This week I continue my snap stories of personal learning and reflections on Snapchat.
Wednesday 3 May 2017
Today is all about Work Out Loud Wednesday and I talk about a presentation I did for my colleagues on Digital Curation. I was asked to present a short session with the team on content curation. I had previously presented the same presentation at a conference some years ago and I reused some of my content and talked about how this is a necessary skill in today’s modern workplace especially when we are overwhelmed with information. I also melded in a story about how I understood social learning and how knitters use various apps, platforms, tools and communities to learn from each other and with each other. I was surprised by the good feedback from the team members and received a couple of emails afterwards, thanking me for explaining the difference between curation and social learning. I think the penny dropped when the team saw how they could use the curation platform to be able to curate resources, sources and content for themselves. I was happy that I had shared my own experience but more importantly, I was desperately trying to use simple language, metaphors and absolutely no “Learning and Development” language at all.
Thursday 4 May 2017
This week was quite exhausting. Being back in the office environment from 9 to 5 for five days a week and being in front of a screen all day zaps my mind. In this snap, I encourage people to undertake a full analysis and consult with business extensively to find true pain points before implementing any learning systems.
Friday 5 May 2017
Although a short snap story, I introduce International Work Out Loud Week on 5-11 June 2017 and encourage people to give it a go. I’ll be sharing more over the coming weeks as I’m thinking of learning how to live stream! It’s a bit scary but I may as well give it a go.
Key Reflections for This Week
By far the biggest learning point for me this week is my communication skills.
I am DESPERATE to get rid of the Learning and Development language once and for all as I came to the realisation that we simply aren’t on the same wavelength as the business. We don’t speak their language and we’re always on the outer from the moment we open our mouths and mention anything to do with learning. I’ve been using my time back in the corporate world to FINALLY ERADICATE the learning lingo from my mouth and just talk business.
As such, I have been observing and learning more from people who seem to have the marketing knack. People like Jacob Morgan and Gary Vaynerchuk who articulately explain the concepts in terms that the general public understand. I make notes about what terms they use, the metaphors they use and how they can explain concepts simply and easily.
My husband has this knack so I’ve been running some ideas past him. When I want to say something, I ask his opinion of what I just said and he gives me how he has understood it. He then distills it to a key concept and uses a metaphor to create a mental picture.
This is a knack I simply wish I had. It would have saved me so much time and hassle and lots of sleepless nights wondering why people don’t see what I see?
