Full Circle Associates

This morning on Twitter, Idocente pointed me to The Girl Effect. WOW! As some of you know, I have been a champion of the GiGis (Girl Geeks in service of the World Cafe community) and have long been a (prejudiced) champion of females in changing the world. So it is no surprise I had a positive response to this site.  Take a look at the video.

Over breakfast today in Bonn, where I’m doing some work this week, my friend Ulf and I were talking about where we have seen positive change take place.  (Check out his cool work with Science-Connects.) We shared stories about how things seem to work better from the ground up. Where people with passion and ownship make things happen, building on assets and in spite of barriers. Girls and women are certainly catalysts for this in many parts of the world. Take a look at this data from The Girl Effect fact sheet (pdf).

• When a girl in the developing world receives seven or more years of education, she marries four years later and has 2.2 fewer children. (United Nations Population Fund, State of World Population 1990.)
• An extra year of primary school boosts girls’ eventual wages by 10 to 20 percent. An extra year of secondary school: 15 to 25 percent. (George Psacharopoulos and Harry Anthony Patrinos, “Returns to Investment in Education: A Further Update,” Policy Research Working Paper 2881[Washington, D.C.: World Bank, 2002].)
• Research in developing countries has shown a consistent relationship between better infant and child health and higher levels of schooling among mothers. (George T. Bicego and J. Ties Boerma, “Maternal Education and Child Survival: A Comparative Study of Survey Data from 17 Countries,” Social Science
  and Medicine 36 (9) [May 1993]: 1207–27.)
• When women and girls earn income, they reinvest 90 percent of it into their families, as compared to only 30 to 40 percent for a man. (Phil Borges, with foreword by Madeleine Albright, Women Empowered: Inspiring Change in the Emerging World [New York: Rizzoli, 2007], 13.)

Since I was in Israel and Palestine last month, I have been struggling on how to write about my experience in a way that is not about judgement, but about reflecting what I saw. The tyranny of person over person is heartbreaking, regardless of the reasons and justifications we create. But from what I saw and learned about, women and children are victims as Israel and Palestine continue without a solution for sustainable peace. The statistics around maternal and child health paint a compelling picture that war, occupation, and the patterns that trigger them are bad for women and children. High levels of maternal depression correlate with poor child nutrition. Raising rates of stunting in children from persistent malnourishment (low nutrition and poor nutrition) are staggering. Cultural challenges that resist healthy patterns of breast feeding and trigger increased poor child health and adult obesity and heart disease in Palestinians.

Where is the hope for something better? For basic human rights of food, shelter, clothing, clean food and water and yes, even peace?

It is with the women.

The women of Palestine and Israel, both, who build bridges across the divides were the most compelling points of light I experienced amongst the bleakness that presented itself. At the conference I was attending, I met a midwife who works for the Jazoor Foundation for Health and Social Development who gave me one of the few moments of light and hope I felt during my visit. She was passionate about her profession of helping women have healthier babies. She was passionate about teaching others to be midwives, even amongst professional disdain from other health care professionals. (US midwives will remember the time when they were dismissed by doctors, and are now an important part of the maternal child health system.) Her brains, her heart, her attitude radiated light. She worked with other amazing, passionate advocates for health, social development and peace in the organization, led by another brilliant, passionate woman. (I’m kicking myself for not having her name handy, but it is on my home computer and I’m on the road!)

Women who are catalyzing positive change.

I would name this radiant midwife, and share a short video we made of her, but I have not asked her permission. I’ll try and remmber to do that when I get home to let you experience a bit of her light.

So the message of The Girl Effect site resonated with me this morning. Wherever we work - in businesses, education, non profit, or independent spirits in the world, what are we doing to foster this light in girls and women? Because so far, they are the best bet I can see for making positive change in the world. By no means am I dismissing boys. But girls are so often dismissed, when they may be the best chance we’ve got.

