Full Circle Associates

Nancy’s Note: In June I was lucky to help facilitate a couple of events for UN University at eLearning Africa in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. One of our panelists was the wise and warm Adejare Amoo from Nigeria. Adejare’s role was to illuminate how business can be part of innovating in eLearning in Africa. In preparation for his part in our “fish bowl” exercise, he drafted an outline that I really appreciated. Because we did not have time to cover all his points, I invited him to do a guest post on my blog. I think Adejare is my FIRST guest post since I started this blog May 26, 2004. I will also post a few reflections from eLearning Africa in a subsequent post.

As for Adejare’s post I love this line: “The higher education institutions in Africa need to follow the industrialists’ innovation concept and good practice policy, whereby they start their projects on a clean slate,  think big, start small, fail quickly, and scale fast, using ICT. Above all, the higher education institutions in Africa should adopt and adapt “open innovation policy” which has helped the industry to grow, just as it has helped most of the higher education institutions in the developed nations to use e-learning pedagogy for quality mass education production which has positively impacted their environments’ development.” Read on! And thanks to Adejare!

AN INDUSTRIALIST’S ROLE IN HIGHER EDUCATION IN AFRICA
I am an e-learning entrepreneur, a highly innovation promoted and real time evolving industry. I am based in Nigeria, the most populous nation in Africa (about 150 million population). Students as well as research & development results are identified as the products and services from  Higher education institutions in Africa. However these products and services form a core input in the industrialist’s production process system. In effect, the industrialist is a major consumer of higher education products and services.

Furthermore, as a major stakeholder in higher education system in Africa, the industrialist sponsors some relevant higher education research and developments programmes, as well as some relevant higher education projects  –academic and non-academic, such as infrastructural developments. Some of the industrialist’s employees are parents and relations to the students, whose progress is of utmost importance to the industrialist’s organisation>. In addition to being a donor, the industrialist is a network builder in higher education system. As a council member, he contributes to higher education policy and practice formulation.

HOW AN INDUSTRIALIST FEELS INNOVATION IS NEEDED IN HIGHER EDUCATION IN AFRICA

Innovation has been identified as turning new ideas into beneficial and/or profitable products and services. It is characterised by information and communications technology (ICT) driven experimentations and sharing of ideas.

Higher education system in Africa is confronted with some challenges. Both the admission and carrying capacities of the higher institutions are too low to satisfy the high demand for quality mass education delivery required to develop their environment.  Most of the institutions stick to their own obsolete ideas and practices, without allowing for other innovative ideas and practices from outside their institutions.  These institutions are starved of adequate funding. In view of the self contented policy and practice in most   African higher institutions, support assistance could not be readily obtained, since the donor partners could not understand their challenges. Most of the higher institutions in Africa are yet to apply technology in their education administration and delivery. The prerequisite solution to these challenges is radical innovation.

The industrialist also needs innovation of his company’s products and services to improve on customer satisfaction, satisfactory return on investment (ROI) to the investors/shareholders, and efficient as well as  effective social responsibility performance as a corporate citizen. The stakeholders desire innovation in the company’s products and services, and which innovation must come from all the inputs in the production process. Such inputs include the identified higher education products and services, i.e. qualified manpower and research & development results.
Expressed mathematically, “Summation of innovation of process inputs equals innovation of products and services.”

INDUSTRIALIST’S GOALS IN INITIATING OR SUPPORTING INNOVATION IN HIGHER EDUCATION IN AFRICA

he industrialist’s primary goal is to achieve his organisation’s set vision, mission, and values. This is, most essentially, to be and remain no.1 profitable producer of his company’s quality products and services, as well as fulfil the company’s  good corporate citizenship responsibilities, through innovation. The industrialist also aims at achieving the planned innovation objectives and strategies for the organisation, products and services, through innovation from the higher education products and services as part of the inputs. As a corporate citizen, the industrialist needs to fulfil the organisation’s  responsibility in promoting innovation of higher education process system, plantation of entrepreneurial seeds for generation innovation, as well as promotion of the organisation’s image and network.

