Group items tagged

Very interesting blog post on how to convert casual readers into activists on Mashable by Geoff Livinston, May 13, 2010. 1. Stop thinking of them as slacktivists 2. Steward people up the Twitter engagement ladder from very low involvement (reads the tweet) to medium (retweets) to high (makes a donation or takes action) or very high (takes action and actively encourages others to do so). 3. Reevaluate the donor funnel to see where people are talking about issue online, listen, reflect back on what you're hearing, invite small acts of engagement, thank people and tell them the difference their acts made, listen some more, invite them to speak... 4. Shift your attitude to understand what hot buttons are to trigger support, cultivate them and make them feel appreciated. 5. Create new calls to action.

Very good, practical article by Marco Albani and Kimberly Henderson, McKinsey & Company, July 2014 on companies and social groups joining forces to protect the environment. The seven tips to make such alliances successful work for all partnerships/odd couples IMO. 1. ID clear reasons to collaborate. "The effort needs to help each partner organization achieve something significant. Incentives such as 'we'll do this for good publicity' or 'we don't want to be left out' are not sufficient." -Nigel Twose, director of the Development Impact Department, International Finance Corporation, World Bank Group 2. Find a fairy godmother "It is important to have a core of totally committed, knowledgeable people who would die in a ditch for what the organization is trying to achieve." -Environmental NGO campaign head 3. Set simple, credible goals 4. Get professional help "It is very important to have an honest broker. The facilitator must be neutral and very structured and keep people moving along at a brutal pace. You need someone who can bring things to a close." -Darrel Webber, secretary general, Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) 5. Dedicate good people to the cause "If a company like ours believes something is strategic, then we resource it like it is strategic." -Neil Hawkins, corporate vice president of sustainability, Dow Chemical LOVE #5--HAVE SEEN "COLLABORATIONS" FAIL IN STATE GOVT. BECAUSE GOOD PEOPLE AND SENIOR LEADERSHIP WERE NOT BEHIND IT. 6. Be flexible in defining success "Partners think that collaboration will change the world. Then it doesn't, and they think that it failed. But often the collaboration changed something-the way some part of the system works and delivers outcomes. It is a matter of understanding the nature of change itself." -Simon Zadek, visiting fellow, Tsinghua School of Economics and Management, Beijing 7. Prepare to let go "I've been absent from the FSC since 1997.

I like this term "free-range learning" and believe it might be part of the Studio language. "Ms. Morgan borrows the phrase "free-range learning" to describe students' behavior, and she finds that they generally shop around for content in places educators would endorse. Students seem most favorably inclined to materials from other universities. They mention lecture videos from Stanford and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology far more than the widely publicized Khan Academy, she says. If they're on a pre-med or health-science track, they prefer recognized "brands" like the Mayo Clinic. Students often seek this outside content due to dissatisfaction with their own professors, Ms. Morgan says." Also this comment: I don't think academe has really come to grips with the very large role peer-to-peer sharing plays in the way students learn. We proved this interesting phenomenon this year in a very large online course that we were in the process of redesigning. One section of the course piloted the redesign, which had dropped the former textbook in favor of all online content, cut out 1/3 of the subject areas covered in the old version of the course and changed the assignment instructions and interaction modalities radically. Despite the fact that all students in the pilot section were fully informed that they were in a different and new course, and were required to go though an extensive introductory module covering all aspects of the new version of the course, including the syllabus, and were required to pass a test covering the course requirements and structure, we still had something like 5% of the students turn in work that was based on the old course assignments and old course structure. Some of them had apparently not read any of the assignment instructions from their own section, and were relying entirely on peers in other sections for information on how to complete assignments.