(A small suggestion to the Girl Effect folks. Your about page is in flash, making it hard to copy and share the stats. Yes, I know I can download the data, but that is one more step. Plus data is still locked in a PDF. For strong virality, making it simpler and easier may be more important than making it slick. )

Passing this along from Leigh Blackall…This is a terrific set of “mini-events” around a variety of online community and collaboration topics. NOT TO BE MISSED!

Participants in the Facilitating Online Communties course have come together to coordinate an online mini conference. Below are the range of events scheduled so far. Keep an eye on the conference wiki for up to the minute details. See you there!

A mini conference for Facilitating Online

From Facilitating online communities
Date: 2 - 9 November 2008
All times are in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) unless stated otherwise. Use this time convertor to work out your times.

2-9Nov Community Leadership Development

Title: Community Leadership Development - review and feedback

Date: online discussion

Duration: throughout the conference period

Facilitators: Valerie Taylor with guests and friends

Venue: blog posts, discussion page threads

Description: Community Leadership Development - online, open education and skills development for individuals and groups working with community-based organizations to provide leadership training, needs assessment and planning, coordination and management of projects to benefit the community.

As Community Leadership Development is a new course modeled on FOC08 and CCK08, participants in the FOC08 Mini Conferences are uniquely qualified to provide input, feedback and suggestions.

Throughout the Mini Conference, questions about the content and the process for the course will be posted for review and comment. Summaries and links to contributions will be posted each day.

Questions, offers of collaboration welcome.

2-9Nov Managing Multimembership in Social Networks

Title: SCoPE seminar discussion: Managing Multimembership in Social Networks: Oct 27-Nov 9, 2008

Facilitators: Bronwyn Stuckey, Jeffrey Keefer, Sue Wolff, Sylvia Currie

Description: How do you track and keep up with blog conversations? How do you manage your time as you engage in social networks? What are our limits as we integrate social learning into our work environments? When you do find yourself becoming disconnected from your networks and organized activities, how do you return to the fray? As facilitators how do you manage multimembership for your participants?

Many of us confess to fumbling along and we engage in multiple networks. Yet, many networks are essential for the projects, sectors and people that we work with, and for staying abreast of hot issues. Multi-membership and multi-platform overload is becoming a BIG challenge!

During this 2-week discussion we invite you to share tips for managing participation in social networks. This seminar is organized as part of the Facilitating Online Communities course mini-conference. There are many ways to participate! Take our survey, leave a Voice Thread, and join the asynchronous discussion.

Venue: SCoPE is an open, online community supported by BCcampus and hosted by Simon Fraser University. Membership is free and open to the public and our discussions are facilitated by volunteers. Access the seminar discussion directly.

Planning for the event: A record of our planning steps is on a subsequent wiki page: /multimembership

5Nov-7pm The Role of an Online Facilitator

Date: 7pm on Wednesday 5th November UTC (8am on Thursday 6th NovemberNZ DST) Check the time in your zone.

Duration: approximately 1 hour

Facilitator: Vida Thompson

Venue: Skype (contact skype user: vidathompson in advance to join this session)

Description I recorded an interview with a Community Facilitator here in Alexandra, Central Otago, New Zealand. For the mini conference I would like participants to listen to the inteview and then discuss their perception of the role of an online facilitator and how that compares to the role of a face to-face community facilitator. This discussion will be held on skype on Wednesday 5th November at 7pm UTC. (Contact skype user: vidathompson in advance to join this session).

All interested people are welcome to attend. It would be good if participants could listen to the interview before the event. Note: The interview does take a while to start as I edited the beginning out.

Please contact Vida Thompson in skype prior to the event so you can be included in the event when it starts (contact skype user: vidathompson or by e-mail address:vidat@tekotago.ac.nz) There is a limit of 9 participants who can talk but no limit to the chat contributions.

5Nov 9pm Interview About Second Life in Second Life

Title: About Second Life

Date: Wednesday 05 Nov UTC at 9.00pm (Thursday 06 Nov 10.00 am New Zealand Time)

Duration: 30 Minutes

Facilitator: Grant Comber (aka Avatar: Clinty Inglewood)

Venue: Explorer Island in Second Life

How to get there? Click on this SLurl Link and then click on the Teleport Now button to zoom to Explorer Island. The Second Life Grid coordinates for the Venue are 195,208,22 (PG) Your Host Clinty Inglewood will meet you.

