As dependency on the internet grows and local, national and global markets are being opened up, how many of us feel that our competitors are forging ahead and leaving us behind? We know that we must use the internet, as it continues to change the business models for many organisations. But it can also support the effective capture, management and dissemination of critical information within an organisation.

As in most propositions these days, there are opposing views. There are those who do not support the view that organisational learning is a ‘living beast’ and would not even consider there to be a need to explore this notion. After all, if the organisation is operated by well-trained personnel, what else is there to secure a competitive edge? Indeed, without people there is no organisation.

The opposing view, supported by many, is that there is a need to separate organisational improvements from personnel development. It is estimated that at least 75 per cent of all improvement investment in an organisation centres on developing the individual – an investment that can disappear as quickly as it takes to issue a P45! The rest of the allocated budget is usually spent on improving processes or procedures, which will stay with the organisation however many P45s are issued.

So, we believe that there is a need for organisations to create a framework that supports the capture of external and internal stimulus, experiences and information leading to innovative service ideas, new products, ‘best practice’, risk assessment and so on. Once captured, each item is reviewed by an authorised stakeholder and a decision taken to develop a new initiative across the organisation. To secure and maintain a competitive edge, it is essential that organisations continually monitor and improve their processes and behaviours.

But how is individual e-learning affected by organisational development? Organisational change in procedures and behaviours will often require immediate implementation at the point of use, possibly by email or something else just as immediate. In the longer term, these organisational changes will need to be cascaded into any e-learning modules for future study and it is here where an increasing number of people are advocating the adoption of Web 2.0 platforms.

Technologies such as wikis and blogs are becoming commonplace within organisations. Aimed at addressing the need of the employees, these tools empower them with the ability to learn from, and also educate, their peers.

We can consider the Web 2.0 technologies as satisfying an ‘informal’ learning need: individuals seek out answers to the questions that they feel they need on the job, while having the ability to also post their own experiences. The structured curricula applied within organisations represent the ‘formal’ learning approach: individuals undertake structured learning that supports organisational requirements. It is bottom-up versus topdown respectively.

At first glance, a dichotomy appears to exist between the two approaches. The Web 2.0 camp sets itself against ‘traditional’ structure, relying on technology to provide a sense of order within what could easily become a chaotic learning framework. So how can the two approaches possibly sit side by side?

It is within Web 2.0’s underlying statistical tools that we find the means for convergence between informal and formal learning. Tools such as heat maps, that show the most common tags (or phrases) in use across a wiki or blog, can combine with search statistics to reveal what information employees require in real-time. This information can now be used to feed into an organisation’s formal learning strategy. The organisation can see, at a glance, what knowledge or competency gaps their employees feel they need addressing.

As with any practical solution, the final answer is not to be found in technology alone, however. Just as implementing a wiki won’t automatically ensure correct information is disseminated throughout an organisation, an organisation with an insight into its employees’ requirements doesn’t automatically produce structured and efficacious learning. What is needed is a process with the authority and autonomy to unify the two systems.

Such a unifying approach might involve a repository, set up to receive internal and external information classified by type and urgency. A person or team, who decides what should be done with each item of information and action, would support this. They would have the responsibility of ensuring that immediate action is disseminated across the organisation and would also create a request to the learning and development department to incorporate the new procedure or behaviours into any affected e-learning courses.

Mike Bower and James Copeland are client services director and account director respectively at Futuremedia Learning. They can be contacted on +44 (0) 1273 829700, via www.futuremedia.co.uk or at mike.bower@futuremedia.co.uk and james.copeland@futuremedia.co.uk

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