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Blog by John Hagel reviewing new book, Design in Nature, by Adrian Bejan and J. Peder Zane, looks like it was published in January 2012. As a systems person, this review resonates with me and speaks to what the WLStudio can do to help women redesign their learning systems as well as the currents that flow through their systems. They must avoid others who wish to dictate where and what and how learning opportunities are available to them. Reworded more constructively, women need to design and nuture their own learning opportunities. Excerpts from review: The book introduces us to constructal law: "For a finite-size flow system to persist in time (to live), its configuration must evolve in such a way that provides easier access to the currents that flow through it." The authors caution "that nothing operates in isolation; every flow system is part of a bigger flow system, shaped by and in service to the world around it." "As the title of the book suggests, the constructal law is ultimately a law about design. It determines which designs will survive and thrive over time. The constant interplay between flow and design drives the evolution of flow systems. The design of flow systems must evolve to enhance the flows within the system or they will die." Final excerpt from book review: The bottom line So, what does this mean for all of us? The message is simple and compelling. If we are not enhancing flow, we will be marginalized, both in our personal and professional life. If we want to remain successful and reap the enormous rewards that can be generated from flows, we must continually seek to refine the designs of the systems that we spend time in to ensure that they are ever more effective in sustaining and amplifying flows. As the authors observe, "it is not love or money that makes the world go round but flow and design"

HASTAC discussion by badge designers, 10/2012 Note this excerpt: Include badge earners in the design process of your program. Understand their motivation, what drives their involvement, and what they hope to get out of the program you are creating. Consider the diversity of your learners; they are likely to be driven by different goals. Assessment is just as important in a badge-based learning system as it is in more traditional learning environments. In order for badges to have value to the earner and to those who would consider using the badge to impute the skills or competencies of an individual, appropriate assessment practices need to back up the process by which the badge was awarded. Craft a badge system that is flexible enough to accommodate a range of learning styles, motivations and pedagogies. Some contexts call for more proscribed badging opportunities, where experts set up gauntlets which learners pass successfully before earning badges. Other systems call for a more grassroots approach, in which learners set their own goals and pursue less well-defined pathways that get them where they want to go as individuals, with badges in hand to show for their efforts. Creating a badge system that can adapt to a variety of contexts and audiences is a worthy challenge. Break up complex requirements into simpler steps and attach a badge to each step (so the badges act like waypoints on the overall path).

The authors Peter Senge, Hal Hamilton, and John Kania in this magazine article from Winter 2015 outline their belief that the deep changes necessary to accelerate progress against society's most intractable problems require a unique type of leader - the systems leader, the person who catalyzes collective leadership. They use Nelson Mandela as the supreme example of this, but state that they have met many systems leaders on a national, regional, and local level. Systems leaders have the ability to see the interconnection of all the moving parts of a problem, issue, or crisis and develop interventions designed to bring diverse views and standings together in supportive and structured ways to address differences. "The simple idea that you could bring together those who had suffered profound losses with those whose actions led to those losses, to face one another, tell their truths, forgive, and move on, was not only a profound gesture of civilization but also a cauldron for creating collective leadership. Indeed, the process would have been impossible without the leadership of people like Bishop Desmond Tutu and former President F. W. de Klerk."

"Applicant Tracking Systems 101 for Job-Seekers: Understanding the ATS Technology That Dominates Online Job Search" Follow up to their annual report: Have Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) "Ruined" Recruiting and Hiring and Job Search? which I already have added to our Diigo group. Great overview of how ATS works and what to do about it.

Interview with Vera Michalchik published by DML Research Hub, funded by the McArthur Foundation. Michalchick heads up research on Informal Learning Environments in SRI International's Center for Technology in Learning. "I'm paraphrasing Richard Feynman who said that the more that we have a monoculture of learning, the less chance we have of producing creative, innovative, capable thinkers. We really want diverse learning environments, and assessment is always the tail that wags the dog. People are beholden to systems of accountability, and what knowledge is valued and how that knowledge is valued really shows up in an assessment system. Besides reducing the diversity of learning environments by having common metrics, we short-change a natural process. This is what we mention in the Naturalizing Assessment article. " Offers pros and cons on badging system (is disinclined but open-minded about their usage) and suggests various kinds of informal learning assessments that do not following the standardized testing model such as: continual monitoring of where kids are in the program, for when kids are "getting it", "minimally invasive studies of behavior and performance" to support documentation of participation and capacity building, ethnology, video documentation, data mining methods of video archives, embedded assessment in learning games, etc.