INDUSTRIALIST’S MAIN STRENGTH OR ASSET INPUTS TO HIGHER EDUCATION INNOVATION PROCESS IN AFRICA.
From the point of view of comparative contemporary policy and practice in the higher institutions in the developing and developed nations, it will be observed that most of the universities that make the first hundred leading universities global ratings worldwide employ the application of the above mentioned innovative characteristics, i.e.  information and communications technology (ICT) driven experimentation and sharing of ideas  in their administration and academic operations.  The ubiquitous internet technology application has facilitated sharing of ideas and good practices such that the entire world is reduced to a digital village, with respect to the higher education institutions in the developed world.  This must have been borrowed from the successful high tech companies, which believe and practice the idea that companies should make greater use of external ideas and technologies in their own business and allow their own technologies and ideas to be used by others.  (Henry Chesbrough, UC Berkeley). In Practer & Gamble (P & G)’s “Use-It-Or-Lose-It Programme” innovation strategy, after an internally generated innovation has been successfully applied within the organisation for three years, it is thrown open to other organisations that could benefit from it. The higher institutions could benefit from such strategy.

The high tech industrialists have capitalised on the above mentioned innovation driving forces to make a significant impact in the higher education institutions, most especially in the developed nations. To the industrialist, innovation is a revolution. It involves high risk taking, along with high failure probability result, and to be undertaken by all stakeholders. The industrialist considers this phenomenon as part of innovation game. It provides opportunities for continuous experimentations as well as controlled frequent and rapid changes.  For instance, Microsoft’s innovation strategy allows its employees to spend about 20% of the company’s time on controlled experimentation of their personal innovative ideas, that could positively contribute to the company’s benefits and ROI to its stakeholders. The company accepts that about 50% of such experimentations could fail. Furthermore, Microsoft provides high tech tools and equipment to some higher education institutions, in Nigeria, for their digital/computer labs. On the other hand, while implementing its “Innovation Research Programme” strategy, Hewlett Packard (HP) votes a huge amount of dollars to sponsor research projects in the higher education institutions annually and use the generated results in its products and services innovation.  In the industry, consumer generated innovation is assuming a greater trend. Similarly, the industry should generate innovation from the higher education institutions, being the major consumers of the products and service, i.e. the students and research & development results.

As the industrialist commits so much  resources into promotion of innovation in the higher education institutions, the challenge of ownership of proprietary rights of products and services resulting from such research and development activities, undertaken by the institutions, could become important and controversial issues. This is where mutual and collaborative understanding should be embraced by both the higher education institutions and the industry.

The industrialist possesses and provides financial support to the higher education institutions, through grants, endowments, foundation, donations, scholarship, sponsorship for conferences, etc. Relevant examples of such donors in Nigeria include Microsoft, HP, Intel, Nestle, Shell, Chevron, and Dangote, among others. The company possesses relevant technology and infrastructure. Provision is made for both the students and teachers to access the industrialist’s technology and infrastructures such as laboratory for research and development. Places are provided for students/teacher industrial work experience, as well as for sabbatical work experience for teachers. Collaborative exchange programme between the industrialist’s staff and student/lecturers is promoted. The industrialist is involved in higher education institutions’ social and academic extra-curricular activities, building and sustaining network between the industrial group and the higher education institutions. Promotion of socio-cultural activities engages the industrialist. The company initiates and participates in community development programmes such as health, poverty alleviation, capacity building facilities, etc. The industrialist organises competitions and quiz and also provides facilities for entrepreneurial skills acquisition to be shared with relevant students/teachers.

