Jen O - A Room of My Own

The case of the missing puppy...

This blog post is for my mom since she doesn't like my work related posts and she said I should blog this story.

John is back on tour with Los Lonely Boys. Let's just say, working for the boys is a series of unexpected surprises and adventures.

Yesterday, they were on flights from their hometown in Texas to Dallas/Fort Worth to Reno for a gig in Sparks, Nevada. While in Dallas, John got a call from Ringo the drummer that his wife had called and couldn't find their puppy. She thought that perhaps the dog has jumped into Ringo's suitcase. Ringo left the boarding area, went through security and had the airline pull his bag and check it for the pup. Not there.

Ringo went back through security, joined his brothers, boarded the Reno bound plane and they all proceeded to sit on the runway for 3 hours. By the time they get to Reno, they were ready to get OFF that plane! Upon landing, Ringo called his wife and she told him she still couldn't find the dog. So...when his bag comes off the conveyor belt, Ringo immediately opens it up, and....

out pops a baby Chihuahua who started running around baggage claim. Guess that puppy was ready to get OFF the plane too!

A blog post for my work friends and those who are interested in education and learning...

The other day I received an email from an old friend who used to work for IBM. He wrote the following about informal learning:

"Question for you.  How are you using the IM tools to capitalize on this?  I've been out of the the IM and Blog world for a bit and wasn't sure if there are new technologies to connect employees together for informal learning.  The challenge I have is that I'm having a hard time getting clients to accept WBT, and ILT just takes much too long and costs too much. I'd rather find a way to distribute learning through an IM tool or some way to combine IM with a blog, a webpage and a sharepoint site to facilitate learning.  Anything new?"

I responded with the following. I've included a couple of the back and forths farther down...

Let's see...on the informal learning front, it is about using technologies that are used for other things - work and life - and employing them in helping:

• people find other people to collaborate with - share ideas, information, knowledge
• people find information and knowledge that is relevant to what they want to learn (note this is most effective when it links back to the people above)
• people develop skills and competencies through thinking through problems, trying new things, practicing new ways of working, applying the learning, thinking through what worked and didn't work, trying again, and ultimately developing a level of competence or mastery.

This can be done using lots of technologies, IM and blogs just being the tip of the stack. I'd add to the list, discussion threads/forums, wikis, social bookmarking, podcasts, videocasts, presentation/file sharing software (not KnowledgeView), twitter and the inside the firewall twitter equivalents, Q&A functions like on LinkedIn, personal profile/social networking sites that allow people to add their personal and relationship information that others can search against. (Note: on the event based learning, I'd add the Centra's, WebEx's, persistent conference rooms that allow interaction and chats. I'd also include virtual/3D-Internet spaces.)

From a corporate perspective, the technologies have to be available, accessible, and easy to use. What does that mean?

• Available - Is there a version of the software inside the firewall? Is it sanctioned by the company? Is it being used?
• Accessible - If people are using the software, can others find the platform, or the results? For example - do people know where to find people? Can they find people's videos and podcasts? Do people know where the best place to search for good presentations? Is information easily found through search?
• Easy to use - Just like in the public domain, this stuff has to be easy, easy, easy to use...otherwise, people won't take the time. It has to be easy for the content creators (bloggers, podcasters, presentation makers), as well as for the content consumers...and often these roles are the same person. (Note - there is a bit of a generational issue here, as the corporate citizens who have grown up with the Net have a somewhat lower barrier to entry than the email/IM crowd.)

Also, more and more companies are recognizing that from a corporate learning perspective there is utility in moving from push/expert based learning to peer-to-peer/informal learning. In addition to the cost issues. People don't like WBT because it is one way. I watch the WBT, I engage part of my brain, I can't ask questions, I can't share ideas, I don't really learn. That's why people don't like classroom/lecture style learning for corporate education either. Why should I waste my time listening to a talking head? Instead, people like experiential/applied learning. They also tend to remember more if different senses/parts of the brain are engaged.