Reminder: Min computer specs - RAM: 500mb (preferably 1 Gig) Chip speed: 800 MHz Pentium III or better, Screen 1024×768 pixels Internet Connection: Cable/DSL Microphone/headset needed for Chatting

Description:An interview between newbie Grant Comber (Clinty Inglewood) and seasoned Second Life user Harold Atkinson (Hat Carter). General questions on the use of Second Life and sharing of unique experiences. Opportunity for all avatars in FOC to gain some insight into using Second Life especially those who are newbies like Grant!

So if you want to philosophize, go didactic on us or just talk some technical turkey issues please pop in for this casual interview.

My thanks to our guest Harold Atkinson who is a fellow teaching colleague of mine with much Second Life experience. See you there! Signing Off: Clinty Inglewood

6Nov-8am Stigmergic Collaboration: The Evolution of Group Work

Facilitated by: Daryl Cook with guest Dr. Mark Elliott.

Mark completed a PhD in 2007 that developed theoretical frameworks for collective activity and mass collaboration in conjunction with a number of real-world projects and now runs a consultancy that provides services surrounding online collaboration and social media / web2.0. In our meeting, Mark will assist us to explore:

• Stigmergic collaboration as a means of explaining how co-ordination is achieved in ad hoc, massively scaled collaborative contexts (i.e. Wikis)
• How we can, as facilitators, use Wikis to collaborate, share and learn
• His experiences from the Future Melbourne project — the world’s first, wiki-based, collaborative city plan.

The one hour session, will include a very brief presentation, but will mostly be informal and conversational. Definitely no Powerpoint.

Please join us!

DATE: Thursday 6th November 2008 at 7PM EST or check the time in your time zone.

VENUE: Join this online event at the Elluminate Meeting Room

Beforehand, please ensure that you computer is ready to use the web conferencing software (Elluminate).

RSVP: daryl.cook@gmail.com

ENQUIRIES: For any enquiries and/or for any assistance with Elluminate, do not hesitate to contact me.

6 Nov-10pm International Online Collaboration Group meets FOC08

Title International Online Collaboration Group

• Date and Duration - UTC Thursday 6 November 10pm-11pm UTC (Friday 7 November 9am – 10am East Australia time)
• Facilitators: Kerry Trabinger (CIT Australia) and Leigh
• Description

This is a FANTASTIC opportunity for the group to meet with teachers who are currently completing a subject called Facilitating Learning Online in Australia. Come and discuss your experiences. Topics will include: - Introductions (where are you from and what area are you teaching in) - Virtual Classrooms - Do you like this platform? Will you use it with your students? Why or Why not? Any tips on using these platforms. - Time Management - How does your Institute allocate time for online delivery? Is it the same as for face to face? - Marketing - how can you get students or participants to join in an online dicussion or virtual classroom session? PLUS you have a chance to try a different virtual classroom platform.

• Venue - VET VIRTUAL (a virtual classroom used in Australia VET Sector - www.vetvirtual.com)

6Nov-1030pm TLC (Think, Learn & Create) Using Mind Maps

Title: TLC Using Mind Maps (TLC - Think, Learn & Create) - Online Discussion, followed by Presentation, - Friday 7 Nov 2008 11.30 am - 12noon NZ DST (10.30 pm - 11 pm Thursday 6 Nov UTC)

Facilitators: Kay Lewis and Elaine Dittert

Description:

• Have you had difficulty keeping up with the ‘overload of information’ during this course?
• Got confused or lost by trying to view all the discussion threads?
• Have you jotted down some thoughts and ideas you’ve read and heard but by the time you’re ready to go over your notes they make no sense?

If this sounds like you, this 30 minute session may be just what you need. It is designed to give you some pointers to help you gather and organise large amounts of data and provide a clear overview, analyse your thoughts, identify problem solving ideas and generate more ideas with clarity, efficiency and accuracy.