INDUSTRIALIST’S NEEDS TO HELP MAKE IT HAPPEN
To effect the innovation, the industrialist will require collaboration and cooperation from higher education institutions leaders and the entire institutions’ community. Collaboration and cooperation from other stakeholders in higher education innovation — parents, NGO’s, and socio- cultural organisations, will be relevant. Open access process policy and practice will enhance “open innovation”, which will involve sharing of technological developments and information, as well as ideas. High quality support/participants and manpower, with positive attitude, integrity, creativity, interpersonal relation, etc will be of mutual benefit. The industrialist will be a member of the governing council of the higher education institutions, where policy and practice are formulated. The industrialists will be represented on all relevant government’s boards and high powered policy and practice formulators, to make audible voice.

The government will provide motivation in terms of tax rebate, recognition and other incentives, which will include conducive business environment — infrastructure, power supply, transportation means, peace, safety, security, etc. Funding from equity, loan and/or grant will be highly required.

CONCLUSION

The higher education institutions in Africa need to follow the industrialists’ innovation concept and good practice policy, whereby they start their projects on a clean slate,  think big, start small, fail quickly, and scale fast, using ICT. Above all, the higher education institutions in Africa should adopt and adapt “open innovation policy” which has helped the industry to grow, just as it has helped most of the higher education institutions in the developed nations to use e-learning pedagogy for quality mass education production which has positively impacted their environments’ development.
Mine is just to provoke more contribution on the way forward to quality mass higher education delivery in Africa, using e-learning pedagogy and other information & communications technologies, for accelerated and sustainable development.

I don’t pretend to have all the answers to the challenges confronting quality mass education delivery for development in Africa.

Engr. ADEJARE AMOO

ABOUT THE AUTHOR – ADEJARE  AMOO

Engr. Adejare AMOO  is a Consultant/Managing Director of CorporateMind Associates Nigeria Limited, engaged in blended education, through their website www.corporatemind-elearn.com and a learning/study centre . This is in support of accelerated and sustainable realization of the goals of the global socio-economic development programs such as MDG, and EFA. The targets of his social entrepreneurial effort cover the disadvantaged communities , such as the youths, girl child, the physically challenged, and the women , among others, in the developing nations.

He retired from Nigeria’s oil and gas industry in 2000 after 27 years work experience. He did an ICT Certificate course on e-Commerce  to support his passion for ICT in education. He is currently the Chairman of the ICT Group, Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry. He participated in the stakeholders workshops organized by Federal Ministry of Education, Nigeria, on education reform programs in 2006 to 2010. He participated in the eLearning Conference in Paris, and in EDUCA Berlin, as well as in the eLearning Africa Conferences between 2005 and 2010.He participated in the Second Science With Africa Conference in Addis Ababa, 2010. He participated in many international online education forums and webinars, including the e-Learning Expert Online Forum 2009, organized by UNU-ViE, Bonn.

He is currently the Nigeria’s ambassador to WWW.SCIENCE-CONNECT.COM NGO. He authors and publishes the Nigeria wiki-page on the NGO’s website. He has a very strong international network. He is bilingual with proficiency in English and French languages. A youths mentor and a community leader, he is married with children. His ambition is to dedicate the rest of his life to support the less privileged  in the developing nations, using ICT.

Note: I’m working a back log of “draft posts” that have yet to see the light of day. This is one from my trip to the Netherlands in December!)

Just a quick post from the Netherlands where I’ve been working with the fabulous Marc Coenders on an evaluation project for ICCO and it’s ComPart “project.” It has been lovely to work with the Compart team of Maarten Boers, Pier Adrea Pirani and Pete Cranston (the last two from Euforic Services and old KM4Dev pals.) It was a bit like “old home week” to use an American expression. The work has been fascinating, intense and challenging. The key word that keeps coming to me is fractal. Just when we get to one moment of understanding, things tilt just a bit and a new pattern slips in shifting things again. This is great for meaning making, not so great for finishing an evaluation report! It reminds us that we are working in a complex environment and if we are to succeed, we have to work with emergence. (See Peggy Holman’s terrific book, Engaging Emergence). We expect to be able to share the evaluation early in 2011 after the team has had time to absorb the findings!