This excerpt from an interview with Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach, PLP founder, captures critical points for PD online. "Will and I agreed that we would only work with teams of school-based educators because the research made it clear that it was collaborative teams within in a school, working together, that really brought about sustainable improvement. That would give us what we needed to anchor the virtual experience in a local context. We also wanted participants to experience a global community of practice-to be able to have conversations with people very different than themselves, with fresh perspectives. Our thinking was that if we put teams of educators who had different ideologies, different geography, different purposes and challenges, all together in the same space, then they could each bring what they did well to the table and people could learn from that. Ultimately that would mean public, private, Catholic, and other kinds of schools; educators teaching well-to-do, middle-class, and poor kids; educators in different states and nations, at different grade levels, and in different content areas and roles. What ultimately grew out of our brainstorming was a three-pronged model of professional development that emphasizes (1) local learning communities at the school/district level; (2) an online community of practice that's both global and deep; and (3) a third prong that is more personal-the idea of a personal learning network that each educator develops as a mega-resource for ideas and information about their particular interests and areas of practice. (These three prongs are described in depth in a new book, The Connected Educator, where PLP community leader Lani Ritter Hall and I tell the story of the evolution of our model and the very solid research base behind it.)

Very very interesting--a year ago we talked about a learning concierge service in the studio. And look at Jane Hart's post published in July 2013 about how we need to provide such a service for people to take charge of their learning. She mentions towards the end of her post that this could be an outsourced function and then shares how she does it. Look at the link to her page describing the service here-- http://learningconcierge.co.uk/about/ She is offering a workshop, too, and one may join her free learning concierge practice group now. Will also share with Change MOOC for Brenda to see.

Blog post by Sylvia Browder at the Story Exchange--where women mean business. "Challenge 2: Undefined Niche To Niche or Not to Niche…that is the question. What is a niche? A niche business is one that targets a very specific group of people with specific shared interest. A business with an undefined niche is like a ship sailing in shallow water. By creating a niche business allows you to market to your ideal clients. For example, if you were a behavioral psychologist targeting teens, you would market your services in places where parents are likely to find out about you; such as advertising in parent magazines, providing resources to local middle and high schools or joining organizations geared towards parents. Solution: By understanding who and where your ideal customers are; it is easy to craft a marketing plan to target them. Here are three easy ways to target your potential clients: * Improve your website's SEO with specific key words * Generate exposure locally and virtually with professional speaking, seminars or publishing a book or articles. * Craft a clear message that speak at the heart of your customer " Challenge 4: No Social Media Plan Random tweets and meandering Facebook posts will result in a lot of time devoted to zero results. Before making another useless post, sit down with pen and paper and make a list of what you want to achieve from social media. To which social media do you belong? What are some social media marketing strategies that you have noticed from other companies? What do you have that will offer value? You may find that your company is spread a little too thin across the social media spectrum. Quality truly is superior to quantity in this respect. Solution: Create a social media marketing plan and stay the long haul. Establishing a strong presence can be a very time consuming process. It is unwise to expect your list of fans, followers or subscribers to grow overnight.

Commencement speeches at different colleges, June 15, 2014 Harvey Mudd College Beth Shapiro, evolutionary biologist "Your unique education has prepared you for careers at the cutting edge of innovation. This is both good news and bad news. It's good news because you're probably going to find a job, it will pay well, and it will be intellectually fulfilling. It's bad news because whatever you thought you were training for when you started this exercise might not actually exist anymore. Five years ago, when you guys were deciding where to go to college, there were very few mobile-app developers or big-data architects, and there certainly weren't any chief listening officers for social media outlets. It's hard to imagine where the next five years will go, but it's kind of fun to do so. ... Who knows, but you guys are going to be among the people that are actually making it happen. And it'll be awesome, as long as you're willing to take some risks and step outside of your comfort zone. When an opportunity arises, take it." UNC at Chapel Hill Atul Gawande, doctor and writer "Ultimately, it turns out we all have an intrinsic need to pursue purposes larger than ourselves, purposes worth making sacrifices for. People often say, 'Find your passion.' But there's more to it than that. Not all passions are enough. Just existing for your desires feels empty and insufficient, because our desires are fleeting and insatiable. You need a loyalty. The only way life is not meaningless is to see yourself as part of something greater: a family, a community, a society. ... the search for purpose is really a search for a place, not an idea. It is a search for a location in the world where you want to be part of making things better for others in your own small way. It could be a classroom where you teach, a business where you work, a neighborhood where you live. The key is, if you find yourself in a place where you stop caring - where your greatest conce

