#MayTheFourthBeWithYou

It feels surreal to get an opportunity to celebrate something during this pandemic. Yesterday, I officially completed the Certificate in Adult and Continuing Education (CACE) from University of Victoria, BC, Canada. I completed the certificate with an A+ grade and in 4 years to the date! #MaytheFourthBeWithYou

We moved to Canada in 2011 and in many ways had to restart our lives here. When I became a Canadian citizen in 2015, I aspired to add a Canadian credential to my resume. At that time, having the name of a prestigious Canadian University on my resume meant that I belonged (it does take more than that). But more importantly, I wanted to walk-the-talk and demonstrate to my 16-year old daughter that no matter where you come from, your age or your experience, it is important to keep learning and keep striving to be better at what you do. I wanted to model the behaviour that I’d like her to demonstrate. And now, after completing CACE, I feel not only a sense of belonging but a sense of accomplishment and pride that only comes from working hard and chasing a dream.

When I had decided to pursue CACE, people asked me why I felt the need to do add a certification to my portfolio. Their concern came from a good place. I have over 20 years of experience in the field of learning and development so I had covered a lot of ground in my area of expertise. The certificate was intense with four required courses and a minimum of four elective courses. Each credit was roughly 40 hours amounting to 320 hours of learning officially (but I spent way more time than that). This included hundreds of pages of books, at least one assignment every week of each course, reflective course-end papers, participation in discussion forums every second day and peer reviewing other assignments. In normal circumstances, 40+ days spent on self development doesn’t seem like too much but when you combine that with a full-time job, a family to look after and several volunteering positions, good time management skills becomes the make or break issue.

Before enrolling for CACE, I had reviewed many other options including popular industry certifications, diplomas and even a second Masters degree. But CACE felt right because it is a nationally-recognized credential and an award-winning one. I took that at face value when I signed up but now I know each word to be true. Besides, it was offered in a blended format (both online and in-campus) and that meant I could rely on late night readings and weekends to complete the certificate. There was flexibility in the choice of electives and that meant I could learn more about areas of learning and performance that I am most passionate about.

The CACE certificate is geared towards working professionals who want to gain practical insights in the area of workplace learning and I can tell you that there was no shortage of real-life in each course. The program coordinator(s) acted like guiding posts along the journey, always encouraging and always available. The learning environment encouraged co-creation and strong peer connections and I made some fantastic friends along the way who collaborated openly and critiqued honestly. The facilitators were top notch and were co-partners in the learning journey and I’d like to thank them for pushing me to challenge my own beliefs and ideas about adult learning and workplace performance and for sharing theirs.

I was so looking forward to my graduation day in June in all my gear but due to the current COVID-19 situation, that has been postponed. But for now, I can rejoice in these little moments of happiness. I am proud to be a CACE graduate and I hope that my education, experience, and passion for learning will always position me to keep growing and help others in their learning journeys along the way.

Learning and Development Post COVID-19

https://stocksnap.io/search/work+from+home

COVID-19 has pushed us into a place of change. And this change has become a catalyst for reflection and innovation. There are many lenses to choose from as we all think about the future of learning and L&D post COVID-19. For now, I am choosing the remote work or work from home lens given that: 

• People have suddenly been thrust into remote work without a choice or a preference and that might continue to be the state in the near future (the important factor being - not everyone likes to work remotely)
• Not all businesses and work can be done remotely and won’t be done remotely in the future either
• I have over 10 years of experience working remotely after having worked for 10 years in a 9-5, daily commute, office environment. So, I know a thing or two about remote work and remote learning

While the tools and technologies existed for many years, remote work was always an after-thought. 

Well, not anymore. 

We are now in the midst of perhaps the largest social and technological remote work experiment of the industrialized economy. Remote work is no longer an exception, challenge or a hypothetical situation; it is the reality of work today and will likely be a big part of the future of work. This has a huge impact on all functions of an organization including the work of L&D especially if our goal is to drive better work performance given the current circumstances and future realities. I don’t know what will be the long-term impact of COVID-19 on learning and I ponder about the impact of quarantine, social distancing and remote work on memory, cognition, learning and behaviour.

As much as technology is helping us in the short-term, we are already seeing the impact of too many synchronous video calls in the form of ‘Zoom fatigue’. L&D will need to critically explore the challenges of remote working and remote learning. Workplace learning and development will need to be guided by evidence-based research practices that consider factors including online distraction, laptop fatigue, work productivity along with employee mental health, emotional well-being and stress levels in a post-pandemic, technology-driven world.

But I am hopeful of some unintended positives consequences of COVID-19 on remote work and on L&D. 