As a little “side benefit,” Maarten Boers of ICCO hosted a borrel, or gathering for the knowledge sharing/KM/social media types in the area at the end of the day, some from my dear old KM4Dev network. It had been a long and intense day of meetings, plus silly me managed to catch quite a bad cold, complete with fever, etc. So I was really pushing my physical limits.

We planned a Fish Bowl for the borrel focusing on the interplay between organiztional change and technology, springing off of the evaluation work at ICCO with their “ComPart way of working.” I was greatful to be able to mostly listen from the outside of the fish bowl and took copious notes, some of which I’ll put below.

But I have to say, there were a few funny, wonderful moments when we, most of whom were working both in a second language and from a very tired state, misheard things and we created something new (and funny) out of it.

• What about “solo galaxies,” misheard from “solidarity.” Earlier in the day I was taking notes on the flip chart and I thought, hm, what a unique thing. Did that mean someone was really working in isolation, a “one star galaxy?”
• We have the fish bowl method, but what comes to mind when you say “fish bowling?” Who is bowling? Are the fish the pins? My visual imagination went crazy.
• Later during the conversation I brought up the concept of “free riding” in networks and communities and how do we distinguish this from legitimate peripheral participation. Some one wanted to know what writing had to do with it and wasn’t free writing good for getting past writer’s block?

I love this stuff.

Anyway, here are the notes — there are some terrific one-liners. I apologize for not catching who said what, nor for having a list of participants. Not such great network weaving on my part!

Watch this video from John Engle, someone I know peripherally from the Open Space facilitators network, about the work he is doing in Haiti, post earthquake. John’s organization, Haiti Partners, is not a relief organization. They work long term on education. Hear how they are reframing their work, tapping their networks and learning what to do in a difficult, emergent situation. Learning. Connecting. Shifting. Adapting.

If you need a place to donate, consider organizations like Haiti Partners – not just today, but in the coming months and years. Invest in a child’s education.

2 Weeks After Earthquake « HaitiPartners.org.

Watch the other videos from the past two weeks. Let’s learn together.

OK, I need your help. I have been playing around with this idea of triangulation (possibly not the right term) for a couple of months. Lilia has written about it to help me, but now I need my network to help me sharpen my thinking. Can you please read this and give me your feedback? THANKS

Triangulating for Success:
a practitioner’s experience using external networks to leverage learning and outcomes within organizations and institutions

Introduction

Organizations and institutions are ostensibly places for learning and getting work done. But sometimes individuals are blocked from achieving those goals. Blockages come from unsupportive superiors, a risk-aversive culture stifling innovation, a need for taking of credit by management, a lack of diversity of opinion and thought amongst staff, and simply the inertia of large organizations. The structure of organizations is often to replicate what is, rather than evolve into what it might need to be next. This can block success. In the context of expanding learning opportunities, one option is to triangulate outside the organization to enable increased learning within.

In an informal evaluation of successful collaboration, learning and teaming initiatives in a variety of contexts, the author and her collaborators have noted a pattern for supporting learning and getting work done: triangulating one’s work with external colleagues, communities and networks. This pattern has three phases: support and personal validation, connection to a community and/or network for practice and learning and finally, external validation. This paper examines each phase, reflects on how this external triangulation relates to some exemplar learning theories, and finally, offers some examples and suggests how designing this external triangulation into learning and work efforts can increase project success.

Blockages to Innovation and Learning

In working with knowledge sharing and learning initiatives within international non governmental organizations (NGOs), the author has observed a pattern where talented internal practitioners have struggled to spread innovations, engender learning required for successful work, and in general, been stopped from excelling.

The Three Phases

Phase 1: A mirror and a candle

Working in isolation and often without supportive management, practitioners feel alone. Isolation has been shown to be a factor in reducing a practitioner’s sense of professionalism and agency.1 Ideas and learnings, initially thought to be generative, start to be doubted by the practitioner. Often there is a diminished sense of worth, and an under-recognition of their own assets.

