Connectivism works with us, never against us is my belief.
I work in a conservative Manitoba Credit Union with about 470 employees. Our training team of three, shrunk to a team of one, and considering the budget cuts related to COVID, it looks to remain that way for at least the next year. Foreseeing the shortage of resources and acknowledging the need to create a learning environment where seasoned frontline employees can share knowledge with peers without having a learning and development team to initiate knowledge sharing, we went live with Learning Café, our own open online learning environment. Learning Cafe was designed to be an active learning environment where every employee is both a producer and consumer of knowledge. It was modeled after the MOOC format, encouraged learning partnerships, open discussions, team-based learning activities and co-creating learning pathways.
The launch was met with phenomenal success, with us going on to win a National Credit Union award for Learning Excellence. Employees were thrilled to share knowledge openly because it gave them organization-wide visibility. There was a social aspect to it that worked so well in a pandemic situation and the discussion forums were buzzing with tips, best practices sharing, and positive exchanges. My manager and I felt we had struck gold. Here was a learning environment that worked with the existing Intranet, did not ask for additional people resources, and was visible across the organization as a source of knowledge and positive knowledge sharing, organizational dialogue, cross-functional collaboration and boundless, yet resourceful learning. Above all, the friction between frontline and back-office teams was withering away as the ability to connect the dots increased.
The euphoria lasted little over a year.
What happened? Weller reflects “In general, though, it feels that the sense of experimentation and exploration that connectivism represented has dried up.” (p, 121.). Was this what we were experiencing? Had Learning Café worn out its novelty?
The leadership team started finding Learning Café chaotic. They questioned the ability to retrieve information from the discussion forums, wanted to evaluate the business impact of the learning that was happening, and stated that the job of the frontline was to attend to service delivery and sales, not share knowledge. The frontline were knowledge consumers and were not getting the support needed from the learning team, they said. Then came the much-dreaded question; about learning evaluation- “How are you evaluating learning? What is the ROI? How do you know how many employees have completed the course? ” My team of one had no answer to any of this.
I believe in Connectivism. It works for me and I am firm in my belief that it will work in the organization of today.
It works for me because it aligns with my working, learning, and facilitating philosophy for most of the past decade, which is ‘Engage, Explore, Experience’. When I started my practice; my working, learning, and facilitating philosophy was ‘Engage, Empower, Excel’. Although I discovered the power of exploration beyond the confines of a curriculum and experiencing learning beyond achieving objectives, late in my career; I have been able to make it a part of life and help many employees break the barriers of learning objectives and four walls to be learning sponges taking in and squeezing out knowledge during and day-to-day activities. As Weller puts it “This is perhaps its most significant contribution — whereas other pedagogies sought to bring order to this chaos, connectivism takes this chaotic nature as a core principle and seeks approaches to navigate through it meaningfully. “ I continue to find this remarkable, because an organization in itself is not simple, and thriving in an organization requires the ability to navigate complexity successfully.
There is a place for Connectivism and there will be for the foreseeable future. As a concept, it will continue to evolve, yet I do see the core principles relevant even today. However, can it exist as the sole learning methodology in an organization like mine? I argue not.
On the other end of the spectrum lies our LMS, UKG Pro. Closed, and full of canned courses.
Most employees also viewed the LMS as a bit of a snitch. It tells managers when employees logged in, if they sped through their compliance course simply to reach the end or if they completed all the readings and tasks embedded in the module. Here is where it got interesting, employees who found Learning Café disorganized were more responsive to e-learning modules offered through UKG Pro. Employees who needed the social aspect of Learning Café and thrived on discussions and dialogue did not enroll in our UKG Pro courses. They had to do their mandated compliance courses and they did.
My thoughts around the LMS vs Connectivism is that there is no one way. It is not this or that. It is this AND that.
It is about finding ways to manage the polarities that exist and to be conscious of what is needed when. The need to exploit our interconnectedness is not going away, neither is the need to reflect and process independently. After journeying with Weller this far, I am firm in my belief that learning is and has always been about finding space in a crowd, independence in togetherness, uniqueness in a group, simplicity in chaos, parts in a whole and vice versa.
References
Weller, M. (2020). 25 Years of Ed Tech. Athabasca University Press.
September 19, 2021 at 11:27 pm
Hi Sharmilla,
Thank you for sharing about your learning cafe and the experience you had within your work! I have never been on the administrative side of an online learning cafe but I am curious to know more about how they work and what created such an overwhelming positive initial response. I think you hit the nail on the head when you said “there is no one way. It is not this or that. It is this AND that”. I am wondering how you responded as an organization when the euphoria of the learning cafe wore off? Would you try as an organization launching another online learning course that is a cross between the LMS UKG Pro course and your learning cafe? I think covid has placed a lot of stress on budgeting in many organizations and this adaption and forward thinking you’ve begun to apply to your training will be needed going forward!
