I was recently asked to define social media. At this time I define it as: Content expressed as thoughts, experience, expertise, opinions…created in text, multimedia, pictures…and shared by individuals for different reasons. It is mediated by technology platforms whose functionality determines the distribution, retrievability and useability of the content.
Social learning, on the other hand, is learning that happens through social exchanges and activities, whether the exchange is motivated for personal reasons or for larger collective purposes (adapted from Aaron Silvers, T&D January 2012).
Okay, so the simple difference between the two definitions is social media = content, social learning = learning through exchange.
I spend a lot of time using social media, and I learn a lot by interacting with it. But I must only do about 5% direct exchange with other people. Most of the time I am reading alone and producing alone – they are activities of individual reflection and interpretation. I use strategies to share my social media contribution to the world and my network, but I don’t expect an exchange will ensue – because everyone is busy, and there is a lot of e-learning and social media content out there. If there is an exchange, it’s a bonus and I get rather thrilled about it.
The term I prefer for organisational learning strategy is social media for learning. This term is inclusive of individual and social learning. When we are developing a purpose, a strategy and an action plan for introducing social media, we need to design platform functionality and activities that enable both individual AND social learning.
Social media is a decentralised learning function
Personally I am not convinced at this time that social media for learning is a centralised function of organsiational learning. I believe (and know this belief is not only mine) that online social exchange in organisations happens best where relationships already exist. Social media can support communities to continue exchanges and activities beyond physical locations. These communities, where people care enough about each other to respond online, build upon conversation and even co-create, can be very powerful for organisational learning and knowledge management. But these community ‘conditions’ are generally few and far between. The opportunity for social media for learning is best identified by people who know the existing community well. The community should be supported by decentralised social media initiatives; by people who care about the community on a local level and who deeply understand their needs and behaviours.
Id’ love to read your thoughts on this. Please feel free to comment – I’d be thrilled.
HI
thank you for the good, clear definitions of social media and social learning. There is a great deal of confused usage out there of these terms and then the debate starts about how to use social media for learning and it gets even more confused as people abbreviate it to ” social learning” . So this is a very useful piece .
Thank you for your comment, Melanie. Aren’t we lucky as learning professionals to be in our practice just now. I think we are only just beginning to understand and unravel the problematics /opportunities facing our practice. By working together, with consideration, we will piece tegether new practice.
Hi Alison,
There is another important point that will help bring this subject from into focus for Organisational Learning people. It relates to enterprises and their needs, and response to change and environment.
So a key organisational need right now is retention of intellectual property and tacit knowledge.
And we have an evolving culture of using technology based social platforms for exchange, eg Facebook, Twitter and the like.
And organisations wish to harness these behaviours (they have no choice, its when not if) in a way that addresses their needs (retaining tacit knowledge etc..).
Major technology vendors, with their deep (R & D) pockets want to help (and profit) from all of this.
So we can all think what we like and do what we like but ultimately, from an organisational learning perspective, the corporate agenda and the response from the major technology companies/partners and innovators in enterprise systems will determine how we work, collaborate and communicate (social standpoint) when we are on the enterprise payroll.
And, this will be an exciting evolution. Imagine no email….
Many observers liken all this to the evolution of the internet from and scarcely used informal medium, regarded with suspicion, to where it is today in all its guises.
Of course ITC Learning have an angle because we provide tools and systems that are integrated directly into these enterprise systems (eg Lotus Connect from IBM) to power enterprise social learning.
ie You can do this today, take a tangible step down the “social” track, in a genuinely strategic manner, rather than dabble or talk about it (which is what seems to be happening pretty much everywhere, particularly in OD).
If you or any of your readers would like to discuss this, I believe we have a reasonable perspective, some good ideas, and some starting positions, so please feel free to contact me or anyone at ITC Learning via our website enquiry at http://www.itclearning.com.au .
Thanks for your insights Alison, enjoyable and interseting as always.
Hi Mark
Thank you for your thoughful comment. As you know, my doctoral research examines the introduction of work-based collaborative learning environments that were designed by Learning practitioners to support learning programs (a different purpose to work-based projects, I acknowledge).
We have so much to do to prepare our culture and climate for social media:
Reward and recognition for sharing
Educating the responsibilities associaed with sharing in these spaces – transparency, accountability, reputatation
Trust
Giving people time to search, retrieve, critically analyse, synthesise and share the useful knowledge
(and more)
From a learning and development perspective, our practice will evolve. We will need to work where work happens, to help people learn and perform using these online social spaces. And, we will need to train peple in how to use and leverage these technology mediums to improve performance and output.
Finally, a lesson from Habermas. Systems have historically been developed by people who do not know the indiviual organisation, the workfow of individuals or how individuals prefer to work and perform. These systems need to be flexible to enable individuals to personalise features, functions and interface to meet the challenges of the organic nature of working and learning.