When an external practitioner connects with the internal practitioner, there is a chance to “hold a mirror” up so the internal practitioner can see the value of their work and their own professional skills. This process of validation can provide a great deal of self confidence and energy in what might otherwise be an unsupportive, or minimally supportive environment. It is like an infusion of courage and confidence.

The connection with an external practitioner then allows a sharing of ideas, and the beginning of a peer coaching or support relationship. This is the candle that lights the way to “next steps.”

In a large international NGO, a practitioner has developed an innovative new way to share learnings within and without the organization using new social media tools and collaborative practices. She feels her idea will accellerate knowledge sharing, increase learning and reduce duplication. However, she is blocked from implementing her ideas because her management has insufficient experience with social media, a reluctance to take a risk on a new idea, and is not fully convinced that the knowledge sharing would protect his team’s “competitive advantage” of being a gate keeper for knowledge flows. While this concern is counter to the organization’s mission, it is consistent with the way “business is done” internally.

Feeling discouraged, but not ready to give up, the practitioner connects with an external practitioner who enthusiastically encourages her, helping her see the power of her own ideas and experience. Instead of thinking her ideas are bad, she realizes they are legitimate but that she needs more examples of success from other organizations and a validation of her technical approach.

In this first step, an isolated practitioner moves from potential, to action, tapping that potential through support and affirmation.

Phase 2: A community of practice, a network of learning

The second phase is the recognition that the practice lives not only in the experiences of the internal and external practitioner pair, but in larger community or network of practice. According to Wenger2, a community of practice is ”Communities of practice are groups of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly.” The importance in this context is that isolated practitioners, such as early e-learning innovators, need the diversity of experience of a wider group of people. Organizations often foster homogeneity which supports uniform execution of plans, but does little to support innovation. E-learning practices are still nascent and require the collaborative thought and practice laboratory with other practitioners.  Innovators need access to ideas, real examples of practice, “critical friends” who can critique the ideas, support, coaching and “testing ground” for thinking out loud in a safe environment. They need time and space for reflection.

New web based technologies now provide visibility of and access to these networks of practice. From the “social networks” of Facebook and others, which appear to have no direct relevance to professional work, to specific professional networks, to loosely affilianted networks of bloggers, people can now find and connect to others. Even the social networks give exposure to professionals and participation in these networks should not be automatically discounted. However, it is important to know how to present one’s professional online identity and effectively use the networks.

The external practitioner then connects her to an online network of practitioners working in other related organizations. Through effective internet searches, activation of personal networks linked via online social networks, the two reach out to other practitioners who enthusiastically offer their experience, feedback and support.

Phase 3: External validation

The interaction with a community/network of practice leverages the learning of the individual practitioner, allowing them to build their skills, reflect on their practice and gain constructive feedback. However, this does not overcome the blockages preventing acceptance and spreading of new practices within the organization. They transform the individual, but not yet the organization. This is where the third aspect of external validation comes into play.

The familiar expression “you can’t be a prophet in your own land” reflects a common pattern of organizations not valuing innovation from within, instead relying on external “experts.” However, when internal work is validated externally, it is given more attention and credence. For example, consider the situation where an innovative staff member, frustrated with a lack of internal support, leaves an organization, becomes a consultant and is subsequently hired by their old organization as a valued consultant. They are paid more, given more respect, and most important, they are listened to.

While positive external “word of mouth” can give validation, internet based social media gives us a more visible medium to reflect on the work of the internal practitioner. This offers validation both publicly and validation available inside of/on behalf of their own organizations. External validation can affirm an innovation, or put subtle peer pressure on internal leaders to recognize the work/learning and respond to it (vs. block or ignore it.)

External validation can trigger management attention – even if this means management takes credit that actually belongs to their staff member(s). Once management recognizes the learning or innovation, there is a chance for it to take root and spread in the organization, triggering change that the one individual could not catalyze by themselves.