At the root of your question, I'd ask you...what is it that you want people to learn? Why is it important that they learn it? How do you incent them to want to learn it well and develop the skill/apply the knowledge/change their behavior? Part of it is by helping them understand how the new skills/knowledge/behaviors will positively impact your client's corporate strategy/bottom line. The other way is by making the learning engaging and easy to learn. You can create all the training in the world and push it at people but that doesn't mean they'll learn anything. That's why so many companies are looking to informal learning in a serious way.

With that, I think I might have to go put this on my blog! : )

And here it is!

I mentioned above that I'd add any responses I receive from my friend. He sent me an email with the following:

"Thanks Jennifer. My thoughts on this is that it is all theory and no one is practicing it. I know the delivery methods backwards and forwards but haven't found a client willing to try an alternative path. I think I could plan to push learning thru IM or a blog, but getting a client to buy it is a different story. I understand how Adults learn; auditory, visual, kinetic... and that they learn 90% of what they know on the job - at their desk... I'm more focused on something new, something clients will buy and something that enables learning, not in any particular order. We need something fresh, that's also useful, and that we can sell. The technology with distributed learning is too hard for learners to use, they get frustrated. I had literally hundreds of learners in Spain ask me how to print the WBT's! It's a joke! They can't figure out the WBT's, let alone Centra, LiveMeeting or WebEx - they would never/ever get how to use Centra, no matter how prepared we made them. I'm out here living this; both on the sales side and the delivery end, every day.

I'm really interested in learning thru IM or some other application that they can easily get to. Anything to make all this easier than it has been!!!"

Here is my response to the comment above...which I sent to my friend in email:

I'm curious, do you really believe this is all theory? I think that there are more companies and organizations practicing these changes than you might think.

One thing you might consider is rethinking the idea of "push" learning. For example, web2.0 technologies allow learners to read (and that can be a passive activity) but typically the learner seeks first, and then she can also comment, engage in conversations, and post her own ideas through blogs, wikis, podcasts, videos, papers, presentations, etc. Then from a peer-to-peer perspective, other folks may access what the individual created and learn from it, comment on it, engage in conversation, and the informal learning cycle continues.

Even IM...which I think is an incredible tool for coaching and mentoring. I don't go out and seek people to coach. Instead they ping me because they have a questions or a situation they'd like some advice about. We then have an interactive conversation where they've decided the topic, I ask questions, and they respond ultimately gaining new insight or solving their own problem.

However, what you may be trying to do is formal learning using different, more informal media. I'm sitting here thinking about that. It is hard to know how to respond without knowing more about your client situation, the type of people, the type of job roles, etc.

Do not underestimate the change management/learning challenges around using new technology. I know whenever introducing new mechanisms for any type of learning, collaboration, working...I assume people have no ability to figure it out themselves or that they are too busy or distracted to focus long enough to really read anything. I've found language can also be a barrier. Discussing topics that one has familiarity or expertise about may be easy; hearing a description about how to use WebEx in a language other than one's native language might be harder. Even for people who are learning in their native language, knowing what button to push is a huge barrier for some people. They're afraid that they'll push the wrong button. They're afraid they'll make a mistake. They're afraid they'll screw up the software. It is a little like that Centra slide that IBM uses on EVERY single Centra session. (I know you remember it.) It has the pictures of all the Centra icons and the facilitator introduces each one each and every session. Even though I've seen it a million times, perhaps there is someone on the session who is seeing it for the first time. Or, the second. Or, the third...but, maybe they still need the reminder.

My former colleague just responded to my response. It is an interesting perspective...I think I need to think about it before I respond.

"Basically, it's the same old thing, teaching old dogs new tricks. People have gotten lazy in how they learn, which isn't a bad thing, it's just that they want to learn faster, easier. We're in the TV era of life. People used to worship in church on Sundays and now they worship TV because it is easier to get into their brain. It isn't frustration, it's what I'm seeing. I just spent 6 months in Madrid and these people wanted to be spoon fed. Couple that with people not wanting to come to class, and I find it difficult to impart learning on them. Workshops are what I'm seeing as the approach to delivery that work best. And that's what I'm talking about here, delivery. But in order to build the content, you have to know your delivery approach. I've been pushing game-based learning lately, with some reception to it. We all know how adults learn and if you think about it in terms of auditory, kinetic and visual, I think short/short videos work well, plus games, plus case studies in a group environment to get them out of their seats. Julie teaches summer school curriculum to adults during late Spring-time and she works for a company called Voyager. They have the teachers in the class do 3 things: 1) Hi-lite the book 2) watch/listen to a video 3) teach someone else. As we all know, teaching someone else is one of the best ways to learn. So this is how they get Adults engaged. Touching the content, reading the content and then teaching the content.

