All entries

We have just spent two days with the social learning team at Deutsche Bank. A dynamic project Banks have had a bad rap of late, so it was a really pleasant surprise to see the work they are doing. It did not seem an obvious home for an ambitious social learning project, but it is what we found there. In less than a year the project has launched about two-dozen communities of practice. They have established a process for starting new communities and a framework for guiding their evolution. They are reaching the stage of forming a community for community leaders. Focus on people Again we were reminded of the importance of starting a social learning initiative by focusing on the social first and the technology second. Their Jive platform has opened the door, but they...

Communities of practice and social learning systems:the career of a concept This article was written by Etienne in 2009 for a textbook co-published by the Open University and Springer. It does two things. It relates the conceptual framework of communities of practice to systems theory and it reviews the career of the concept of community of practice since its inception in Etienne’s work with Jean Lave in 1987. Contents A social systems view on learning: communities of practice as social learning systems   - Learning as the production of social structure   - Learning as the production of identity A learning view on social systems: communities of practice in social learning systems   - Learning as the structuring of...

We may know what we need to know to deal with many of the world’s complex problems; what we don’t have as a system is the learning capability to deal with them. After a talk on the subject of social learning capability at the WHO, a doctor shared the following reaction: “You are onto something important here. We know everything we need to know to save 95% of children under five today. What we don’t know is how to increase the social learning capability of societies to make that happen.” If facing change, expanding our horizon, and dealing with complexity are all social learning challenges, we live in demanding times. In the context of rapid globalization and incerasing interdependence, we face a threatened environment, economic precariousness and...

We had an interesting visit to the Mandel Institute in Israel. The occasion was the annual conference with graduates of their two-year, intensive leadership program. The theme was “professional identity”. Robert Kegan and Lisa Lahey opened the day with their work on “immunity to change” and we led the afternoon with our work on “learning citizenship”. It was exciting for us to introduce the concept of learning citizenship in this context for two reasons: it is a major theme of our joint work going forward, and it also happens to be critically relevant to both the theme of the conference and the work of the Mandel Institute with its graduates. Spearheading such an approach in a place in the world where political challenges (which we would view as...

We see it as our mission to develop a theory and practice of social learning – for individuals, communities, organizations, and society more generally. So this concept is fundamental for us. Etienne’s work on social learning theory places learning at the core of human existence and assumes that it is fundamentally a social phenomenon. Learning is the foundation of who we are (becoming). It is social because our human nature is social, not just because (or when) we interact with others or use certain tools. We are aware of the current trend to focus conversations about social learning on social media. We understand this trend because, indeed, emerging social media technologies are surprisingly aligned with the tenets of social learning theory. We...

Successful social learning spaces depend on acts of learning citizenship on the part of everyone. But some people have a knack for making it happen. They can create social spaces where meaningful learning can take place where people are inspired to learn together and to act as learning citizens. We have met a number of these wonderful people in our work and witnessed their art first hand. We call them “social artists.” We are not entirely sure how they do it, or even if there is a recipe for how it is done. But we know that what they do is important. Their work in key to the development of social learning capability at all levels, from small conversations and communities to large-scale social systems. It is definitely an art form – expressed in many...

We all have a unique trajectory through the landscape of practices that constitute the human world. All these practices have in some way contributed to shaping who we are. And the resulting identity is a unique perspective on the world. As we participate in different social learning spaces our actions affect those spaces. They also affect the people we interact with. And those people belong to other social spaces. So our own learning behavior can affect the learning capability of a whole landscape of learning spaces. Taking responsibility for managing this participation in and across different learning spaces is what we call “learning citizenship”. It comes in different forms. Learning citizenship might simply be the quality of our engagement in a given...

Hopefully we all know them… those contexts where you feel like you are able to have really meaningful conversations with people about your experience of and involvement in practice. You feel that you can be who you are as a learner. Communities, workshops, events, co-authoring… they can all give rise to those kinds of interactions where you feel like you are engaged with learning partners in pushing the envelope. That’s what we mean by social learning spaces: …social containers that enable genuine interactions among participants, who can bring to the learning table both their experience of practice and their experience of themselves in that practice. Not all attempts to bring people together to learn create social learning spaces! They involve a social...

Something got us excited in a strategic meeting with Executive Networks the other day in San Francisco. Executive Networks is a company that builds communities of practice for executives mainly in HR. The Community Directors were very appreciative of our Assessment Framework. They were particularly taken by the value-creation matrix (Figure 7.1, page 39). They liked the idea of integrating quantitative indicators and narratives of value creation and the fact that the usefulness of the framework is both retrospective (what learning a communities has enabled) and prospective (what learning a community may enable). In other words, the framework can be used to account for the value of an existing community and also to imagine the development of a community through...