Finally, members of the network of practice begin to blog, write on their email list and web platform, about the work of the internal practitioner. This news filters back to the practitioner’s management, validating her ideas and giving them more reason and courage to  support the new ideas and practices that they had previously resisted. She now has approval to begin a pilot project to test her ideas. Her management is further recognized for their innovation, giving everyone a tangible example that sharing knowledge and collaboratively working can provide benefit to everyone.

Strategies for Individuals and Organizations

By recognizing the power of external support from individuals, communities and networks, we can begin to design this triangulation into our work. This suggests some competencies and actions, as well as some pitfalls to avoid.

Competencies supporting triangulation

There are three important competencies: having one’s own online professional identity, scanning for related professional networks, and the willingness to “learn in public.”

Developing a public online identity as a professional is the first competency. “‘Digital Identity’ (DI) is a term to describe the persona an individual presents across all the digital communities in which he or she is represented5.  (For more information about building an online digital identity, see “This is Me” for NGO Folks by the author. 6)   Professionals need to establish their professional digital identity as a way for others to discern if they want to  learn with each other.

One cannot tap into external support without knowledge of other practitioners and their networks. Scanning for professionally related communities and networks, engaging with them and reciprocating support to others are core competencies for triangulation. Being willing to ask for help, reflect on one’s own practice in view of others and accept constructive feedback are also important. In organizations where “being right” is more important than learning, this ability to learn “in public” with others may be difficult. But today, learning and innovation require us to become professional networked learners7. We simply cannot learn all there is to learn by ourselves – let alone filter and evaluate everything in the world.  Digital tools create a flood of  information. Only with our networks can we filter that flood. And only by willing to experiment and think outloud can we do this together online. Not everything can or will be done behind “closed doors” or “closed firewalls.” Ultimately, our reputations will not rely soley on what we accomplished, but also how we accomplished it and with whom.

Reciprocation of support and external validation of others is important for maintaining one’s reputation and identity in an external community or network of practitioners. While reciprocity in networks is rarely one to one, being known as someone who gives, not just takes, increases social capital and the availability of peer support. Robert Putnam described the value of this  communally shared social capital as a cornerstone to society itself.8 One should never consider “one-way” triangulation. It is an ongoing interweaving of learning and support across the network.

Activities supporting triangulation

Triangulation can be designed both into projects and into personal practices. For example, during a learning project design, practitioners can include steps to identify external individuals, communities and networks that relate to the work and allocate time and other resources to tap into those networks. External actors can be included as part of project peer review and evaluation, creating natural linkages for support and validation. The inclusion of informal, ongoing publications sharing “work in progress” via blogs, micro-blogging or wikis can create additional windows for external triangulation.

Pitfalls to avoid

Triangulation is not without risks. There are two primary things to watch out for: transgressing organizational rules, norms and boundaries and the issue of who takes or gives credit to ideas and work.

Practitioners must not violate organizational rules about what can or cannot be shared outside of the organizational boundary. This may involve intellectual property, competition and other factors. These boundaries are often significant blockages themselves to innovation and learning, and organizations should be very careful about not overregulating. The value of openness often brings deeper and longer term rewards than a short term “holding tight” to ideas or a strong need to take credit for things.

Practitioners may also find that once their ideas are triangulated and validated externally, others in the network and even their own management may “take credit” for the ideas and work of the practitioner. While we hope that people aggressively work to recognize prior contributions, we know it does not always happen. The ideas in this very paper grew out of a myriad of uncountable and now untraceable ideas shared by colleagues and network acquaintances of the author. What of that attribution? It has flowed past, never to be recaptured. As a consequence, the credit may never fully land where it is deserved. This is a cost of working openly in and with the network.

