Week One, Part Two (Questions 5 - 8)

How can edge participants help to facilitate the move from push to pull? How to establish trust relationships between edge participants and organizations?
Knowledge at the edge requires trust-based relationships (p.55), edge participants must reach out to the core.  Edge participants (brave souls) must be the ones who reach out and "give" in order to earn trust in the core (org).  Edge participants need to be alert to opportunity.  Edge participants must speak openly & reveal their networks as source of new ideas/approaches. Edge folks have had to find their own way to unique resources.

When an executive (or leader) wants to promote "pull" - what actions or behaviors best demonstrate the commitment? Our Gov has started announcing first on a FaceBook page and via Twitter.  They walk the talk.  Execs need to be consistent in their support. Pull is not a temporary solution.  It’s a culture/paradigm shift.  To promote pull, execs need to demo pull . . .  * say, "I read this, and I learned this, so I tried this, and it worked..."  To promote pull...quit pushing. Don't give all the answers/resources/direction. Trust folks to find the answers.

What are the ways organizations can foster “Creation Spaces” for optimal Pull?

Seems like recognition of individual needs helps creation. Good read “Why 8-hr workday doesn't make sense.”  http://bit.ly/bdb219

Authors talk about 'old style' networking v. new. What has been your experience of that? What's changed, and what's been the result?

Still see old-style networking happening, like @ prof assoc meetings. 30 ppl in a room swapping biz cards- but not on Twitter.  Old style networking limited to people I knew & wanted to know; more strategic. Today, unlimited, open, welcoming; serendipitous.  New networking more focused on sharing for general good than positioning/selling self. (I hope...)  Social media allows us to get to know someone, so if/when we meet in person, the conversation is richer.

Additional thoughts:

Passion becomes pursuit-which creates connections http://amzn.com/k/3BV4F3F8FNUFF

(Gr8 idea to post highlight & note directly from kindle to hashtag.)

See Marc Prensky- Passion-based Lrning http://bit.ly/eTOOeQ.

Week One of "Power of Pull" Book Club

The first week’s questions from the LrnBk Chat on “Power of Pull” included the themes: Passion, Serendipity, Learning, and Creating Change. See http://lrnbk.blogspot.com/.

How do we help others find, leverage, and kindle passion?

To help others kindle passion in their work we need to address their entire environment: provide support, tools, and enable connections.  Convince people they can "pull" the information they need.  Show them how to go out and figure out how to do their jobs best.  Let’s help others marry their passion with their profession. 

According to John Seeley Brown, organizations must be re-crafted to serve the needs of individuals.  That will require serious change.  That sort of serious change can't come from the top down (that's PUSH).  It must come from within the organization with leader support.

How can we map passion to profession?

Let’s ask people what attracts them to the job and find out how the organization can facilitate connections that help foster that passion.  Perhaps we need to be doing “stay” interviews; find out how we can make the profession one someone can be passionate about.  Let’s invest time in genuinely *knowing* people in the organization, in the work path and outside of it. 

What did the Grommets learn about learning?

Grommets didn't focus on learning. They focused on their passion, their joy and through this they learned and improved their skills.  They learned by learning together, studying their performance and the performance of others.  Grommets made learning fun; learning happened as a byproduct but drove success.

What are lessons for those of us in learning and development (L&D)?

Learning requires performance feedback and practice. Collaboration and support are key elements. We need to build a way for employees to get access to knowledge flows when needed.  L&D needs to set up two way communication and sharing of best practices.  L&D must support and provide the platforms - creation spaces really moving away from command and control.  We are better together then we are apart.

How can we 'create' serendipity?L&D can create serendipity for our employees by sponsoring events that bring people together who share the same passion.  Serendipity requires being "out there" constantly, in search of new ideas.  If you follow your passion, you'll be in a place to learn when it happens.  You may not be expecting a payoff in your search but all of a sudden you have a serendipitous encounter.  L&D needs to facilitate learning experiences that allow for serendipitous encounters.

Creating change:  Saying "The edge transforms the center”, the authors assert that we need to start by working to change individuals, not institutions.  Do you agree?

We must change individuals.  Change comes from individuals working from the ground up.  How can an institution change if the individuals do not? Start with the people who display their passion and branch out from there.

The Power of Pull

In preparation for the LrnBk Chat starting 12/15/10, I started reading "The Power of Pull" this weekend.  I took my book to BooksaMillion, bought a grande mocha latte, and found a comfortable chair.  Three hours later I looked up.

"Small moves, smartly made" keeps running through my head. It may become my mantra.  I am fortunate to have a role in my organization where I can influence others to become passionate about collaborative learning.  I certainly am passionate about it.  I have always had a passion for learning.  I've found that collaborating with others who share my passion has definitely increased my knowledge at a faster pace.  I now want to convince others that collaboration can propel them forward and get them passionate about their own work.  "Small moves, smartly made" is the way to make this happen. 

Until I started reading "The Power of Pull" I was attributing the focus on collaborative learning solely to the rise in social networking through 2.0 platforms.  It is so much bigger than that.  It's so much more about the rapid change we face every day.  The technology is just the platform by which we make our connections and find the answers to our questions.  The power to deal with rapid change is the key to helping others understand the value in spending time asking questions, connecting with others and looking for new solutions to new issues.

Pull is about finding people and resources at the time we need them.  It is also about our ability to attract people to us who share our passion.  Most importantly it's about pulling from within ourselves knowledge and insight required to achieve our potential.  As we pull to learn quickly we translate that learning into improved performance.  That improved performance helps us, our organizations and others with whom we interact.  It's all a collaborative learning cycle.

The world has changed.  It used to be we were taught what we needed to do our jobs and that was that.  That used to be enough.  It's not enough anymore.  We need to constantly refresh our knowledge to stay on top of the rapid change the world is facing.  We can do this by collaborating with each other, sharing ideas and trying new things to address new challenges.

I'm looking forward to collaborating with others starting 12/15/10 as we discuss our impressions of the book, "The Power of Pull."