“In the future, when the history of our time will be written from a long-term perspective, it may be that the most important things historians will see are not technological advancements or the Internet, but the fact that for the first time a substantial and rapidly growing number of people had choices.” (Peter Drucker)
The industrial age was about limiting the scope of choices. This was accepted since the need to gather costly information and to communicate with low quality tools were minimized. Furthermore, by narrowing the scope of decision-making and action, the learning requirements for workers and customers were limited, reducing the transaction-costs of work. The efficiency contribution of mass-production was in fact derived from these lower information- and communication-related costs.
Today, in contrast to people being content with limited choices, more and more offerings are made specifically according to the unique requirements of the specific context.
For knowledge workers and customers the task of gaining needed inputs for these situations is creating an entirely new environment different from that of the mass-era.
Creative learning becomes the fundamental activity. It is not about consuming pre-determined content or passing tests. Learning is the foundation for creative action. Ability to better meet the needs of a situation can only partially take place outside of the situation. Learning cannot be a separate education domain outside of the practice of work. Neither can it be something with beginnings and ends.
The new competitive edge comes from interactive capacity: the ability to connect with information and people, as and when needed.
What is already known by the individual doesn’t give the edge as much as the ability to solve problems that require real-time learning through live interaction. In increasingly complex environments learning curriculums cannot be effectively designed beforehand. Needs and also solutions emerge responsively.
This view focuses attention on the way everyday conversations between people are perpetually creating the future. Organizations are self-organizing patterns of participation and communication through which creative learning takes place and coherent action and innovation emerge.
The concept of the social business builds on an agile, iterative framework. Learning is not related to meeting the requirements set by someone else, but is motivated and expressed through personal situational needs and aspirations. The idea of interactive competence also reflects the radical change of thinking that is going on. We are leaving behind the Western preoccupation with the autonomous individual and begin to appreciate the importance of social processes.
This understanding of competence suggests that capability to act is a social process. The primary learning asset for a knowledge worker is the interactive, reflective practice. The network is also a means for signalling: making own learning not only visible to oneself, but also to others, thus creating a platform for comments, conversation and even formal accreditation.
Learning happens in interaction between interdependent people. Competence, the ability for more purposeful action is the emergent phenomena resulting from that interaction. People are simultaneously forming and being formed by each other at the same time – all the time.
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Thank you Riel Miller, Doug Griffin, Stephen Downes, Kenneth Gergen and Ralph Stacey
