#BNLF - 7 Key Takeaways and Other Impressions from Day 1

#BNLF I've learned means Blog Now, Live Forever. Pretty cool I thought! 

This weekend—31^st Oct and 1^st November -- was spent at the #BNLF conference held at The Lalit, Mumbai. Intrigued by the name and impressed by the lineup of speakers consisting of people like Purba Ray of the A-Musing fame (I have always been intrigued by that hyphen), Arnab Ray, the author of May I Hebb Your Attention Pliss, better known as the @greatbong, Anshul Tiwari, Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Youth ki Awaaz, Christoph Trappe, the writer of The Authentic Storytelling Project blog, Jeff Bullas whose blog I have been following from years, Preeti Shenoy and none other than Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden – decided how I would spend my weekend. This post is a summary of my impression of Day 1.

This was my first BNLF, and I wasn’t quite sure what to expect from the blogging fraternity. I had somehow assumed that a hundred odd people would turn up and most would be fans of writers like Arnab Ray and Purba Ray… . I turned up at The Lalit well-ahead of time as I’m wont to do, and was ready to meander in the lobby when I encountered at least 300+ people generally hanging around – some in clusters, some alone and some evidently #BNLF organizers wearing the hashtag T-shirt. Hmm! Not quite what I had envisaged for sure. Within a span of 15~20 mins, the 300 swelled to 500+ with more coming. And registration was yet to start. I learned that this amorphous bunch of people consisted of #BNLF regulars as well as the uninitiated like me. “Welcome to the tribe,” someone said. “Are you’ll all bloggers,” I asked? “Yes, of course,” was the somewhat astonished response. That shut me up for sure!

Purba Ray on Stage

There were bloggers from all over India—from Delhi, Chandigarh, Pune, Kolkata, Banglaore… There were bloggers writing on every kind of topic imaginable—from gardening to lifestyle, urban yoga to urban homes, from quilling to political spoofs – if you can think of a topic, there was probably a blogger there writing on it. There were bloggers ranging from 21 year olds to folks in their 50’s. I couldn’t have been more mistaken in my assumptions. And everyone had come to learn, to improve their blogging skills, to pick-up techniques and methodologies to take their blogging to the next level. I was impressed and a little bit awed.

Being used to conferences like #SHRM, #HRTech, and other corporate affairs, I was in for another dose of shock when we entered the main venue post registration. It looked nothing like a conference room. It resembled a rock-show arena with a brightly lit, kaleidoscopic stage, laser lights doing their thing and various musical instruments (I don’t know all the names so won’t get into the details) casually strewn about. The long hall held rows and rows and rows of white chairs – at least a 1000 it seemed -- and looked somewhat surreal to me. I quickly grabbed one in the first row and settled down. The day began with rock music—yes! no corporate affair this one! 700+ people were on their feet rocking and swaying and clapping to “We don’t need no Education” and other favorites. What a start!

The day maintained the momentum and the speakers didn’t let us down either. Each had their unique story and perspectives to share. I’ve made a holistic list of my key takeaways from the day that I felt would be worth sharing for other bloggers like me. 

1. Bring Constancy and Commitment: This theme cropped up in everyone’s talk and the masterclasses that followed on Sunday. More about these in my next post. Without exception everyone spoke about being committed and regular with one’s blogging schedule, to post on a specific day of the week, and even at a specific time. The trick is to have a set of posts ready and scheduled to publish. This not only helps loyal readers keep track of your writing but also helps in search engine rankings. While I theoretically knew all this, I had not gotten around to being this disciplined. Coming from some of the most respected bloggers and writers, it was a hard-hitting message for me. 
2. Keep it Conversational: Apparently, while we all like to sound erudite and believe that obfuscating points make them more interesting, it is not true. I pondered a while and realized that the blogs I like in my domain are all written in the simplest language without any loss of depth or impact. The first example that came to my mind was @AbhijitBhaduri ‘s blog! So, keeping it simple, using short words, and writing as if we were explaining a concept to a friend is a good approach to follow. 
3. Make it Authentic: In their various ways, each of the speakers emphasized this with Christoph Trappe making it the core of his piece. Of course to be authentic, it is essential to feel deeply and passionately about our domain of blogging. It is impossible to be authentic without being passionate. It also implies being vulnerable and open, considering readers as friends. A stilted and fake voice will neither get us loyal readers nor make us feel satisfied with our writing. 
4. Re-purpose Content: I often forget that I can use my blog post to create a SlideShare presentation, craft unique tweets or use the images for Pinterest boards. Re-purposing content across different social media channels in different forms not only ensures a wider and more constant reach but also addresses varied audience preferences and needs. 
5. Keep an Eye on the Headline: According to research, listicles are a great way to get attention for primarily three reasons -- 1) provide a container around content pieces; 2) make it easy for the readers to keep track, and go back and forth; and 3) make it easy to recall. While definitely not all my posts can have a title beginning “7 ways to…” and “9 things to keep in mind…”, it is an advice worth remembering. Headlines are very critical, especially in this era of content abundance and attention deficit. Headlines should clearly tell readers what they can expect from the post. 
6. Remember the 60-30-10 Rule: This specifically struck a chord with me. Christoph Trappe mentioned that successful blogging is defined by this rule of time and effort breakup – where 60% is devoted to creating authentic and original content; 30% should be given to listening and conversation because blogging is not a siloed activity; and 10% effort can be spent on sharing and linking on different social platforms. This is a good rule of thumb I intend to practice more consciously. 
7. Don’t be Over-Dependent on Social Media: Jeff Bullas emphasized the importance of focusing on search and doing keyword research for those serious about growing their readership. Good content is of course a must and a given. According to him, the power of headlines, images and email lists should not be ignored. I’m going to explore these one at a time and test for impact.