Harvard Business Review's top trends identified by using 5 questions that determine if these are indeed a trend or not. Top trends for 2015 are: Deep learning (machine learning); Smart virtual personal assistants; Uber's monetization of downtime and the offer for those needing employment to work. Uber-like businesses such as grocery delivery, massage services, dry cleaning and laundry, etc. will take off; Oversight for Algorithms - ethics of how algorithms can be used especially when programmers add subjective judgments to algorithms causing false answers; Data privacy - dealing with ongoing breaches. The public does not blame hackers but blames business for not taking measures to combat hackers; Block chain technology is a transactional database that is shared by everyone participating in bitcoin's digital system. Block chain systems may become a universal platform for anything needing a signature or authentication.

Harvard Business Review's top trends identified by using 5 questions that determine if these are indeed a trend or not. Top trends for 2015 are: Deep learning (machine learning); Smart virtual personal assistants; Uber's monetization of downtime and the offer for those needing employment to work. Uber-like businesses such as grocery delivery, massage services, dry cleaning and laundry, etc. will take off; Oversight for Algorithms - ethics of how algorithms can be used especially when programmers add subjective judgments to algorithms causing false answers; Data privacy - dealing with ongoing breaches. The public does not blame hackers but blames business for not taking measures to combat hackers; Block chain technology is a transactional database that is shared by everyone participating in bitcoin's digital system. Block chain systems may become a universal platform for anything needing a signature or authentication. 

Principles of Feminist Social Work Process by Jenny Gilmore. These principles mesh well with the work on systems leaders, as really all that is written about systems leaders are found in these principles which have been practiced since the 1960's by feminist leaders.

"Applicant Tracking System Tools for Job-Seekers" has a list of resources for ATS optimization of resumes including articles, blog posts, and tools.

"How to Get the Applicant Tracking System to Pick Your Resume" from bigInterview. Good explanation of how ATS work, the history of ATS, why used by more and more employers. Also good easy checklist of tips for resume writing for ATS.

"Optimizing and Formatting Your Job-Search Resume for Applicant Tracking Systems" gives a detailed description of how to format your resume, and what to include. Goes into more depth than the checklist already in Diigo.

"Beat the Robots: How to Get Your Resume Past the System & Into Human Hands" from theMuse by Mark Slack and Erik Bowitz. Good, simple 4 step process for optimizing resumes for ATS.

"The Easy How-To Guide to Formatting Resumes for Applicant Tracking Systems" by Lisa Rangel on LinkedIn. Quick, easy to read explanation of what ATS is, how it works, and how to format a resume for ATS success.

blog post by Donston-Miller, June 4, 2012 on how social changes how we work 1. website home pages (home pages less of a destination, Facebook timeline becoming more important) 2. Email--with built-in IM systems on Twitter, LinkedIn, and Facebook, email less important. Google+ users get tight integration on communication tools 3. Help desk call centers--moving to discussion forms on social networking platforms 4. Resumes-- "Now, social networks are basically living resumes. Or, looked at another way, you are your resume; what you post, how you interact, what you share, who your friends and followers are, and more all combine to demonstrate your value to a company." 5. PBXes--enterprise wide phone systems are affected by Skype and online chat and messaging features

Fascinating article on Baylor research on how internal social networking sites supported and managed within the workplace helps newcomers (younger people usually) to connect and learn from each other, interact directly with more senior people, and inadvertently cause problems for middle managers who did not want to mentor new hires and who did not necessarily have the social/technology proficiencies to participate in the SNS, Science Daily, 1/29/2013. Their conclusions showed that a "company can improve morale and reduce turnover." Researchers are Hope Koch, Baylor, Dorothy Leidner, Ph.D., Ferguson Professor of Information Systems at Baylor; and Ester Gonzalez from Washington State University. Excerpt: he study centered on a financial institution's efforts to reduce IT employee turnover by starting a social and work-related online networking site. Under the supervision of executives, the IT new hires developed and managed the site's content. Since most new hires had moved hundreds of miles to start their new jobs with the institution, they initially used the social pages as an introduction to the community. After a year or so with the organization, the more senior new hires began using the system to acclimate and mentor incoming new hires. All study respondents worked in the institution's IT department and included new hires, middle managers and executives. With less than three years of experience, most new hires and interns were men between 21 and 27 years old. The middle managers and executives were baby boomers or members of generation X. The internal social networking site helped the new hires build social capital in several ways, according to Koch. "It gave them access to people who could provide useful information and new perspectives and allowed them to meet more senior new hires and executives. These relationships set the new hires at ease during work meetings, helped them understand where to go for help and increased their commitment to the financial