We plan to have one special guest speaker:

• Jennifer Goddard, BBus (Admin), Master of Entrepreneurship and Innovation, Master Trainer in Buzan Advanced Learning Techniques, inspirational Director of the Buzan Centre in Australia and New Zealand and co-founder of Mindwerx International. OR
• Jennie Vickers, Buzan Licensed Instructor (senior advanced coach), Masters of Management, Diploma in Business Administration (University of Auckland), BA Law (Honours). Jennie is also an Alumni of the Leadership NZ Programme.

Venue: From your feedback in the discussion here [1], we will use 24/7 Meeting Room (Elluminate) or Skype to host the presentation.

7Nov-4PM EST Storytelling

Title: Storytelling

Date: November 7, 2008 at 4PM EST or check the time in your time zone.

Duration: 60 minutes ?

Facilitators:

• See list

Venue:

• Join the event on WiZiQ
• Join the event on Connecting Online.

Description:

• Do you think of stories when you look at a photo, a video, or listen to music? Does the topic interest you as a tool for instruction and learning or are you just curious? In any case, for whatever reason you may have, you are invited to join this storytelling mini conference.

• We will have a live storytelling event on WiZiQ or Elluminate. Please refer to the main page of Connecting Online for further discussions on the topic.

Further Information

• Storytelling Mini Conference

• Please add your name to the list and/or ask questions here.

8Nov-Midnight Heart2Heart Online

Title: Heart2Heart Online

Date: Tentatively Saturday, November 8, 2008 00:00 UTC Time

Duration: 90 minutes

Venue: TBA (Skype, Elluminate Meeting Room or WiZiQ)

Group Size: Maximum of 8 people

Facilitator: Greg Barcelon assisted by partner Ivy (guest)
A place where we can simply be ourselves… sharing ourselves at a deeper level without the fear of condemnation, unsolicited advice, interruption or being judged.

Traditionally we got this deep level of connectedness with our true selves, and assist others in doing the same, from our families. But, with many people experiencing difficulties in their family life today, we need communities that can become “Schola Amoris,” a School of Love, in which all learn to first of all accept themselves as they are, and then in a greater way accept others unconditionally – the greatest yearning we collectively have.
More about it here.

TBA Connecting Online in Developing Countries

Connecting Online in Developing Countries

Title: Connecting Online in Developing Countries

Date: Saturday November 8, 2008 at: See your time zone, please.

Duration: 60 min?

Faciliatator: Joy Zhao & guest speakers

Venue: WiZi or 24/7 Meeting Room

Description: to be updated…

–
Posted By Leigh Blackall to Facilitating Online Communities at 11/05/2008 10:08:00 AM

Warning - this is a venting blog post!

For nearly four years my dear friends and colleagues John Smith and Etienne Wenger and I have been writing this thing that became a book. You’ve heard me periodically obsessing about it here in my blog. Writing communally is one of the hardest and most rewarding practices I’ve ever done, especially when done with smart, diverse people. It is both heaven and hell. It is almost unending. But the end is in site.

We finally picked a title. FINALLY. FINAL-FRICKEN-TASTICALLY. What started out as Stewarding Technology for Communities, (site to be renamed today!), then veering around many ideas, including the recent “Digital Nests” theme, we landed today on something that both brought the warmth and natural world and a metaphor that works with the topic of the book.

So drum roll pleasssseeeee!

“Digital Habitats: stewarding technology for communities”

Now, I dare ask, what do you think?

I could not resist searching for a few Flickr creative commons images for the post … not intended as book images, but just … just… because I CAN!

