one click away from problem-solving information or personal enrichment.  With all the priorities competing for the time and attention of today’s knowledge worker, convenient access is as critical as engaging content.

By: Darlene Frederick

Dovetails

 

   

The word “dovetail” creates an image of furniture in my mind.  In the land of furniture, dovetail features mean quality.  Drawers that have dovetail joints are far more durable than staples or glue.  In a metaphorical term, dovetailing creates value in conversation as well as in furniture.  In my maiden posting to this blog, I will take the liberty to dovetail on Julie Ogilvie’s recent blog entry about a conversation.  Conversations can dovetail and create quality as much as furniture joints can create quality.

Julie wrote about Café and conversations and work feeling like an extended family.  She points to the customers that are an extension to our work family.  I am fortunate to work with a group of amazing professional Learning Consultants (LC).  The Learning Consultant team extends the SkillSoft family into our customer base, as Julie shared.  The LCs work with our customers on a daily basis collaborating on business objectives, program planning, marketing and communications and value measurement.  Clients benefit from years of combined experience and consistent best practices through partnership with our Learning Consultants.  As I have conversations each day with my team, they truly personify the extended family that Julie refers to. 

 

When it comes to family, I know I can count on my sister to tell me if my hair is a mess or if I have spinach in my teeth.  As a manager of this team, I can always count on the straight-shooting input from these consultants.  The sibling-like relationships we have across the team make it easy to pick up the phone and get the real story about what is happening across various industries.  They know what is important to customers.  As I ponder blog postings, I know I can count on the expertise of the LC team to share their ideas around those things that matter to me, to SkillSoft and to the extended family of customers. 

 

Dovetailing on Julie’s post is a fine start.  Dovetailing on what is happening across our customer base and in the world of our Learning Consultants creates a strong method that we will all find value in.  In future posts, I will expand on some of those strong joints and partnerships, allowing for learning.  Truly, isn’t that what this is all about?

By: Lori Neblung

Is your LMS Saasy?

Hi, my name is Stephanie Pyle and I’m a SkillPort-aholic.  Obviously I’m a little bit biased, but recently as we have rolled out a brand new user interface  I’m starting to really love this ‘little LMS that could’. 

I completely understand why some companies need to go with much larger systems and we count most of those big players in the LMS space as key partners of ours when it comes to delivering content.  But more and more, I’m talking to people who are looking for something easier to deploy, easier to run and easier for their learners to use.  At our annual Café event last week I ran a breakout session to discuss the future of SkillPort.  Although there were several areas that we want to continue to build out and work on, the feedback from our customers was overwhelmingly positive and those that had already moved to the new SkillPort 7 version loved it.   

One thing that makes me such a huge fan is the Software-as-a-Service or SaaS model for SkillPort.  This takes the burden of managing the system off of our customers and allows them to really focus on the things that make the most impact in their organization.  Josh Bersin recently posted a blog on this topic called “How SaasY is your HR Software Vendor?  What does SaaS mean to you?” where he explains what defines a SaaS vendor.  At SkillSoft, we have been using this model for over 10 years which I think makes us old-pros in an area that may consider new. 

One of the many benefits of our SaaS model is the getting new content loaded into SkillPort.  As a customer gets new content, it is automatically updated on the system which eliminates the need for someone to have to manage and load it.  And at SkillSoft, our model allows customer to always get new versions of the platforms when they want them.  Each version release is made available to all of our customers, but they get to choose the best time for their upgrade. 

Over the next few weeks, I plan to discuss other key areas that make me such a SkillPort fan.  With a philosophy that you shouldn’t have to train people on how to use their training system, SkillPort is usually worth a look and often fits the bill. 

By: Stephanie Pyle