I'm looking for a new way and I haven't found it yet. Something that works and that a company will buy. They will buy into IM as a support model. That being where all users have access to IM and they load the Super User names into their IM at Go-Live and they ask questions ad-hoc. They get that. But the days of WBT and ILT are getting harder to sell. Clients want something new. And yes, until I see it implemented, I see it as theory, not practical. Everything you say below is true, but that doesn't mean clients are implementing learning this way. I've yet to see a client example where learning was implemented any other way than the basics that we all know (ITL/WBT/WebEx, etc). There has to be a new way, a better way to deploy this content. Every pitch that I've seen since coming here, where we've been up against IBM, Accenture and Deloitte, there's no new way to implement training. I've seen their decks, I've had 2 clients show us their decks, there's nothing new in them. I'm not being pessimistic, I'm following the facts that I've seen."

I'm still thinking...wondering what you think?

Relationships and Influence

Two weeks ago I went to a workshop designed for women about Business Relationships and Influence. The reason for the workshop was two-fold. First, the company I work for (like many other companies, especially those in high tech) don't have enough women in the executive ranks. Second, women's career paths tend to progress differently than men's. There are a lot of reasons for this, but frequently women will assume if they do a really, really good job and do the right thing (think of an analogy of collecting girl scout badges) someone will notice and promote them.

As painful as it sounds to me as I write this, and even though I was a terrible girl scout, I think I fell in to this trap. Or, I fell into a slightly different trap, I made an assumption that I don't need title and rank. As long as I love what I do it doesn't matter...and oh by the way, I don't want one of those executive jobs anyway because I MIGHT not love my job as much. One of my workshop aha's was lose the assumptions and ask. Find out. Do something, because no one will do it for me and I might like what I find out.

What does this have to do with relationships and influence? Right...that is the title of this post. Well, it was an area we focused on in this amazing workshop and just by shining a light on this area I've noticed some amazing things this past week.

First, I'm starting a new initiative focused on our Workforce and Talent Solution (WTS) at IBM. I'm responsible for the component WTS-Connect. It is largely about how social computing has completely changed how people can do this within the enterprise. Why am I the Connect lead? Probably because I have spent much of the last three years helping people and speaking with clients about the importance of this within the workforce. A bit ironic isn't it. Doesn't Connect have a lot to do with Relationships and Influence? Maybe I need to pump that aspect up. Connections for the sake of connections may be meaningless, they're valuable if they lead to higher performance, smarter workers, better business results.

Because I've been on the road for the past quarter (two trips to China, a trip to London, one to Paris and multiple weeks in San Jose), this week was really the first week I could focus on the solution. I spent much of the week reaching out to people, discussing how we might work together, assessing the current landscape, learning what I don't know, sharing what I do, thinking about how to structure the work, thinking about how we collectively support one another in this community of people who do like work. I've barely scratched the surface.

But a couple of other things happened.

A young IBMer who works in a totally different part of the company reached out to me because we have a Wellesley connection. She joined IBM last August. From our conversation it sounds like she has a very cool job - and has had a great opportunity to learn about the company and travel the world. Now she's reaching out to IBMers who went to Wellesley to develop her IBM network. In a company of something like 400,000 people the odds are there are a few of us. When I asked her how she was locating people, she said that she went into our Blue Pages and searched on Wellesley. I thought, jeez...here I am always thinking about connections how come I never thought of that?!? I just did it now and WOW there are Wellesley women in cool jobs all over the company!

So back to my networking call. This young woman and I spoke for an hour. It was a lot of fun. I commended her on her initiative to reach out. As I say this, I think I'm going to set up a WC at IBM community in Lotus Connections. I'd love to foster this network. This is an example of the 21st Century version of relationships and influence that I could be doing a better job on from a career perspective in this vast company in which I belong.