Haworthia viscosa in habitat

Linda Lane's Habitat

Flickr Creative Commons Photo Credits:

• martin_heigan
• wonderlane

Tony Burgess, one of the founders of the CommpanyCommand community (and author) made a great post on Com-Prac this week around engagement in communities of practice. It was so terrific, I want to point to it and share a snippet from his post.

com-prac : Message: Re: [cp] CoPs and unpaid volunteers
The question I have asked myself is, “What is the experience of becoming an
especially active member of a community of practice?” In the process of
searching out this question, what emerged for me was a sense for what makes
members’ experience meaningful. It is the depth of meaning that they make from
the experience of being an active member that seems to propel them forward in
their journey. In a nutshell, here are three factors that stood out to me:

The experience is meaningful to me (an active member) along three dimensions:

(1) Connection: As a result of this experience I am becoming connected to
like-hearted leaders who I value. This is about relationship.

(2) Contribution: I am able to give back and make a difference–to contribute
my unique experience and talent to something greater than self. I am making a
positive difference for people and a collective that I value.

(3) Personal Development: As a result of this experience, I am personally
developing and becoming more effective as a leader and a person than I would
otherwise be. I am being exposed to people and experiences that change me. I’m
learning.

Given this understanding, a follow-up question follows:? “What can we as a
community of practice do to be a catalyst for the meaningful experience of
members?”

These three dimensions are terrific. They are also pretty general. A good starting place, but I think in practice, we need to go deeper. How do we understand these motivations? Both in CoPs and in other collaborative settings.

In yesterday’s telecons in our Knowledge Sharing Workshop, we asked what people thought motivated others to share knowledge. We talked about “gaining visibility for work” and “getting useful information.” They were all “true” answers, but very general. Easy to say yes to on first blush, but often prioritized at the bottom of giant to-do lists and thus engagement rarely happens.

Then we asked them personally, what motivated them to share their knowledge in the workshop and the answers were much more specific and actionable. People had a task they needed to do involving knowledge sharing. They wanted to expand their network of colleagues working in KS because they didn’t have enough of those people in their daily work life. And yes, some of them wanted to share because they believed in sharing. Those seem to be the people we can count on, but make up a fairly small percentage of any group we are working with.

When we are trying to design, support, create conditions for collaboration, how do we best suss out motivation to increase the chance of actual engagement? What are your “sussing” strategies?

Photo Credit:

Uploaded in Flickr on February 4, 2008
by Philippe Boukobza

I have a tendency to destroy my computer headsets/mics with regularity. I run over the cords, the plugs loosen and then the sound degrades. It is time again to buy a new set, but instead of buying the cheapest set at the local office store, I decided to get the recommendations of my network - since many are also frequent users of this product.

Here is what I learned.

• GeoffBrown3231 @NancyWhite I find Logitech’s audio stuff surprisingly good for a basic brand without frills
• josiefraser : @NancyWhite I use a headset but you’re not going to get as good sound quality as with a mike. After 3 hours it also starts to hurt a little.
• dougsymington : @NancyWhite I like these http://tinyurl.com/5fd5h7&cl=us,en <tweelings_en : LOVE
• GrahamAttwell : @NancyWhite would not buy headphones but good directional mic - love my blue ice- is more expensive - 100 Euro - but worth it
• GrahamAttwell @NancyWhite yes - I use a mac pro with external speakers - no feedback at all
• kiwicarol : @NancyWhite bought Creative HS-400 recently and they are gr8. Use to call NZ-UK via Skype Out with no probs.
• TedErnst : @NancyWhite I love my USB Logitech headphones
• thewebcoach : @NancyWhite I have this plantronics headset… it’s awesome! http://tinyurl.com/6b3wuc
• ejgertz I’ve had good luck with Cardo S-2 headphones. They are bluetoothy and seem to handle input as well as output quite well.
• My son recommends the Steelsound (he is a gamer)

Via Emily Gertz’s tweet of a recent blog post of hers, I was led to Bright Idea Shade on mandiberg.com.

From Eyebeam OpenLab comes and open source idea for making a cover for those glare-y compact fluorescent lightbulbs (CFLs) we are all installing to save energy. But the bare bulbs are, well, unbearable. I’ll embed the video below, because it is wonderful, but I want to add some additional observations about process and values here. The light bulb information is practical and usable, but what is going on with EyeBeam OpenLabs work is what I’m focused on.