• I hope that L&D does not end up converting all classroom training into webinars but rethinks the idea of learning while working remotely and looks at tools and processes to support learning for enhanced remote work performance 
• I hope L&D lets go of the control. With organizations and employees getting a fair taste of personalized streaming and customized content online, L&D has an opportunity to position ‘learning’ as something decentralized, distributed, collaborative, personalized and a 24x7 endeavor. I hope L&D leverages this opportunity. 
• I hope L&D looks at blending synchronous and asynchronous, self-paced and collaborative, self-directed and instructed, desktop and mobile-based learning opportunities, etc. Perhaps, now is the time when L&D can bring the 70/20/10 model into fruition especially focusing on the 70 and 20 and creating opportunities for collaboration and co-creation, for informal and non-formal learning. 
• Back in 2015, I wrote about how L&D needs to help employees move along their maturity continuum and help them define and follow their path from dependence to interdependence. If not now, then when? 
• I hope L&D understands the importance of taking on the role of curator of learning opportunities rather than the creator of courses thus enabling employees to learn how to learn.
• Finally, I hope L&D strives for the highest level of impact where we act as the invisible glue that seamlessly integrates learning into the working lives of those we serve irrespective of their physical location.

While we are all trying to find some kind of remote work arrangements in the short-term, in the long-term, employees will need to get comfortable with the idea of ongoing remote work and leveraging technology to do so. Now, technology can serve both as an opportunity and as a barrier. If remote is the new normal, L&D (like Operations) will need to push for a stable, reliable and consistent technological infrastructure to support continuous, non-disruptive work and learning from home. If not, the technological divide between the have and have nots will widen and the marginalized will be pushed further away from mainstream with fewer opportunities to work, learn and grow. 

If working collaboratively from a distance is the new normal, it will need the acquisition of new skills, attitudes and mindsets for optimum work performance. L&D will need to take the lead and enable the development of these skills, attitudes and mindsets. L&D will need to create the channels of learning, growth, communication and sharing and help employees learn new ways of working efficiently and effectively.

This does not mean more elearning, virtual webinars and online video meetings. Instead, I hope to see L&D step in as the curator of learning and connector of shared experiences, enabling employees to be more autonomous and self-directed in their continuous learning journeys.

The Unfolding Story

“After nourishment, shelter and companionship, stories are the thing we need most in the world.” ― Philip Pullman

Back in November 2019, I completed a FLOMicroCourse: Teach With Stories with DeniseWithers. Denise is an award-winning filmmaker and strategist, who has helped over 100 clients use story design to launch new ventures, transform programs, shift policy, engage stakeholders and accelerate innovation.

The objective of this particular course was to describe how stories facilitate learning, identify ways to use story in our teaching and design an effective, story-based learning activity.

Stories have been used for ages (since cave men) and have always been a critical tool for knowledge management. In many non-western cultures and indigenous cultures, elders continue to use stories as a way to talk about the past and their experiences and share their knowledge and wisdom with the younger generations and the community at large. For me, stories are immersive, engaging and emotional. I often find myself a captive audience for my father’s stories. When I hear a story, I want to relate it to my own experience and find a way to make it useful for my current situation.

As I reflected on the course notes shared by Denise and the inputs from fellow participants, I drafted the following storystorm to highlight some of the ways in which stories can be used for learning:

• to share and learn from mistakes
• to create a scenario or set a context for the problem at hand
• as an emotional glue - to generate emotions and make things memorable
• to situate audience into an alternative reality - one that’s not theirs - so they are more receptive to feedback within that role-play
• to give deeper meaning to data
• to capture the key take-away from a learning experience
• to share knowledge - a key concept or idea when shared as a story is more likely to be shared forward
• to help audience derive multiple meanings from the same story by using alternative endings; the audience may even draft their own ending
• to capture the learning journey of how an expert got from being a novice to an expert
• as a teaser/marketing material to launch new training programs for the organization 

There are many benefits of stories. But there is something to be said about the ethics of storytelling. I am reminded of a powerful TED talk on the dangers of a single story. 

In 2009, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie gave a fabulous TED talk called “The Danger of a Single Story.” The talk focuses on what happens when complex human beings and situations are reduced to a single story thus breeding stereotypes. What are the consequences of a narrative where African children are always shown as poor, malnourished and uneducated? Her key idea was that we need to appreciate and highlight the heterogeneous compilation of stories and that if you reduce people to one story, you’re taking away their humanity.

One of my favourite sentences is from the book, Learning in Adulthood: A Comprehensive Guide (Sharan B. Merriam, Lisa M. Baumgartner, Pg. 264):

‘Life’s narratives are retrospective, always in process, unfolding.’

We bring with ourselves the stories of who we think we are. But we can also change our own stories and become something we never imagined we could be. Looking at our own life as a story can be so empowering because we can change the narrative anytime. Stories are transformational because we are our own story.