Engagement, Libraries, Six Sigma, & Internet

Debunking Employee Engagement Myths - McBassi
There is a great deal of focus these days on employee engagement (and rightly so). There are two big problems, however, in the way that most organizations are measuring - and therefore managing - employee engagement.

The Well-Wired Use Libraries More - The New York Times
Library use is far more prevalent among people who have a broadband Internet connection at home or at work, according to a new study. The finding counters a decade-old assumption that libraries serve as a "bridge" for people who want to use the Internet, but have only dial-up connections, or no access at all.

Why Six Sigma Is on the Downslope - Tom Davenport
So what's the best alternative to Six Sigma for process improvement? Well, there really is no one alternative that's best for all processes and circumstances. Companies really need a combination of tools and approaches.

Where did the computer go? - Rough Type
Beneath the Web's familiar, page-like surface lay a set of powerful technologies, including sophisticated protocols for describing and transferring data. In the years ahead, more and more of the information-processing tasks that we rely on, at home and at work, will be handled by big data centers located out on the Internet.

Big Think, Predictions, Technology, Word, Globalization, & Humanity

Creative Process -Big Think
Big Think makes its appearance today. Read the story behind it.

Google's Lunchtime Betting Game _ New York Times
Information is shared most easily and effectively among office neighbors, even at an Internet company where instant messaging and e-mail are generally preferred to face-to-face discussion.

Why Does Technology-Based Teaching Fail? - Mobile Learning
Alan Kay effectively translates his understanding of cognitive psychology and learning theory into new ideas for making computers easy to learn - and learn on.

An Interface of One's Own New York Times
Oh, Word. For 20 years, you have supported and tyrannized me. You have given me a skimpy Etch A Sketch on which to compose, a cramped spot on the sentence-assembly line.

Mapping Globalization - Princeton University and the University of Washington
A comprehensive definition of globalization: geographically expanding networks of transactions, where transactions may be of any type, and may have occurred at any time. This naturally supports a strongly historical perspective that includes trade, migration, transportation, communication, empires, and so on.

THE LISTENER - Seed
"A danger that the art of observation may be lost, and the richness of the human context ignored."

Boundary-less Learning, Best of 2007, Closed Software, & Small World

The Future of the Future: Boundary-less living, working and learning - KM World
Competing in a billion-mind economy means totally rethinking how you live, work and learn. That applies to you as an individual as well as to the organizations to which you belong. In the enterprise of the future, living, working and learning environments are converging in an unprecedented way.

Your 10 Most Popular Posts of 2007 - The Rapid eLearning Blog

• What Steve Jobs Can Teach You About Designing E-Learning
• Warning: Using the Wrong Images Can Confuse Your Learners
• 5 Ways Web 2.0 Can Make You a Better E-Learning Designer
• What Everybody Ought to Know About Using PowerPoint for E-Learning
• Little Known Ways to Create Your Own Graphics Using PowerPoint

Top Ten Best (and Worst) Communicators of 2007 - Create Your Communications Experience
This year's List of Top Communicators highlights the best (and worst) from business, politics, entertainment and sports.

Long Live Closed-Source Software! - Discovery Magazine
"Open wisdom-of-crowds software movements have become influential, but they haven't promoted the kind of radical creativity I love most in computer science. If anything, they've been hindrances." For a good response, see The innovation dilemma by 451 CAOS Theory.

Top 10 Posts of 2007 - Writers Gateway

• E-learning Design Challenge Series - Designing a Game Based Course
• Storyboard Templates in Instructional Designing
• 8 Easy Steps to Create a Storyboard
• Top 8 Reasons Why Captivate Rocks
• Needs Analysis in Instructional Designing

Innovation Predictions 2008 - BusinessWeek
And the Big Idea for 2008? Stop competing against your competitors. Your traditional rivals aren't your biggest worry.

It's a Small World (with Big Training) - Training Magazine
These days, we're bombarded by articles that refer to China as the Awakening Dragon or the Next Frontier. The conventional wisdom is that China, with its vast population and resources, will become the mother lode of new customers and new products.

Innovative Minds, Internet, Information, & Bored

Innovative Minds Don't Think Alike - New York Times
Look for people with renaissance-thinker tendencies, who've done work in a related area but not in your specific field. Make it possible for someone who doesn't report directly to that area to come in and say the emperor has no clothes.