All in all, Day 1 gave me plenty of food for thought and action. I know consistency is going to be my key issue, with procrastination my Achilles’ heel. Look out for posts on the Day 2 Workshops and other unique moments. 

Demystifying Working Out Loud

“When people leverage collaboration platforms to contribute and to build relationships, that appeals to their intrinsic motivators of autonomy, mastery, and relatedness.” ~ Working Out Loud-Better for You; Better for the Firm

Working out loud has been steadily gaining popularity and has become a topic of conversation on many forums including the Facebook community of the same name. In the post 5 Gifts for the HR Department, John Stepper describes working out loud as a “different kind of talent program” writing, “as more employees work out loud, more of their work is visible along with public feedback on it”. Dion Hinchcliffe in What Are the Required Skills for Today’s Digital Workforce?, mentions working out loud as one of the “genuinely transformative new digital skills”, and as seen in the diagram below, it heads the list of critical skills for a digital workforce.

I have been writing about working out loud as a practice for some time now. Here are some of my older posts: Working Out Loud 101, 7 Strategies to Facilitate Working Out Loud, and Working Out Loud: Using the Tools We Already Have. In this post, I want to demystify working out loud and highlight the organizational as well as personal growth that accrues from the practice. I am a huge believer of the practice because I have experienced the effect first hand. It has helped me to develop my personal learning network (PLN) and enabled my PKM. However, individuals for whom it’s a seemingly new way of working are still beset by doubts, and some may even express outright skepticism. Given this context, I have tried to explain what #wol entails for those like me who might be trying to spread the approach, believe in the fundamental philosophy of transparency and open work, and wish to empower everyone with a simple yet powerful learning tool for self-driven learning.

First let me clarify what working out loud is NOT… It is not any of the descriptors given below:

• A tool/methodology to boast about oneself

•  A mindset that can stem from selfish interests

• An approach that implies networking for personal benefits

•  A methodology that can flourish under very controlling and hierarchical organizations

• A process to be mandated by management/supervisors/organizations with defined rules

I’m going to take a step back and examine the world we live in today and how the notion of work has changed. 

1. Work has become location agnostic; workplace is no longer defined by a brick and mortar building 
2. The 9:00 am to 5:00 pm notion of work is all but vanishing, at least for the knowledge workers 
3. The workforce today is not only globally distributed but also contingent giving rise to the notion of the extended enterprise 
4. The workforce is ubiquitously connected, networked, and mobile 
5. The ecosystem we operate in is volatile with rising complexity & ambiguity – the quintessential VUCA world 
6. Five generations are working side-by-side (often virtually) 
7. The baby boomers are retiring taking their tacit knowledge and experience with them 
8. We live in an age of information abundance but lacking in insight and wisdom; it is almost impossible to make sense of it as an individual 
9. Exceptions are the norms; making sense of exceptions require a coming together of cognitively diverse individuals 
10. Disruptive business models are upending traditional org structures

Demystifying #WOL: Some questions I have encountered when discussing working out loud in forums & conferences or with colleagues:

Q. Does working out loud need digital technology in the form of an online platform or tool?

Fundamentally, one doesn’t need any tool to practice working out loud. However, in an era of distributed, dispersed and global workforce, an online platform becomes a necessary connector and amplifier. It is perfectly possible to share one’s experience over a “lunch & learn” session; however, if that session can also be aired on Hangout, the impact is amplified tenfold. I would say that a platform that facilitates easy and seamless interaction, forming of groups and threads, a powerful search mechanism and a way to aggregate conversations across topics (#) would be ideal for working out loud effectively.

