Smarter and more social
Social learning means learning from each other. While interacting with each other, you’ll acquire new knowledge and insights, which is the oldest way of learning. The renewed focus on it these days has to do with technology: social technology helps to connect people with room for communication and learning.
Social media puts you in charge of your own learning process: you decide what you’ll learn, where and when. That’s how social media allows you to work together and learn together: when sharing your opinion, experience or knowledge, you can inspire someone or learn something. Just look at YouTube or LinkedIn. Together you can also (learn to) solve a problem.
A lot of organizations are intimidated by this. A traditional training provides the Learning & Development apartment control: what it is that somebody learns, when and how. But how much of that control does L&D maintain when it comes to social learning? What exactly is shared regarding knowledge, and who will learn from this? And when?
A first step towards social learning could be adding several working methods to a learning intervention. But at its core, it means that an organization recognizes and allows people to learn from each other. That can require a certain mind shift. L&D can’t steer social learning, but they can facilitate it: for example, by using an online academy where people share knowledge and can work together.
For this to be successful, you need to know how to get started and how to manage this. That’s exactly what we’re here for. TinQwise helps organizations to develop their own social learning strategy and implement it.