What is going on here?

1. A problem or need is identified
2. A solution is created (in this case, building upon a previous product)
3. The idea is opened up an shared and…
4. an invitation is made to offer that idea to a manufacturer to reproduce it! (Eyebeam apparently also plans to produce a DIY kit but that is not yet on their site.)

The question that then surface include:

1. What is in this for Eyebeam? (Beyond possible sales of a DIY kit which any other manufacturer could also create) What values are being expressed - beyond valuing open source. That part is already clear. Eyebeam’s “about” page gives a 404 error, so it is hard to fully discern by just looking at their web site. It looks like a non profit organization. So I’ll make some guesses that this organization is about the application of design in support of some greater good. Thus they find willing funders to fund their work and they “give away” their ideas as the result of that work. The additional benefit is the support of the designers and artists in doing their work and advancing their own practice. Hopefully the open source values continue past their participation in Eyebeam work. As a result, Eyebeam builds a good reputation and attracts more funding. So doing good does good for the existence of the organization. Does this apply only to non profits? As a small business person, I’d say no, it applies more widely. But is it practiced? Have businesses seen the strategic value of a triple bottom line that includes public good?
2. What motivates people to solve problems and give away the answers? Is there a certain set of characteristics that motivate people to do this? My personal guess is yes - thinks like a perspective of abundance (as in good ideas) rather than scarcity, belief in the existence of many possibilities, and some sense of optimism. But I think it is bigger than that. What else?
3. Why aren’t more people doing this? Or are they, and it is just invisible? (And if it is too invisible, what might we do to make it visible?) What can we be doing as individuals, groups, organizations and networks to amplify the positive effects of acts like Eyebeam’s which offer solutions to us? Can we encourage this beyond a lightbulb cover to things like improving girl’s education in an African nation, or improved health practices in Palestine?

OK, so bear with me. Here is the next leap in my thinking today. Is there a link between the work of organizations like EyeBeam and the idea of micro-lending. Kiva.org has opened a window of possibility on how an ordinary person in the US can support an individual entrepreneur in a country half way around the world who would otherwise not be able to start or continue their small business which supports their family. Tune Your World is trying to support musicians in countries without the economies to support their work by getting support from people like me who can support them.

Can we micro-finance and encourage ideas that solve all sorts of problems? Is there a non-financial element of micro-support? What would it look like? Is that kind of support useful or destructive? (maybe both!)

What do you think? What do you know of going on like this that might help us explore these ideas? I ask, because I know from my experience that top down, large organization-driven solutions are not going to work for all the needs in the world. We need to identify, understand and expand other options and approaches. I want to learn more.

Now, the video, in case you have a bare CFL that is glaring you down:

CFL Cover from Eyebeam OpenLab

Production by Simon Jolly

Soundtrack by I Am Jen (iamjen.com)
SteveTouch(TM) by Steve Lambert
Project by Michael Mandiberg and the Eyebeam OpenLab
http://www.eyebeam.org/project/cfl

Flickr Photo credit:

Uploaded on February 14, 2008
by mandiberg

Now, I also have a problem I just discovered. and I’m looking for some bright ideas. I got home from a three week trip to find large-ish animal doo doo in my basement and now I don’t even want to go down there to find out what left the doo doo, how it got in and how to make sure it (they) are out. Anyone in Seattle wanna come help me? Signed - chicken Nancy

Last week I wrote about Obliterate or strategically use business travel?

Then I saw this post on Facebook by NetTeams wizardess, Jessica Lipnack. Her emphasis on the social processes resonates. It is worth a link here…

Facebook | Jessica Lipnack’s Notes

…Many reporters, for example, The New York Times’s fine one, Steve Lohr, whose article, “As travel costs rise, more meetings go virtual,” took the headline earlier this week. Nothing wrong with Lohr’s article, good, solid reporting with news for the newbies to the area: Cisco’s telepresence offering, high price tag aside, makes participants feel like they’re “there;” “companies of all sizes are beginning to shift to Web-based meetings for training and sales;” and this, worth the pull quote:

A report last month by the Global e-Sustainability Initiative, a group of technology companies, and the Climate Group, an environmental organization, estimated that up to 20 percent of business travel worldwide could be replaced by Web-based and conventional videoconferencing technology.