Great article by Susan Weinschenk, Brain Wise: Work better, work smarter, September 11, 2012, and why dopamine keeps us "seeking" when we already have enough information. excerpt: Do you ever feel like you are addicted to email or twitter or texting? Do you find it impossible to ignore your email if you see that there are messages in your inbox? Do you think that if you could ignore your incoming email or messages you might actually be able to get something done at work? You are right!" ... "Instead of dopamine causing you to experience pleasure, the latest research shows that dopamine causes seeking behavior. Dopamine causes you to want, desire, seek out, and search. It increases your general level of arousal and your goal-directed behavior. From an evolutionary stand-point this is critical. The dopamine seeking system keeps you motivated to move through your world, learn, and survive. It's not just about physical needs such as food, or sex, but also about abstract concepts. Dopamine makes you curious about ideas and fuels your searching for information. Research shows that it is the opioid system (separate from dopamine) that makes us feel pleasure." Turn off the cues - One of the most important things you can do to prevent or stop a dopamine loop, and be more productive is to turn off the cues. Adjust the settings on your cell phone and on your laptop, desktop or tablet so that you don't receive the automatic notifications. Automatic notifications are touted as wonderful features of hardware, software, and apps. But they are actually causing you to be like a rat in a cage. If you want to get work done you need to turn off as many auditory and visual cues as possible. It's the best way to prevent and break the dopamine loops. What do you think? How do you deal with dopamine loops? Are you willing to turn off your cues?

blog post by Dmitri Dragilev in Better Humans "Dopamine is why CEOs write down goals and vision statements. As you move toward these goals, mentors and advisors reassure you that you are moving in the right direction and every step of the way you get a shot of dopamine. The problem is that all of us have learned how to cheat the system and get shots of dopamine without actually accomplishing anything. Gambling is a great example, every time you pull that handle on a slot machine you get dopamine. Alcohol is the same story, a shot of whiskey = a shot of dopamine, you want more, you repeat; you're not actually moving toward a vision or a goal." I too am guilty of dopamine addiction. I love email and depend on it for a lot of my day to day work. I love instigating stuff, fast back and forths, and knowing what is happening everywhere. But I have found that all this stuff re-prioritizes my day quite a bit. For the past year I have successfully disabled email, Twitter, Facebook, and text message notifications on my phone and have kept it off since then. My life has been transformed. Not only do I find that there are a lot less distractions, I find that I stay focused on the right tasks that keep me marching toward my overall goal. Again, I'm not saying that what I did is the magic formula for everyone. What I am saying is that perhaps it's time to re-assess how much you check your email, text messages, social media and your devices in general and see if you're cheating the system in order to get a rush of dopamine or you're truly marching toward your goal.

"What You'll Learn: In this highly interactive three-day workshop, we'll take a deep dive into transformative leadership for social change. Employing the framework if "I/We/It" What you'll learn: Why mindfulness is a critical leadership skill How to shift from "ego" to "eco" or system-awareness The difference between organizational and network leadership How to identify your allies, build relationships, and map your network What "systems-change" is, and how to scale social impact   Why design-thinking is a critical skill for change-makers Case-studies of organizations and networks that have achieved impact at scale "

Reactions to badges for the hyperlinked library MOOC by Brian Kelly. He found all the badges he was awarded for various tasks: join a tribe; send a friendship request, accept a friendship request, update his MOOC avatar, plus, another badge just for receiving 5 badges. He found all this badge awarding for these simple tasks "cheesy" and that the system was patronizing him. However, he does acknowledge that it may motivate others. He also brought up the issue of cultural diversity. This MOOC has participants from all over the world. How will they find badges?

Reactions to badges for the hyperlinked library MOOC by Brian Kelly. He found all the badges he was awarded for various tasks: join a tribe; send a friendship request, accept a friendship request, update his MOOC avatar, plus, another badge just for receiving 5 badges. He found all this badge awarding for these simple tasks "cheesy" and that the system was patronizing him. However, he does acknowledge that it may motivate others. He also brought up the issue of cultural diversity. This MOOC has participants from all over the world. How will they find badges?

Digest of ideas by Gwen Teatro, You Are Not the Boss of Me, reprinted 9/7/14, originally written in 2010. Very interesting look at the Fifty Discipline by Peter Senge. "There was a time when everyone was jumping onto The Learning Organization bandwagon. This usually happened when times were good, when organizations felt a little more ebullient...Budgets were cut....wisdom and decisions would only come from the few and learning for the many was a luxury no one could afford." Learning Organization components 1. Vision--shared--may start with one person, it must be embraced and shared by all. Can be simple, i.e., Zappo's Delivering Happiness 2. Team learning--in an age where shared leadership is or will become critical, the need to understand the dynamics and functional operation of teams is pretty great--how team members communicate with each other, how they manage conflict, and how they examine their successes...and their failures 3. Personal Mastery--taking the time to study and understand our reality and our purpose 4. Mental models--dangers of clinging to and operating from narrow perspectives--assumptions and biases in our thinking 5. Systems thinking--paying attention to the connections between and among a variety of elements that make up the whole.

reviews of webconferencing systems