Elearning blog: Learning re-imagined

Learning Transformed at 2013 Skillsoft Perspectives EMEA

The social media bubble is showing no signs of bursting. In fact, most of our social networks are still growing; Twitter’s Vine video app has been shared 2.86 million times on the social network since launching five months ago. Providing learning via your target’s preferred means is a crucial step towards giving training credibility.

Of course people take different approaches, so we look forward to discussing how businesses are using social to aid learning development at 2013 Skillsoft Perspectives next Thursday 20 June.

Our theme this year is “Learning Transformed,” and we plan to discuss issues such as linking learning to business value, maximising learning spend, and the future of organisational learning with some of the most influential UK thinkers and practitioners, from both global corporations and academic institutions.

Lynda Gratton, Professor of Management at London Business School, will lead discussions alongside speakers from the BT Group and Lancaster University Management School. The event, which takes place at 8 Northumberland Avenue, London (just round the corner from Trafalgar Square), will also provide an interactive forum to discuss innovations in learning, plus the chance to network with an exciting mix of influential business and leadership experts.

We’ll also be discussing the key findings of our recent research into how key skills issues might be impacted by the demands of our changing working world. Our panel will look at how new recruits will cope with working in remote, virtual, flexible teams and how vital it is that they start to develop the skills today that they will need to succeed in this new environment.

Make sure you are there to get involved in the debate and question leading minds in the learning field!

Social Media Metrics for Dummies

By Pam Boiros, Vice President, Corporate Marketing, Skillsoft

With so many social media monitoring and measurement tools available, it can be overwhelming to figure out which tool is right for you when it comes to calculating the success of your social media marketing efforts. This user-friendly guide helps you determine which tools and techniques will serve you best for understanding your online audience.

Social media monitoring and metrics let you listen to what is being said about your business like never before. Whether it’s interpreting analytic dashboards, understanding what metrics mean for you, calculating your return on investment (ROI), or putting your findings to use in future social media marketing campaigns, this book contains a wealth of information.  Real-world case studies demonstrating how small and large businesses are using social media metrics help to illustrate key points. Also addressed are emerging areas such as measuring mobile app metrics. 

Author Leslie Poston (@leslie) is the Founder and CEO of Magnitude Media, a media and business consultancy.  She coauthored Twitter For Dummies and has written many books, magazine articles, e-books and blogs. Leslie is a frequent speaker and presenter on social media.

What do you think? How is your organization leveraging the power of social media metrics? Read this book and let us know. Skillsoft® Books24x7® BusinessPro™ subscribers can access this book with their account. 

Forrester Research Analyst Discusses Social Media and Social Networks

Organizations can leverage social media to foster discussions among learners. Groups can rate content similar to consumer websites, helping employees find targeted and relevant resources. Watch Claire Schooley, Senior Analyst, Forrester Research discuss trends around social media and social networks with respect to learning.

From capitalism to talentism: a complimentary webinar with Lucian Tarnowski

27 March 2013 – 12 p.m. GMT

Understanding the role of social media in talent engagement

As the prevalence of social networks continues to grow, more and more of us are using the likes of Twitter and Facebook for not just personal, but business use. Indeed, last Christmas Twitter revealed that it had more than 200 million monthly unique users; with both people and businesses keen to get involved and reap the benefits of this increasingly mainstream communication medium.

So with interest in social media at an all time high, does it have real relevance for businesses beyond representing a nice add-on?

Lucian Tarnowski, founder and CEO of BraveNewTalent.com, believes social media has created a fundamental shift in the way organisations communicate and engage with talent. He believes talent is king in the modern workplace and will explain how businesses can use social media to engage and foster talent, in a free Skillsoft webinar on Wednesday 27 March at 12pm GMT.

In the session, Lucian will explore:

• The effect and impact of social media on the talent function.
• How next generation talent now expects to be engaged online.
• The opportunity to leverage the internal knowledge and content at your organisation to the external world.
• Social learning trends and the future of online learning.

If you are interested in finding out more about how to use social media to attract and retain top talent, visit our event page to register for the free webinar. We look forward to seeing you (virtually at least!) on the day.

About Lucian Tarnowski
Lucian is Founder and CEO of BraveNewTalent.com the social platform where organisations create talent communities in order to attract, engage, develop people from their past, present and future workforce. The long term value is that BraveNewTalent will map the talent graph by knowledge, skills and potential enabling organisations to increase the efficiency of applying human capital. 

Lucian has been honoured as a Young Global Leader (YGL) by the World Economic Forum. He is also winner of the Global Enterprising Young Brit. In his spare time Lucian runs Take Heart India, a no overheads charity that provides blind and handicapped students in rural India with the vocational employment skills that guarantee them jobs for life. Lucian speaks to audiences around the world about the convergence of talent and technology and its impact on the future of the global workforce and education.

Throw Back Thursday: social learning

We receive so much valuable content from our customers, partners and internal subject-matter experts. On Thursdays, we thought it would be fun to do a “throw back” and bring back an older post that was valuable to our audience.Today’s throw back is about social learning.