Are the new “web 2.0″ technologies relevant? Technology has always been relevant to communities to help members connect across time and space and share relevant resources. Web 2.0 technologies are often associated with new, more “horizontal” ways to connect and share information, networked thinking, and new forms of representation—all uses of technology that are very much aligned with the peer-to-peer learning typical of communities of practice. There are many different tools and for each tool, many different realizations; and there is also a great variety in the ways people and communities use these tools. Yet practically, it is useful to review briefly the potential that these new technologies hold for the learning of communities of practice....

Do communities use tools like “Second Life” for their activities? Avatar-based web worlds (e.g., Second Life). Some communities have meeting areas on avatar-based sites. It allows them to have more of a sense of shared space even when they cannot be together in physical space. For instance, the ability to see who is there, even as an avatar, can help members get a more concrete sense of community togetherness than in a teleconference call. The full potential of these types of sites has yet to be fully explored.   >...

What use are media-sharing sites for communities? Some communities open accounts on media-sharing sites, such as Flickr for sharing photos, so that members can share photos, videos, and maps. This provides a simple way to document community events or to collect resources relevant to members. In other communities members use their own individual accounts and a common tag to share memories or resources. Sharing through a common tag means that individuals can share their photos, videos etc. across multiple communities.   >...

Are Facebook, Linked-In, or Goggle+ tools for communities? Networking websites, such as Facebook, Linked-In, or Google+, offer quick, simple, and cheap ways for communities to open spaces for interaction. While the sites may not offer all the features that communities of practice need, they present the advantage of being located where people already have accounts, profiles, and personal networks.   >...

Should a community be “tweeting”? Micro-blogging, using a tool such as Twitter or Yammer, has become a very popular way for some communities to stay connected. It is used in a variety of different ways, including to: Stay connected. Micro-blogging allows members of a community to be in very close contact on an ongoing basis as they subscribe to each other’s “tweet” feeds. It is way to follow what members are up to through the website or through a desktop or mobile application. Leverage the network. Community members can also use these “tweet” messages to get just-in-time help, instant responses to a request for information, or quick feedback on a thought or new idea. Filter multiple sources. “Following” people you trust who share...

Why are analytics important for a community? Analytics, such as Google Analytics, enable community leaders to collect, analyze, and act on data they receive about how people are connecting to their website. Data is easily collected and represented in many different ways. A community leader can see which pages are being read by whom, from where, and through which browser or media. As well as enabling community leader to observe which content is popular it helps them to know who to reach out to and provides information for making decisions about which tools to use for which members of the community.   >...

How do communities use tagging? Communities can use a set of tags as communal keywords, thus creating shared set of pointers to resources relevant to members. A “tag cloud” (the set of tags that a community uses sized according to frequency of use) can be a way to represent dynamically what a community is interested in and where its learning is focusing. It can be interesting for members to visualize their membership by comparing their own tag cloud that of their community. A tag can also have its own “feed”. This means that members can stay subscribed to a tag, being notified when content tagged with a specific term is used.   >...

  Communities of practice usually involve multiple levels of participation. Because involvement can produce learning in multiple ways and the domain has different levels of relevance to different people, the boundaries of a community of practice are more flexible than those of organizational units or teams. Typical categories of membership and participation include: Core group: a relatively small group of people whose passion and engagement energize and nurture the community Active participants: members who are recognized as practitioners and define the community (though they may not be of one mind as to what the community is about) Occasional participants: members who only participate when the topic is of special interest, when they have some...

What use are feeds for a community? Feeds, such as RSS feeds, are used in two ways. They enable communities to: Distribute content beyond the people who visit their website. Members and non-members can subscribe to feeds through an aggregator so they are automatically updated through a web portal, news reader or email whenever new content is published to a site.   Combine content through bundling feeds into “widgets”, “gadgets” or mobile devises that make it possible to display blogs, videos, slideshows, news headlines etc. into another website. This means that communities can combine and integrate the content from different tools in different ways onto their website. As the number of communities increases, feeds enable people to manage their...

How do communities use blogs? Communities use blogs, such as Blogger or WordPress, in two ways: individual blogs and collective blogs. Individual blogs give people a personal voice as contributors to a community. Some communities offer individual blogs inside the community space for specific purposes, such as telling personal stories of practice. Some communities also point to the personal blogs of their members outside the community space, for instance by including member’s blogs on their “blog roll” (links to associated sites). Informal communities also develop as conversations connect related blogs through postings and comments that point to each other across blogs. Collective blogs are also used by communities as shared chronological spaces for...

How do communities of practice use wikis? Wikis, such as MediaWiki used by Wikipedia and Wikispaces which is popular for Educators, are used by communities of practice to create and publish collective, co-authored documents, including web pages. They also use wikis as interactive workspaces for conducting projects or for creating a shared memory of events. The use of wikis range from mere accumulations of resources to full co-authoring of text. Accumulation. For communities, the easiest way to use a wiki is as a repository to which everyone can contribute in order to accumulate text, images, and other resources–for instance bibliographies, lists of pointers of interest, descriptions of tools, etc. In such cases, the advantage of wikis is that it is...