The Disappearance of IT By Nicholas G. Carr - CIO Insight
The network -- the Internet, that is -- has become, literally, our computer. The different components that used to be isolated in the closed box of the PC -- the hard drive for storing information, the microchip for processing information, the applications for manipulating information -- can now be dispersed throughout the world, integrated through the Internet and shared by everyone. The World Wide Web has truly turned into the World Wide Computer.

Info Overload Costs Economy - Wired
After years of naming a product or person of the year, Basex Inc. decided to name "information overload" as problem of the year for 2007.

Bored? - Scientific American
Most people blame boredom on the circumstances, but psychologists say this emotion is highly subjective and rooted in aspects of consciousness -- and that levels of boredom vary among people.

Mirror Neurons, Brain, Performance, Schools, eLearning, & Gladwell

Mirror Neurons -- Rock Stars or Backup Singers? - Scientific American
The reversal of the mirror effect was found: watching index-finger movement resulted in more electrical activity in the pinky, and watching pinky movement produced more activity in the index finger. The brain learned new sensory-motor associations, and it is these associations that underlie the mirror neuron-like effect.

Top 10 ways to un-bake your brain - jonathanfields - awake @ the wheel
Stress is GOOD. . . when there's a reason for it. But, when that stress becomes chronic, the exact opposite happens.

My Unfashionable Legacy - strategy+business
You have to build the authority to insist on accountability and performance -- including in sisting on getting it from your superiors -- but you also have to give up authority to anyone who is capable of wielding it effectively. And you have to accomplish all this in corporations that set up incentives (such as stock options) that punish long-term investment and favor short-term measures: cutting head counts, selling off underperforming businesses, and cashing in on quick gains.

6 Things That Are Right with Schools - Parent Resources

1. inspiring teachers
2. inspired students
3. a commitment to educate everyone
4. fine facilities and equipment
5. caring, sensitive administrators
6. plenty of choices

Corporate eLearning's Dirty little Secret - WE DON'T USE eLEARNING! At least not very much - corporate elearning strategies and development
Actually the part that seems crazy to me is that training departments are creating internal training to train themselves on the tools of their trade.

A child's view of the $100 laptop
What will a child in the UK make of a laptop designed to help children in the developing world? Rory Cellan-Jones brought an XO home to find out.

The Contrast Triangle (Rare Optical Phenomenon)
A psychological effect. The dark "triangle" between the moon and the surface of the ocean. Place your hand over the bright, reflected moonlight in the ocean, and the dark area disappears!!

NONE OF THE ABOVE: What I.Q. doesn't tell you about race - The New Yorker
Malcolm Gladwell discusses the Flynn effect

Learning Financials
Learning Tree Swings to 4Q Profit

Plato Learning 4Q loss wider than expected, revenue falls short

Performance, Crowdsourcing, Learning, Design, & iPods

I'm Not Really Running, I'm Not Really Running... - New York Times
All maximum performances are actually pseudo-maximum performances. You are always capable of doing more than you are doing.

Should your company 'crowdsource' its next project? - Computerworld
Whether it's to increase loyalty among customers speed up development time or cast outward for innovative ideas, companies are trying on many styles of 'crowdsourcing'

Humans Appear Hardwired To Learn By 'Over-Imitation' - Science Daily
Children's ability to imitate can actually lead to confusion when they see an adult doing something in a disorganized or inefficient way. Watching an adult doing something wrong can make it much harder for kids to do it right.

Is good design just a formula? - Ravi Vora
The function of design is to make the product more usable and improve the usability of the product's function. Yet, as we all know, great design is innovative and different. The simpler and better the design can be, the more enjoyable and easier it makes our lives.

What Did the Professor Say? Check Your iPod - New York Times Students already have an iPod and they already use them all the time. You don't need to train them. They are very expert at clicking back and forward to the exact spot they want. They don't listen from start to finish.

eLearning, Hybrid Learning, Web Design, Leadership, & Blogs

US eLearning Market Reaches $13.6 Billion in 2007 - PR Web
The current industry is growing at 22% with new buyers demanding new types of products. Free Executive Overview.

HYBRID LEARNING MODEL - CETL
The Hybrid Learning Model describe learning activities as a series of understandable and universal set of learning events where the teachers and students experience and roles are clearly defined at each stage.

Understanding Web Design - JEFFREY ZELDMAN
Web design is the creation of digital environments that facilitate and encourage human activity; reflect or adapt to individual voices and content; and change gracefully over time while always retaining their identity.