Next story.

The Executive Sponsor from the workshop I attended two weeks ago sent a note to me and the course Program Managers. She had just delivered the workshop in Asia and she wrote, "the whole idea of using technology to enable networking and connections came up again." It's the same idea as the Wellesley College at IBM community - this time for alumnae of the Business Relationships and Influence workshop. Now I find myself playing consultant to the program. This is fun! And, I will personally benefit.

Final story.

Yesterday I was in the gym. I still see Christine (the wonderful person I pay to make me do things I won't do on my own volition). After nearly 3 months without seeing her, my body is rebelling and terribly sore. So...Christine's next client, Paola Gianturco, came in and we were saying hi. Paola is a photographer and a storyteller. She travels the world. She may have the coolest job of anyone I know. I have her book "Women Who Light The Dark." It is all about women who help one another. It is about women who use their relationships and influence to change the world. How inspirational is that?!?

Christine had mentioned that Paola had been to a workshop where she learned about twitter and facebook and community building. I asked Paola about it and she said it was a workshop lead by a woman named Denise Brosseau. I thought, that name sounds so familiar. Paola said I should look her up. I did, on the spot, with my handy dandy iPhone. I checked LinkedIn first and immediately saw...she's a Wellesley graduate!!! Her entire career is focused on building women leaders. Another WOW! Paola told me her twitter handle, so I immediately followed her on twitter. Next, I'm going to reach out to her directly. I think I'll share my post with her. She might find it interesting.

Bad hair day...

Today we're having our IBM HCM (Human Capital Management) University Event in Second Life. I'm going to try to liveblog some of the experience. I often liveblog at conferences and learning events...actually when I'm in blogging mode, I blog about lots of things. As many of you have mentioned to me, I've been on a bit of a blogging hiatus. Well...today is a good day to pick up again.

So, first things first. During our Second Life (SL) Orientation session earlier in the week, I decided it was time to change my SL hair style. It was 4 years old and was quite short, spiky, and blue. Now, it is much longer, nicely styled, and blue. However, as we kicked off this morning, I noticed I had a little light colored spot on the back of my head. At first I thought it was a hairclip, but I quickly realized it was my scalp!

I quickly fixed my hair faux pas. What I didn't realize is that others noticed my little appearance lapse and Carolyn (Citron) Carlson our Industrial HCM Practice Leader mentioned during her kick-off comments that she was glad I'd fixed my hair. A number of people started chatting that they were having hair issues too! A beautiful sunrise on our Industrial HCM island and we're all having bad hair days?!?!

More to come...

Happy New Year! AND do you have opinions about social media governance?

It is nearly the end of January and I haven't blogged in ages. Nearly two months...

I've twittered, and facebooked, and linkedin, and talked. Friday I did something new, I podcasted. I joined Matt Simpson of Sweettt.com on his Friday morning recorded talk hour. We were joined by Doug Cornelius a social media guys AND attorney AND compliance officer from Boston.

STOP

I started this post yesterday. I've been feeling the itch because I haven't blogged out here in so long. I blog more regularly in my IBM blog, which is inside the firewall. Today I wrote a post that was really a response to an email query I received. I do this often, respond to email queries in my blog. I do this for two reasons: 1) I can find the questions and my answers long after the email has been deleted. and 2) I get excellent feedback, opinions, and sharing from my colleagues who comment. There is always something I haven't thought of, or a different way to think of the question.

So...instead of blogging about all the great music John and I experienced this weekend, I am going to post the post I posted this morning internally.

Why?

Because I've gotten a ton of interesting comments. AND, it occurs to me that some of you might have equally interesting and, and perhaps very different perspectives!