A number of great quotes offered by Tom Peters on leading in the 21st century, September 2014. Tom Peters: Today's technology tools give you great opportunities to do 73 things at a time or to at least delude yourself that you are. I see managers who look like 12-year-olds with attention deficit disorder, running around from one thing to the next, constantly barraged with information, constantly chasing the next shiny thing. The only thing on earth that never lies to you is your calendar. That's why I'm a fanatic on the topic of time management. But when you use that term, people think, "Here's an adult with a brain. And he's teaching time management. Find something more important, please." But something more important doesn't exist. Tom Peters: Unless you were born with a very, very silver spoon, you're going to spend the majority of adult life at work. Why shouldn't this be a joyful experience or an energetic experience or a vivid experience? If you're a leader, your whole reason for living is to help human beings develop-to really develop people and make work a place that's energetic and exciting and a growth opportunity, whether you're running a Housekeeping Department or Google. I mean, this is not rocket science. It's not even a shadow of rocket science. You're in the people-development business. If you take a leadership job, you do people. Period. It's what you do. It's what you're paid to do. People, period. Should you have a great strategy? Yes, you should. How do you get a great strategy? By finding the world's greatest strategist, not by being the world's greatest strategist. You do people. Not my fault. You chose it. And if you don't get off on it, do the world a favor and get the hell out before dawn, preferably without a gilded parachute. But if you want the gilded parachute, it's worth it to get rid of you.

ComsterCollege.com article by Lauren Bayne Anderson, June 16, 2011. Excerpt Here are some benefits to joining a professional organization: Jobs Many professional organizations help their members find jobs, or at the least, offer up job listings that other members may be offering. Mentoring Mentoring is the cornerstone of many professional organizations when it comes to working with younger members. You may never get in the room with someone at the top of your field, for a very long time. But professional organizations have the ability to pare you with someone much more experienced. Professional Development Many organizations offer professional development via courses, workshops, publications, and information on their website shared only with members. They also keep members up to date on industry trends and how to deal with them. Some organizations (take the National Association of Black Journalists for example) offer news and print coverage of their annual conferences, run by students-which is an excellent opportunity to gain experience. Networking Most organizations have an annual conference. This is an opportunity for you to mix and mingle with others in your field in both professional and leisure settings. There is also often a job fair where you can make contact and stay up to date with the very people who hire - even if they're not hiring right now. In fact, some people find recruiters follow their career and stay updated when you stop by their booth at the job fair. They may be keeping an eye on you until they are ready to finally offer you a job. Scholarships For the youngest of members (high school and college), scholarships may be the primary reason to join a professional organization. Many offer scholarships to the new members studying to enter the field.

Interesting (very positive!) assessment of the value of Facebook for lawyers to connect socially using the largest social network in the world by Kevin O'Keefe, May 16, 2013. Google+ comes in #2 in terms of worldwide use (not as popular in U.S. but very popular elsewhere), Twitter at #4, and LinkedIn follows Twitter as the fastest growing network (if one excludes the intervening Chinese social networks).

A group of friends in Mexico, all entrepreneurs, started talking about their failed ventures. The conversation engendered such deep learning and reflection, they created a regular meeting where they modified the Japanese Petcha-Kutcha model of presenting slides for and narrating the slides for a very brief time. The Mexico group named these f2f thriving on failure group Fuck Up night. Others around the world began to hear about the FuckUp night via social media, and soon were asking the Mexico group if they could replicate the model. Now FuckUp nights are global, and the original group only asks that the model be followed, and any slides and videos of the presentations be shared with the world on the fuckup nights website.

A group of friends in Mexico, all entrepreneurs, started talking about their failed ventures. The conversation engendered such deep learning and reflection, they created a regular meeting where they modified the Japanese Petcha-Kutcha model of presenting slides for and narrating the slides for a very brief time. The Mexico group named these f2f thriving on failure group Fuck Up night. Others around the world began to hear about the FuckUp night via social media, and soon were asking the Mexico group if they could replicate the model. Now FuckUp nights are global, and the original group only asks that the model be followed, and any slides and videos of the presentations be shared with the world on the fuckup nights website.

