The Learning Guys believe that people learn best when they learn from each other. It is through meaningful exchanges with colleagues, partners and customers that people learn how to do their jobs better. Real value is created when people share tips, solutions and best practices. To this end we design learning events where people connect and share knowledge.

We emphasize a learning theory whereby people actively “PULL” learning rather than passively receive “PUSH” learning. The “PUSH” perspective represents a traditional learning model which has an education expert assess learner needs, design instruction, and “PUSH” a uniform body of learning at a defined group of learners. In this case the education expert defines what learners need to know. Let’s call this Learning 1.0

The “PULL” perspective, on the other hand, represents an evolving learning model that is characterized by collaboration and knowledge sharing amongst a cohort of learners. Let’s call this Learning 2.0. The learners themselves define what they need to know. In terms of instructional design this means that learning infrastructure and events must be constructed in such a way as to allow the learners themselves to “PULL” the knowledge most relevant to their real world needs (an archive of webinars or podcasts for example). It also means that communication channels must be developed to enable learners to form organic, self organized communities of practice (a corporate wiki or community discussion forum for example).

Many of the corporate clients I deal with understandably feel challenged by the transition from Learning 1.0 to Learning 2.0, or from “Push” to “Pull” learning. “Push” training programs are easier to design and implement. They are easier to quantify (xx number of learners completed the program in xx months), and to measure (xx number of learners achieved xx results).

Learning 2.0 or “Pull” learning programs, on the other hand, are seemingly more complex to design, implement, quantify,and measure. Allowing each learner to “Pull” and to tailor their own learning experience means that each and every learner in the organization is learning differently. Each learner will have different learning needs, will define different learning goals and objectives, and will travel a unique and individual learning path. And learners will share what they know with each other (tips, suggestions, lessons learned, how to…). As a result, knowlege within the organization becomes networked as opposed to hierachical.

This is very challenging stuff indeed! Those of us in the Enterprise Learning and Development field will have our work cut out for us as we wrap our minds around how to implement Learning 2.0 within our organizations.

If you are interested in other views on Learning 2.0, pay a visit to Ken Carroll’s very excellent Praxis Language blog Ken’s recent post on Connectivism highlights the centrality of the network in learning, and notes how this marks an evolution in learning theory.