September 21, 2021 at 9:56 am
Thank you for your thoughtful question London. It was a tough realization but I quickly understood that ‘Learning how to learn’ is in itself a skill, especially for learners who are used to a more instructor-led , directive approach that is also contained within the four walls.
Learning Café is still thriving and I have gained approval to build a course on ‘Learning How to Learn’ We hope that this will help learners and leaders gain comfort in the learning environment- where everyone is a knowledge producer and a consumer. What is working in my favour now is that new employees are quicker to adapt to and navigate through Learning Café. Legacy employees will need to catch up or be left behind.
Having said this, the LMS isn’t going anywhere either. We do have a number of mandated learning that needs to be tracked and reported.
As for budget, beyond the soft costs like my time and collaborators’ time, Learning Café had a budget of zilch. I am hoping to change that, and am looking to introduce browser based courses that can be deployed in Learning Café using Rise 360. I have been talking to Paula about this, as she is adept in Rise.
The one challenge I still face is learning evaluation in a way that pleases leaders. Your comment has prompted me to explore this with our group. I will post that question in the discussion forum for input from our bright team.
September 14, 2021 at 11:17 am
Hi Sharmila,
Thank you for sharing! This sounds like an amazing project to be a part of. Even though there has been some issues coming to a head, would you still consider the project a success? Being that so much was learned about how the employees responded, it sounds like some valuable insight was discovered that can help drive your future programs forward.
Would you consider the Learning Cafe a Community of Practice? It seems like the experience and knowledge sharing of the participants part of it would meet that criterion. It also sounds like that part of the project had a positive response from the participants but maybe not as much from management?
I look forward to connecting with you more about our shared challenges. I am in a similar situation as you with limited resources, budget, and people. We too experienced Covid driven layoffs that impacted our training personnel.
Melissa
September 15, 2021 at 11:09 am
Melissa,
Thank you for the comments. You raise valid questions. Yes I would consider the project a success. It kept learning going even when the pandemic related restrictions were on , it helped a number of SMEs who participated actively rediscover themselves and most of them went on to apply for promotions and get them. Another overwhelming feedback that emerged from active participants was that it helped them see themselves differently, improved sense of self and increased their problem-solving and decision-making skills.
As for what I consider Learning Cafe to be, the FOLC model we read about in our first module resonated deeply with what Learning Cafe is.
In case you are interested, please review this link https://youtu.be/26agsxb8_PA
I would LOVE to be connected to you and discuss our shared challenges. my email is svijayann@acu.ca and my WhatsApp is 2042907846
September 16, 2021 at 9:17 am
Hi Sharmila,
Thank you for the link, I look forward to checking this out.
Absolutely, my email is trainingbydesignmm@gmail.com.
Melissa
September 13, 2021 at 10:01 am
Hi Alexandra,
Great to see your response. I am intrigued by your work with credit unions. Will look up Enterprise for certain now. You are right, there is nothing like Learning Café anywhere else in the Canadian Credit Union world, one of the criteria for the award was Innovation and we were told Learning Café was a true innovation in the credit union space.
Learning Café is still alive and thriving. Although the leadership team wants to see order in the chaos it is. Weller was spot on when he says “For some learners, this was a revelatory experience and they couldn’t imagine studying any other way, but for others it was confusing”. Much of the leadership team found it confusing. Many employees especially new employees who were introduced to Learning Cafe as part of their onboarding, find it exciting – a space to connect, share and learn.
My fear for Learning Café is that , accommodating leadership requests will result in it becoming little more than a marriage of a library of resources and a browser-based LMS. It is so much more than that, revealing the pulse of the organization through energetic discussions.
I will reflect on what you have raised about diversity and accessibility missing from conversations around connectivism and get back to you. Would like to contextualize Tannis Morgan’s statements and then respond.
Am so happy you are part of our cohort Alexandra. Look forward to learning with you.
Sharmila
September 13, 2021 at 12:50 am
Hi Sharmila, very interesting to read about your background and the Learning Cafe. It sounds really innovative – is the experiment officially over now or are there talks to get it back up and running? (Sidebar: I have a personal interest in reading about credit unions because for years I used to write for Enterprise, a credit union member mag all about credit union issues and I’ve never heard about anything like the Learning Cafe at other credit unions)
In this context, I can see why connectivism speaks to you. I just learned about it earlier this year in the program and it has been of great interest to me as well. I was surprised at it being discussed as a passing fad as well. In case it’s of interest, I found the “Between the Chapters” podcast on connectivism with Tannis Morgan provided some further insights on the issues around accessibility and diversity that have been missing from discussions on connectivism.