Twenty percent? Me thinks a lot higher. But, numbers aside, where Lohr’s article is like all the rest - and where it misses the point - is in this: Technology alone does not solve the problem. I’ve harped on about this before. Our old motto, “90% people, 10% technology,” is being drowned out by the reflexive action whereby companies/organizations throw technology into the hands that once held airline tickets.

Here are a couple of more related articles if you are interested in this topic of when and how to replace F2F meetings with virtual meetings.

July 31 Addition: As an added afterthought (I keep adding links) this is also a technology stewardship issue. Who is building the capacity to use these tools well? What does their community of practice look like!)

• From Jessica: “Bored on conference calls? Relief!“
• An emerging page on the KM4Dev wiki on virtual meeting tools
• Edited and added 18 hours later - Report on Microsoft virtual world meetings
• And on a related tangent, a report on virtual leadership.
• Added on July 31 - Has the Telecommunity Tipping Point Finally Arrived?

Photo Credit:
Uploaded on July 7, 2008
by linh.ngân

Fast Company has a provocative article out yesterday under their “Big Idea” flag about “obliterating” business travel. Sounds like quite a headline, eh?

July 23, 2008
“Within five years, technology will obliterate the need for business travel.” - Inspired by new videoconferencing technologies and rising fuel costs

… Companies too are making an active effort to limit employees’ air travel for the duel-pronged benefits of cutting costs and being environmentally friendly. AT&T has reportedly reduced employee air miles by 15% through video conferencing and Web meetings, while Accenture plans to have 22 video conferencing rooms installed around the world by the end of this year.

OK, I am in firm agreement that we can cut out a lot of business travel, particularly when we are doing things like information dissemination. I cringe each time go to or hear of international gatherings where the structured interaction is all presentation. Thank goodness for meals and coffee breaks. But I think we should seriously rethink large conferences. See Jim Benson’s post on this… But what about the other things we get on airplanes and fly around the world to do, both explicitly and implicitly, with each other? (No, I’m NOT talking about mile-high clubs!)

We know we can do meaningful work and learning with each other at a distance, even without video conferencing. (In fact, please, I don’t want to have to get out of my yoga clothes for a vid!). Sales can happen via online technologies. But is there a “throw out the baby with the bathwater” element here? Will we obliterate business travel, or use is both more sparingly and strategically? I think it is the latter and here’s why.

Learning is not an instant… it is a path
I was chatting with Tony Karrer (lots of good stuff in his blog and at his new venture with Michele Martin, Work Literacy) earlier today about “training.” Oi, such a word. One of my friends says “training is for dogs, learning is for humans.” I’m not quite that rabid (or am I a dog?) but often feel like training is dumping information on people (see this clever slide show for an articulation of this.) We have expectations that training as an isolated act solves a skill or more general learning need.

In my experience, it ain’t that simple. Yes, there are certainly things we can learn and apply with a quick workshop - online or face to face (F2F). But taking learning and deepening it, applying it to work, innovating upon it - that takes time. And it sometimes takes poking at the issue from more than one direction. Working on it over time. Or perhaps with more than one stick. This is where blending online and F2F can sometimes be the thing that puts us over the current hurdle. I learn something online with you today. I go off and work on it. We help each other online. Then we get to meet, have a great meal and we start out talking about our projects, and then we go from there, discovering new learning from each other we never even imagined. Kismet, made possible by the space we create when we take time to meet F2F.

Why is there something important about this F2F stuff? Because so much of learning is nurtured by the social context and sometimes the online social context is not always sufficient for everyone. I find it very satisfying. My sister does not. Have we had some shared experiences to compare? You bet. So those of us who smugly say we can do it all online have not yet found a way to translate those rich experiences to others with different preferences and styles of learning and interacting. And, hey, we still can’t sit down and make/share a meal fully online.

