Three Experts Talk about Corporate Learning and the Future

Corporate learning is going through profound changes as the need for fast, anytime learning grows.  The paternalistic models that have served for a hundred years are not able to provide flexible, fast learning. They are dependent on knowledge staying static for a long time, on constants, on predictability. The world we are living in is none of these things.  We need empowered models based on self-learning, choice and fast connections  to massive amounts of information.  MIT and other universities have put their classes online and most are available free. Finding a fact, learning how to do some particular task, getting information on how a product works or what a software feature does are so easy today that there is no need to enter a classroom.  There are videos, articles, books, chat rooms, and other tools to deliver what you need to know precisely when and how you want.

We are still working out delivery mechanisms.  Not everyone has learned to deal with empowerment.  Choice can be overwhelming because we have not developed skills to deal with massive amounts of data.  Our past models are those of scarcity – data was hard to get, hard to find and fungible.  Today data is ubiquitous and persistent. Everything is stored somewhere. Nothing is completely erased.  Accessing and making sense of this surfeit is the grand challenge of our era.

The new corporate learning model will begin to offer tools and methods to address making good choices, they will help people filter and organize information in meaningful ways, and information  architects will find better ways to store and retrieve facts and ideas. Rather than a building with classrooms, a new corporate university will be largely virtual.  Almost everyone will be a teacher. Crowd-sourcing answers will be normal.

Here are three additional perspectives on the future of corporate learning.

My own perspective as the author of the Corporate University Workbook and founder of several corporate academies/universities. I consult and work with learning organizations globally to implement some of the ideas above. I am working on a book about the next generation corporate university.

Clark Quinn, author of Designing MLearning and well-known expert on e-learning, mobile learning, and all things related to technology and learning.

Jay Cross, the informal learning expert and education commentator and writer. He’s the author of several books; his latest is the Working Smarter Fieldbook.

For more information, see the website: www.glresources.com.