Corporate social media 'do's and don'ts'

By Jim Zimmermann

Back in September, Andrew McAfee, the author of Enterprise 2.0 (Skillsoft® Books24x7 subscribers can read the book or the book review), wrote an interesting post in his Harvard Business Review blog called “Do’s and Don’ts for Your Work’s Social Platforms”. McAfee points out that how an employee uses their company’s social networking software should be different from how they use their personal Facebook and Twitter accounts.

If used correctly, McAfee believes that a corporate social tool can “simultaneously advance your own work, make your existence and expertise better known throughout a digital community, and benefit the organization as a whole” – all things that any learning leader endeavors to provide.

McAfee goes on to provide a number of Do’s, Don’ts and “Gray areas” for users of corporate social tools:

 

Throw Back Thursday: social learning

We receive so much valuable content from our customers, partners and internal subject-matter experts. On Thursdays, we thought it would be fun to do a “throw back” and bring back an older post that was valuable to our audience. Today’s throw back discusses social learning.

The Eight Truths of Social Learning - revisited

By Pam Boiros

A little less than a year ago I wrote a post on this blog entitled “Eight Truths of Social Learning.” It was one of the posts that generated a surprising amount of traffic and discussion. Clearly social learning was -- and continues to be -- a topic for which many learning professionals are seeking information.

I thought I would revisit my eight truths now, given that we have a year under our belts since the launch of the Skillsoft inGenius® social learning platform in April 2010. In the last year we’ve continued to learn a lot—not only about social learning, but about the organi­zational dynamics that surround it.

2012 Skillsoft Perspectives Canada: registration now open

By Melynda Hilliard

Here is a 2012 Skillsoft Perspectives Canada update from Melynda Hilliard, Skillsoft’s Events Marketing Manager. Stay tuned for more exciting details!

We are thrilled to announce that registration is now officially open for 2012 Skillsoft Perspectives Canada. Perspectives brings together our customers, employees, and other elearning industry experts for a unique opportunity to hear from distinguished speakers, discuss hot topics in the industry, and learn about our plans for the future. This year’s event will take place October 4 at the Old Mill Inn & Spa in Toronto.

At the event, Skillsoft customers will be able to network and learn from one another, reaping the benefits of a collaborative atmosphere that not only encourages participants to share experiences, strategies, and challenges, but also drives discussion around the connection between learning and business value. The theme of this year’s Perspectives Canada is “Driving Value Through Learning.”

C3/Customer Contact Channels, Inc. uses social collaboration in learning

Lisa Oliver, Director, Internal Development, C3/Customer Contact Channels, discusses how her organization utilizes Skillsoft inGenius® to encourage learners to participate in valuable learning programs.

 

2012 Skillsoft Perspectives Australia keynote and speakers announced

Justina Phoon is Skillsoft’s Asia Pacific Marketing Communications Manager. She will be sharing updates on 2012 Skillsoft Perspectives Australia throughout the next few months. Stay tuned!

By Justina Phoon

Our annual Perspectives Australia event in Sydney will happen in just about six weeks, but there’s nothing typical about this year’s event! We will be extending Perspectives Australia over 2 days (15 and 16 August) and have lined up a fantastic keynote speaker and other great speakers focused on key topics that will provide you with valuable takeaways and insight into their own learning success stories.

Keynote

We’re pleased to announce Sue Langley, CEO of Emotional Intelligence Worldwide, as our keynote speaker. She will give the keynote presentation: Transforming Culture by Leading with Innovation and Fostering Creativity. Find out more about Sue and watch a clip of her interview with the Leadership Development Channel™.

Our topical focus aligns closely with this year’s theme – Motivate, Innovate, Learn: Driving Value Through Learning! Join us and learn from your peers and Skillsoft experts:

 

Exploring Digital Immigrant Perceptions Toward Leadership Development

We’re pleased to bring you a guest post by Roderick Millar, Managing Editor at IEDP, the executive development information portal and of Developing Leaders magazine. Find more at www.IEDP.com.

By Roderick Millar, Managing Editor, IEDP

If you ask a leader whether they would like to engage with a learning program that fits around their schedule, does not involve travel, allows them to interact with peers and experts, gives them direct access to the latest thought leadership and is often less expensive than a traditional learning program, it is not surprising that they tend to agree that this would be a wonderful thing. When you make it clear that that is exactly what modern elearning programs can do, often their demeanour on the topic changes.

This is an area of curiosity that we are currently researching at IEDP.  From recent anecdotal discussions there seems to be a perception problem with the elearning medium which is quite at odds with current reality. Without wanting to prejudice our current research, it seems that the negative impressions from executives is partly a matter of outdated preconceptions and a concern about building ‘trust and empathy’ with other participants. Clearly the only way to change outdated attitudes is to provide newer information.  To do so, a stealthy approach needs to be adopted, where smaller groups can be introduced to modern versions of online learning and participate in blended approaches.