"Innovation often comes from where you least expect it and harnessing collective intelligence, the core principle of Web 2.0 as well as Enterprise 2.0, is the very art of eliciting value from emergent systems such as the Web and our intranets. That this value is forming the bulk of the networked economy (open source software, social networks, social media sharing, etc.) is one of the signature lessons of the era of open business models and 2.0."

Dion Hinchcliffe's blogs are very interesting and he has great graphics. He also explores stats to show ROI in the networked age, or explains why they are not forthcoming. His home page is: http://blogs.zdnet.com/Hinchcliffe

Blog post by Lisa Lane in her (Online) Teaching Blog, June 25, 2011 She reviews Pink's book on A Whole New Mind. Excerpt: "Accumulation -> Meaning Pink says the predominance of the baby boomer mentality means that the goal of accumulating meterial goods is changing to the desire to find meaning in life, a kind of "post-materialism"." For each chapter on these aptitudes, Pink provides resources and tips to develop your own brain along the new lines. Thus we go from theory in Chapter 1 to a series of storied examples, then each chapter ends with self-help advice. (It's already pretty light - I find it very funny that there's a "Summarized for Busy People" version available.) But the mental yoga commercial was a distraction from the main idea. What's significant here is that right-brained, big picture, contextual, design-based thinking will likely be increasingly respected in our culture.

Very interesting graphics for categorizing MOOC participants (lurkers, drop-ins, passive participants, and active participants) and for no-shows at end of week 1 (almost 90%)

Very interesting assessment of Twitter users in comparison to general public. They seem to be younger, more Democratic (redundant?) than general population. . . but only 13% of adults said they ever use Twitter or read Twitter messages. So there is a small saturation rate. " In the Pew Research Center's 2012 biennial news consumption survey, just 13% of adults said they ever use Twitter or read Twitter messages; only 3% said they regularly or sometimes tweet or retweet news or news headlines on Twitter. Twitter users are not representative of the public. Most notably, Twitter users are considerably younger than the general public and more likely to be Democrats or lean toward the Democratic Party. In the 2012 news consumption survey, half (50%) of adults who said they posted news on Twitter were younger than 30, compared with 23% of all adults. And 57% of those who posted news on Twitter were either Democrats or leaned Democratic, compared with 46% of the general public. (Another recent Pew Research Center survey provides even more detail on who uses Twitter and other social media.)"

Blog post by Harold Jarche, Life in Perpetual Beta blog, March 24, 2013. Asserts that enterprise social tools can go only so far to help people share their knowledge because people wish to retain ownership and use as they see fit it. Excerpt: "People will freely share their knowledge if they remain in control of it. Knowledge is a very personal thing. Most workers do not care about organizational knowledge bases. They care about what they need to get work done. However, if we are going to build organizational knowledge from individual knowledge-sharing, we have to connect the two."

Very wonderful blog post by Nancy Dixon, KM and social learning maven/professor/writer, on how talking with each other produces learning as we try to articulate what we know and what we might need help with, March 9, 2009.

Very interesting infographic on how integrating use of twitter and facebook greatly increases giving to nonprofits during the last three years, 2010, 2011, and 2012.

Post in WP discussion forum on how unhelpful so-called help discussion forums really are. Excerpt: "I signed up for WP AT Godaddy,com and have the same question, so I have to come here and do whatever I can understand of what i'm told. my universal experience with forums like this - here at WP and at the forums which serve as the ONLY assistance for non-paying users of third party design businesses -is that genuinely inexperienced people are not-so-subtly encourage to self-select out. people who need help make it very clear that they are really inexperienced, beg for step-by-step directions and get responses they cannot decipher or use. And if they have the temerity to say so, well, here's the first forum i clicked under this topic: http://wordpress.org/support/topic/email-set-up-on-wordpress-site?replies=3 the forum was simply shut down. lol? I don't understand why experienced users who know how to do things bother to make such replies. Is there some club somewhere where such things are on display for the amusement of our betters? Because unintentionally or not, it seems gratuitously mean. "

Excellent series of very short (1.5 minutes or less) how-to videos on using PowerPoint presentations by Dave Yewman, published in July 2008 but still relevant today.