Do we need to change our organizational culture first? Organizational culture can work against communities of practice, if it is individualistic, competitive, and focused on the short term. Changing organizational culture is very difficult. Change initiatives to address cultural issues have had mixed results at best. One of the problems of these change initiatives lies in their scale: they have to happen in lockstep across the organization. As a result they remain for the most part distant from people’s daily concerns. Communities of practice are very sensitive to culture because of their voluntary nature and their basis in identity. But for the same reason they are also a locus for the creation of culture. Each community inherits the culture of the...

If knowledge is power, why would anyone want to share it? Knowledge is indeed a source of power; but hoarding knowledge is not necessarily the best way to benefit from its power, especially in the context of communities of practice. Generalized reciprocity. In a community of practice, sharing knowledge is neither one-way nor merely a transaction. It is a mutual engagement in learning among peers. An improved practice benefits the whole community. Even experts benefit from having more knowledgeable colleagues. Contributing one’s knowledge is an investment in the stock of the community. In this context, the distinction between self-interest and generosity is not so clear. Reputation platform. A community of practice acts as a platform for building a...

What about power? Wouldn’t communities become a threat to the organizational hierarchy? Existing across an organization’s formal structures, communities of practice rarely derive much power directly from positions in formal hierarchies. But communities do not usually seek positional power, with its control over resources and accountability for investments—tasks for which communities are not well suited. They do seek the power of voice, however: the power to be heard, to make a difference, and to have their practice-based perspective matter. In the knowledge economy, the power of voice becomes just as important as the power of position. In an organization where the power of voice is acknowledged, managers would routinely ask: “Have you checked with your...

Should communities of practice attempt to assess or measure the value they create? The issue of measurement and assessment is a controversial one when it comes to communities. Some see measurements as community killers and some see them as the only way communities can survive in organizations. The reality of most communities is more nuanced. While it is true that red tape can harm a community, some awareness of the value created can also inspire members and legitimize their participation and personal investment. And while demonstrating value to an organization is important to ensure support and sponsorship, trying to measure everything is not always the best way to make the value of a community understandable. This calls for a very pragmatic attitude. Communities...

What about tasks and expectations for communities of practice? Communities of practice that have high expectations about what they can achieve tend to be energized. And yet misplaced tasks and expectations can also make the community feel like just another job to do. So the question tasks and expectations hinges on a key distinction between energizing and de-energizing tasks and expectations: Energizing tasks and expectations. They usually allow practitioners to make a difference with their expertise; they help them connect with each other around their desire to perfect their craft; they have visibility in the organization (or at least with the people who can appreciate the results). Typical examples include solving hard problems, debating a hot issue, or...

Should organizations institutionalize communities of practice? Because of this tension between vertical and horizontal processes, integrating communities of practice in an organization is an exercise in paradox. Organizations tend to pay attention to structures or issues by institutionalizing them but it is a delicate task to integrate communities of practice into the organization without squelching the very self-organizing principle that makes them thrive. When it comes to communities of practice, organizations have varying degrees of institutionalization, which even vary from community to community. It is useful to distinguish between two kinds of institutionalization: institutionalizing communities of practice themselves, and institutionalizing their existence...

What should an organization put in place to cultivate communities of practice systematically? If organizations are going to cultivate communities, in their midst or across their boundaries, they have a responsibility to create a context in which these communities can thrive. Large numbers of communities of practice today live inside or across organizations that influence them in many ways. And most of the failures of these communities are at least in part due to a lack of organizational support or understanding. So the organizational side of the cultivating equation is a critical success factor. Organizations are only beginning to learn how to integrate communities of practice. The point is not to institutionalize them and shape them into the image of the formal...

What are three key success factors for communities of practice? Communities of practice are complex social structures, whose voluntary and self-governing nature makes them quite sensitive to subtle dynamics. As a result a host of factors potentially contribute to their success (and to their failure). Any of them can become critical in some circumstances, but if we are asked to name my top three, we generally mention the following: Identification: Communities of practice thrive on social energy, which both derives from and creates identification. Passion for the domain is key. This makes the negotiation of the domain a critical success factor. Leadership: A key success factor is the dedication and skill of people who take the initiative to nurture the...

Should participation be voluntary or compulsory? In general, it is much better to let participation be voluntary. This way, communities of practice live on because they create value for members, not because of an edict or a box to check. It does not mean that one cannot strongly encourage participation or even request that someone run an idea by the relevant community. But making participation compulsory more generally runs the risk that communities become just another meeting to go to and survive. This is likely to deflate the very social energy that makes healthy communities of practice places of meaningful learning.   >...

Can a community of practice exist only online? A community of practice is not defined by the medium through which members connect. Mutually relevant challenges of practice are much more important than modes of interaction. The key to a community of practice is the ability of participants to recognize the practitioner in each other and that basis, to act as learning partners. If online interactions alone allow people to do this in meaningful ways (and by now there is enough evidence that it is possible), then the result is an “online” community of practice.   >...