Conclusion and Implications

Triangulating learning through external support from individuals, communities and networks can provide significant, low or no cost support to innovators and learners within institutions. This triangulation requires networking skills and a willingness to learn in public – even possibly loose part of all credit for one’s work. The rewards, however, are increased learning, practical experience and ultimately the ability to change not just one’s self, but one’s organization.

1 Barab, S., Kling, R., Gray, J., (2004) Designing for Virtual Communities in the Service of Learning, , Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, UK

2 Wenger, E. (1998). Communities of practice: Leaning, meaning, and identity. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

3 Engeström, Y. (1999a). Activity theory and individual and social transformation. In Y. Engeström, R. Miettinen, & R. L. Punamäki (Eds.) Perspectives on activity theory, (pp. 19–38). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

4 Efimova, L. 2009 Understanding Networked Professionals accessed November 29, 2009 at http://blog.mathemagenic.com/2009/11/09/understanding-networked-professionals/

5 This Is Me by OdinLab, University of Reading (Not quite sure how to reference y et) http://thisisme.reading.ac.uk/

6 White, N 2009. This Is Me for NGO Professionals, accessed November 29th, 2009 http://www.fullcirc.com/wp/2009/05/19/digital-identity-workbook-for-npongo-folks/

7 Efimova 2009 http://blog.mathemagenic.com/2009/11/09/understanding-networked-professionals/

Next in the series of podcasts (previous podcasts linked below) is Sarah Blackmun of the Pangaea Network. Sarah is another long time online colleague and friend from the late 90′s who also seems to connect with others in my network (especially around her studies at the Fielding Institute where we both have a lot of mutual friends.

Sarah brings some different aspects to light about social media in international development. Sharing about work she and Dr. Steve Eskow have been doing in Ghana, Sarah brings in the issue of gender, particularly the importance of recognizing that often womens’ experiences are very different from men, so thinking about introduction of new technology needs to be with a full awareness of gender. Take a listen.

SarahBlackmun

Related Links

• The Need to Integrate Gender in ICT Policy Processes

Sarah’s Bio
Sarah Blackmun-Eskow is President and Chief Operating Officer of The Pangaea Network.

Sarah  has four decades of experience as a president, CEO, and general manager of education-related international businesses. She served as the CEO of Harcourt Brace International and as President of Harcourt Brace Media Systems Corporation. She was a founder, with Dr. Eskow, of the Electronic University Network, where she served as Chief Operating Officer. She also served as COO of Durand Communications, Inc., a technology firm based in Santa Barbara.

Blackmun serves as President and Chief Operating Office of the Pangaea Network, where she coordinates research, planning, budgeting, implementation, and day-to-day operations.

In addition to her business background, Blackmun-Eskow has nonprofit and community service experience, including serving as a Commissioner of Human Services in Santa Barbara County; chair of the Justice and Outreach Council of Trinity Episcopal Church; and board member of AIDS Housing Santa Barbara. As a member of the World Mission Group of the Episcopal Diocese of California, and in her earlier position as  information officer of the Episcopal Diocese of California (San Francisco), Blackmun established connections with Episcopal and Anglican leaders in the U.S., Africa, Latin America, and the Philippines.

Blackmun-Eskow earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from Ohio Wesleyan University and a Master of Arts degree from Bowling Green University. She is currently a doctoral student in the School of Human and Organizational Development of the Fielding Graduate University, Santa Barbara, California.

• Social Media in Intl. Dev: Dr. Steve Eskow
• Social Media in Intl. Dev: Simone Staiger (e-consultations)
• Social Media in Intl. Dev: Gauresh Rajadhyaksh on iSimulate (crowd sourcing economic models)
• Social Media in Intl. Dev: Podcast with Bill Anderson on Scientists using Twitter
• Social Media in International Development Podcast: Bill Anderson

• Simon Hearn on Online Community Facilitation
• Sam Rose on the Social Media Classroom
• Howard Rheingold on the Social Media Classroom
• Blended Facilitation Podcast from Matt Moore (with Ed Mitchell, Matt and I)
• Using “the clock” on telecons