Going F2F creates a different and time bounded social context. We give each other full attention for a limited amount of time. Online, we may spread that attention out - even if we are using synchronous technologies. One of the most powerful gathering experiences for me is being able to work and stay at the same place with people - a research facility, the same hotel, or in a colleagues home. The mix of work and play, of social and intellectual, creates a different sort of stew that jumpstarts my learning differently than online. Being able to “sleep on” what we said today makes tomorrow’s conversation deeper. This F2F stuff is different, not better or worse.

We benefit from that difference. The translocation to another place jostles new ideas and opens us up. We get out of our cocoon and I think that can be very productive. And in my experience, it bolsters and deepens both the learning and the subsequent online interactions.

So lets reduce business travel - it saves time, money and the environment. But lets not obliterate it because there is value in the social learning context of face to face gatherings, particularly ones that open the space for us to create meaning and ideas together. Skip the panel and the presentation. Break out the good food, wine and tea. Let’s sit elbow to elbow, look over each others’ shoulders and let’s get to work. AND, let’s do great things together online.

Photo Credit (CC)

Uploaded on July 24, 2008
by law_keven

I’m a Joss Whedon fan. Loved Firefly. I also love musicals (please, don’t judge me! ). So when I heard about Dr. Horrible’s Sing Along Blog, I had to take a peek.

Then I wanted to know more about the Master Plan. Here is what I found:

Spread the word. Rock some banners, widgets, diggs… let people know who wouldn’t ordinarily know. It wouldn’t hurt if this really was an event. Good for the business, good for the community – communitIES: Hollywood, internet, artists around the world, comic-book fans, musical fans (and even the rather vocal community of people who hate both but will still dig on this). Proving we can turn Dr Horrible into a viable economic proposition as well as an awesome goof will only inspire more people to lay themselves out in the same way. It’s time for the dissemination of the artistic process. Create more for less. You are the ones that can make that happen.

Wow. I had no idea how important you guys were. I’m a little afraid of you.

Wait a minute - look at this. A new way to create and collaborate? Yeah, baby. While I see international NGO’s struggling to maintain ownership, get credit and other such things in order to keep the donor dollars running in, what would happen if international development was done in this model - by people both who identify themselves as “development professionals” (whatever that means) AND by anyone who had something to contribute. Give it away free for a bit, and then if it has value, sell it at a reasonable price. We fund based on usefulness and demand.

What would happen if learning had this model. Instead of lining up for a degree, what if people could offer and accept the offer of some bit of learning. How could these informal offers link up with the formal structures of certification or degrees? Should they?

What would happen if ….

To quote Whedon one more time… “Wow. I had no idea how important you guys were. I’m a little afraid of you.”

I wanted to point out a new article on the CGIAR’s ICT-KM site about the Knowledge Sharing Toolkit Wiki that I’ve been working on and which has become near and dear to my heart. Here is a snippet:

Knowledge Sharing in the CGIAR - Tools and Methods for Sharing Knowledge: The CGIAR’s Wiki Approach
The Institutional Knowledge Sharing (KS) Project of this Program together with its CGIAR Center partners has been experimenting with a range of KS tools and methods over the past five years and has recently been assembling these and many others into a toolkit (http://kstoolkit.wikis.cgiar.org). This evolving resource – continually updated, edited, expanded, and critiqued in wiki fashion – is targeted mainly on scientists, research support teams, and administrators in the 15 international centers of the CGIAR. But it also serves their partner organizations, as well as development organizations working in areas other than agriculture. And it benefits from their diverse feedback too.

Science has traditionally relied on a few key vehicles for sharing and validating new knowledge. The most important are experiment replication, the publication of research results in peer reviewed journals, literature searches, and formal and informal communications at conferences, workshops, and other meetings. In addition, the patent system serves as a complementary knowledge broker in instances where research spawns technical innovation. With such longstanding institutions already in place, why is there a need for new avenues to share knowledge? The answer to that question is surprisingly complex; but a few key reasons stand out.