The New Psychology of Leadership - Scientific American
Strong leadership arises out of a symbiotic relationship between leaders and followers within a given social group—and hence requires an intimate understanding of group psychology. When a shared social identity exists, individuals who can best represent that identity will have the most influence over the group's members and be the most effective leaders.

PDI Pulse on Leaders Study Shows 27 Percent of Boss-Rated High Potentials Also Have a High Risk of Derailment - CLO
High-performing individuals are used to success but often don't take the time to consider how it is achieved or how their actions impact others.

Republic.com 2.0 - Larry Prusak
The Daily Me: the great number of blogs, etc. on the web and the fact that most of us only read a tiny bit of this and then just what we know will confirm us in our beliefs. This can lead to "excessive confidence, extremism, contempt for others, and sometimes even violence."

Training, Innovation, KM, & eLearning

2007 Industry Report - Training Magazine
U.S. organizations shelled out $58.5 billion for training this year (including payroll and training budgets). These numbers are up 4.8 percent

Haman's Innovative Investigator Questions (2007 Version) - Alex Chua's Blog
Gerald Haman devoted over 16 years to fine tune and perfect just six questions. Indeed that's a long time, but innovators discovered the questions keep getting better

The Convergence of Learning and Knowledge Management - Mohamed Amine Chatti's ongoing research on Technology Enhanced Learning
Learning and KM solutions have to fuse; that we should speak about union and fusion of the two fields rather than intersection or complementary relationship between them and that the two fields are increasingly similar in terms of input, outcome, processes, activities, components, tools, concepts, and terminologies.

Growing pains: The emergence of 'e-learning' - HR Zone
E-learning still has a long way to go if it is ever to take over traditional training methods, but as part of the learning and development armoury it offers some tempting benefits and many agree that its strength is that it isn't trying to replace the tried and tested methods.

TRIZ, DFSS, Brainstorming: Which Methodology is Best? - Design News
Do you believe in structure, brainstorming or a combination of the two? Obviously, both have merit, but what is the best way to consistently come up with innovation that matters technologically and commercially?

elearning, PACTwiki, Creativity, Instruction, & mLearning

What Steve Jobs Can Teach You About Designing E-Learning - Articulate
People can only retain so much information at one time. So, its important to design your elearning courses (even simple ones) so that the learner can recall as much as possible.

PACTWiki - Guy Wallace
A resource and resource guide for all PACT Practitioners adopting and adapting the "starter-set" of PACT concepts, models, methods, tools and techniques.

Talks Larry Lessig: How creativity is being strangled by the law - TED
Larry Lessig gets TEDsters to their feet, whooping and whistling, following this elegant presentation of "three stories and an argument."

Religious wars - Clive on Learning
Training, like education, has for too long endured the unnecessary battle between two camps, which could be characterised as the 'left brainers' and the 'right brainers'.

Handheld Learning 2007: Keeping up with Change (Marc Prensky) - Learn 0n-the-go
What educators need now are frameworks and paradigms for deploying mobile technologies to engage learners and enhance learning; open, scalable mobile learning products and systems that educators everywhere can use, deploy and develop to allow learners to create, share, and reflect; and content that works across mobile platforms.

Brain cells, Miscellaneous, Sensemaking, Education, & Web 2.0

ADULT BRAIN CELLS ARE MOVERS AND SHAKERS - Johns Hopkins Medicine
It's a general belief that the circuitry of young brains has robust flexibility but eventually gets "hard-wired" in adulthood. As Johns Hopkins researchers and their colleagues report, adult neurons aren't quite as rigidly glued in place as we suspect.

Everything is Miscellaneous - KM World
In the book, I use the "miscellaneous" to mean the aggregation of everything, with the important difference that with the digital miscellaneous, we find all sorts of ways that the things are alike, all sorts of connections and relationships.

New forms of sensemaking - e4innovation.com
The multifaceted possibilities of modern technologies represent a quantum leap in the ways in which we can interact information. Knowledge can now be represented in a multitude of different ways - beyond linear text.

The Science Education Myth - Business Week
Forget the conventional wisdom. U.S. schools are turning out more capable science and engineering grads than the job market can support.

Growing Pains: Can Web 2.0 Evolve Into An Enterprise Technology? - Information Week
Forget outsourcing. the real threat to IT pros could be Web 2.0. While there's a lot of hype and hubris surrounding wikis, mashups, and social networking, there's also a lot of real innovation--much of it coming from increasingly tech-savvy business users, not the IT department.