Here goes - this is my first cut at a response to a set of questions that came in from a client who has recently purchased Lotus Connections and is dealing with implementation and adoption issues:

There seems to be 5 questions embedded within the customer's questions (Note to those of you who aren't familiar with my "internal" blogging style: rephrasing helps me digest what the client is asking and then organize my thoughts. I've highlighted my interpretation of the questions in color):

1. How detailed should social media guidelines be? It is my opinion that they should be simple and straight forward. The guidelines should announce why your company thinks social media is critical to the company and individual employee's success. If you make guidelines too long or complex, people will not take the time to read them. Moreover, guidelines should be that, a guide. Not a set of codified rules. Set out the overarching principles and behaviors that you expect from your people, reserve the right to take any post down (exercise this right as infrequently as possible), and have a no tolerance policy for explicit violations of the guidelines.
2. When introducing social media into the workplace, how do we address HR concerns about reduced employee productivity? There are ways to answer this question: 1) people are doing it already (searching for people, connecting, sharing, conversing, researching, etc.) they're just not doing it in ways that are visible to everyone else. 2) people become more productive with social media because social software allows people to work more effectively including finding people and expertise is that much faster; locating relevant articles and research easier; or sharing ideas, learning, asking and answering questions to a broader audience than just one's personal or group network. 3) people who waste time or who aren't productive exhibit these behaviors with or without social software and traditional management comes into play. Is this person meeting his or her performance objectives? If not (because she is spending too much time blogging, or because he is playing too much solitaire), then appropriate feedback, coaching, and performance management needs to be used. Now, I caveat this by saying that there are generational differences with respect to productivity. More mature generations tend to think that people sitting in meetings or in their cubes working on email or a document are being productive. Newer generations will think they're being productive because they're tapping their network, sharing their ideas, and collaborating within the context of getting their work done. There are great change management opportunities with respect to helping people understand different preferences and styles of work, As well as, helping employees from different generations understand how to work well together.
3. How do you guide employees or manage employees in navigating the gray with respect to posting content that is or is not appropriate in the work environment? Every company is going to have different opinions about what is and is not appropriate. IBM has taken an expansive view on this topic. In fact, in order to encourage connections and build trust across employees from different business units, countries, cultures, and generations, and amongst a huge population who work remotely, IBM encourages people to use our social software to share personal, not just work information about themselves. Where, once upon a time, you could easily walk into a person's cube and see their "artifacts" or bump into them in the break room and have a quick chat about the kids softball team, now our people are sharing this type of information online. As for when people stray into that "gray zone" --- one thing, we've seen is that the community can play a role in self correcting. For example, someone will post something questionable, and others will jump in and say, "Did you really mean that?" or "I disagree and here's why." The conversations are going to happen online or offline, The rumor mills will always be in place. The question that an organization should ask itself is how does it want to handle controversial topics? Do you want openness and transparency? Do you want to be able to see the rumors and address them directly if the need presents itself? Or, do you want pretend the conversations aren't really happening? Finally, as for postings that go against business conduct guidelines about how we treat one another - racist, sexist, xenophobic - if they're not shouted down immediately, and the person doesn't recant or withdraw their statements, I'd recommend the no tolerance approach. Management should address the behavior in the same way that it is already addressed in the workplace.
4. What about content that falls squarely in the HR domain? What if employees use social media to publicize HR issues, or to gain "supporters" to their cause? This is an interesting question. Once again, IBM takes an expansive view. Right now we are going through some lay-offs and people are blogging about the fact that they've been let go. However, in my opinion it has all been very respectful. People are disappointed, but they're letting their colleagues know, they're describing the types of positions they're looking for, they're sharing their future contact information. We've had people blog about their performance ratings. We've had people blog about personal disabilities and illness. I'll poke around to see if there are policies on this front that I'm not aware of. I personally think that as long as people are respectful, having the conversation in social media as opposed to around the watercooler in private rooms is not necessarily a negative thing.
5. Do we have IBM or client examples of stats, use cases or any other stories that address these concerns? Anyone have anything to add here???

So...that's it. This is my braindump in response to some very real client questions. Please comment with your reactions, experiences, disagreements, and/or suggestions. Thanks so much!

Who am I?

There have been some funny blog analyzers floating around the last few days...

First there is the GenderAnalyzer. Although the number has changed slightly between yesterday and today, this tool says that this blog is written by a man (62%). I've been twittering with some of my friends about this and so far, they're all showing up as men too. Of course, so far, they've all been MEN.

Next is the Typealyzer. This analysis tells me that this blog is an ISTP (interesting since the last time I took the Myers-Briggs test I was a I/ENTP. Anyway, here's what they say about my blog:

My husband thinks this is all terribly amusing. I'm feeling like I need to start writing about cars and sports!

Finally, yesterday, I responded to a request from Flash Light Worthy Books on twitter:

The tweet by @FLWbooks was "Help! Please? A question for the women out there: Name a book you'd like to get for the holidays this year? It's for a new list. Thanks!"

I responded with: Neal Stephenson's Anathem

Sigh. I suspect this doesn't fall into the typical female response. I quickly perused some of the responses, and a lot seemed to fall under the cooking category. There was one woman who responded with Confessions of a Hit Man. Maybe I should go check her out, we might have something in common!

Blogging from my iPhone

This is a test. A rather fun test. Since Rosanna showed me how to download iPhone apps and Ted pointed me to a bunch of must have apps (largely based on his nephew's recommendation), I've been exploring. I just found the free Typepad app. So.....I'm testing it out.

My assessment is the iPhone will not replace my laptop for blogging. However, I might use this for short posts and sharing in the moment experiences...especially those that are more wordy than 140 characters. (note: that is a reference to twitter for the uninitiated)

Now i'm going to take a photo from where I sit. Not sure how the pic will show up...but it is a glimpse into where I can often be found when not at my dining room table.

My finger is getting weary...time to end this test.

P.S. That's John in 2nd photo. He's really working while I play.

A tribute to Miriam Makeba

In this time of great joy around the world about the election of Barack Obama I have sadness in my heart.

The same day that the United States elected Barack Obama to be our nation's first black President, the state of California chose to discriminate against a specific group of people. I believe Proposition 8 will be found to be not only wrong, but also illegal. In the meantime, I share my friends' disappointment, sadness, anger and fear. Using ballot propositions to legislate discrimination is outrageous. And just think, if it can happen to "them" it can happen to "me" and "you".

Now, on to the next piece of sadness in my heart. This week Miriam Makeba died. She was an artist, an activist, a role model, an inspiration. She also had a very full and very rich life full of sadness and joy. You can read about it here and here and here.

What I do want to say is, I had a chance to know Miriam when John was her tour manager. It was a time of great change in another part of the world...in 1994 when South Africa elected Nelson Mandela to be its first black President. John accompanied Miriam and Hugh Masakela and their band members around the US and to the United Nations so that they could vote. I remember Miriam getting on stage and saying in that grand voice of hers, "I have beeeeen waiting over 30 years for the right to vote!!!"

Here is a video of Miriam talking about her life and singing with Hugh playing Soweto Blues, the South Africa freedom song.

I pray for freedom for all around the world. I wish Miriam peace.

Which superpower would you choose? Flight? Invisibility?

I'm listening to a This American Life episode on Superpowers. Act 1, a guy goes around and asks people, which would you pick. Flight? Invisibility?

That's easy. Flight.

People are going back and forth, describing their choices. What the superpower would allow them to do. Steal. Spy. Hmmmm....

Is something wrong with me? I chose so quickly. I didn't think twice. AND now they're saying most men choose flight, and most women invisibility.

I know why I picked. I fly in my dreams. Not often, but when I do I know it is amazing. One thing I've discovered over the years is not everyone flies in their dreams, and not everyone flies in the same way. I fly like Superman, like the woman flying in the picture. I had a roommate who flew like Pegasus. Someone else I know flew on his back, feet front, kind of like one of those reclining bicycles.

Uh oh, now they're analyzing their decisions. This is getting a bit deep.

Now someone on the radio is saying that those who choose flight have nothing to hide versus those who desire to hide from themselves. They are guileless versus guileful.

Honestly, I've never thought about being invisible. Other than when Harry Potter wandered around in his magical cloak. I do remember thinking at the time that would be kind of cool.

----

Note:

Picture of woman flying in SecondLife is from a USA Today story, interestingly enough on Jesuits using SecondLife to evangelize.

Art on invisibility created by Desiree Palmen, a 44-year-old Dutch artist.

Today is my blog's birthday!

My first blog post was November 11, 2004. For my birthday I give you all a present...a TED video of Tim Brown the CEO of Ideo talk about the powerful link between creativity and play. Enjoy!!!