Q. Why should I work out loud when my immediate team sits right next to me?

Organizational silos form because we don’t know what the teams across the hallway are working on leave alone being aware of what other business units and divisions are doing. Thus not only do we lose out on diverse inputs and knowledge, we also proverbially reinvent the wheel many times over and feed into systemic inefficiency. An organization that shares openly –successes and failures, learnings and insights, explicit and tacit knowledge – learns faster, builds an ambient awareness and paves the road for serendipity. The practice of working out loud across and beyond the borders of a conventional org chart leads to a much higher probability of expertise location, talent discovery, innovation, cross-pollination of ideas, and a resilient and constantly learning organization. It is an excellent method for bridging those very gaps and silos – the white spaces – between the defined boxes of the org chart. To illustrate this, I have slightly modified Dion Hinchcliffe’s diagram (see below) to show how the process of #wol can benefit all of us – employees as well as the organization.

Q. It’s not natural for me to post whatever I want to say or think online. What are some of the compelling reasons that will make me do so?

Given this VUCA world, it is imperative for and incumbent on all of us to remain learning agile and relevant. A distributed workforce requires a digital platform for connect. When we refuse to acknowledge that the fundamental paradigms that defined organizations of yore have changed, we kill our chances of personal development and growth by continuing to operate in silos and with people who are cognitively aligned. We run the risk of suffering from a “frog in the well” syndrome and fail to see signs and symptoms of change. Today’s work requires us to collaborate with folks we have never met, often from the other side of the world. These call for an adoption of some fundamental digital skills of which #wol is one.

However, it is not all gloom and doom! While the practice may seem novel, it actually taps into the basic human nature of sharing, learning and collaborating – aspects of humanity that traditional organizations suppressed in the name of efficiency, economy of scale and productivity. What working out loud requires is for us to collectively go back to the days when we swapped stories sitting around a fire, the only difference being that the fire has been replaced by a participative medium like a social collaboration platform, communities of diverse individuals and a global mindshare. Just as we would not have survived as a species had our ancestors not swapped those early stories, our survival and relevancy as individuals and organizations today may well be threatened if we fail to tap into the wider network of diverse and global intelligence. A complex world requires collaborative and cooperative problem solving.

Q. I deal with sensitive information and data. Why should I post it for all to see?

First of all, the definition of sensitive information is changing as organizations morph from complete control and hierarchy into more flatter and networked organizations. Having said that, there may well be data like employees personal information that must be protected. Working out loud does not imply exposing sensitive information. #WOL is a lightweight way of doing open work, i.e., sharing one’s learning, asking questions, sharing resources you may have found useful and hope others will too. It is based on the fundamental principles of generosity, a growth mindset, leadership and a desire to build a purposeful network. The latter is one of the most profound and meaningful outcome of generously working out loud. Consistent practice leads to a network that is open, diverse and deep. The image below (came across it via the Facebook Working Out Loud community) captures these core characteristics succinctly and beautifully.

Q. I barely have time to finish my tasks; when will I share and work out loud?

Working out loud is not an extra activity we do over and above our regular work. It is how work will get done as digitization and globalization become driving forces. On an average we send out more than 30 mails in a day and receive ten times that number. If we pause to think, how many of those mails are in search of that elusive information, that particular PowerPoint presentation or that one person we know who has experience in the current problem scenario. The same ask posted on an open network is ten times more likely to throw up more relevant information at a much faster pace, reduce all the back and forth, and also help us to locate that expertise much more quickly. This reduced time and cost of coordination that #wol facilitates is one of the key drivers to practice the approach. We need it more than ever now – because we don’t have time. It is one of the ways to save us those precious hours while also building our network and meta-learning skills for the digital world.

Q. How will working out loud impact my professional development?

Working out loud enables us to practice and hone skills like reflection, synthesis, evaluation, online collaboration, co-creation and so on. No one will argue that these are invaluable meta-learning skills – especially in an era characterized by complexity and exceptions. Working out loud not only helps us to make our work visible to others in a way that they can find useful, it also helps us to build crucial skills. By sharing openly, we demonstrate generosity that invites others to share with us thus building a virtual cycle of giving and learning together. It wouldn’t be an exaggeration to say the practice of #wol lays the foundation for other skills depicted in the diagram on top – skills like building one’s PLN, becoming adept at digital collaboration and letting the network do the work. The diagram below summarizes the different ways that working out loud manifests itself.

  

"Working Out Loud": Using the Tools We Already Have

While the concept of "working out loud" has been gaining popularity, thanks to the work done by thought-leaders like Jane Bozarth (Show Your Work), John Stepper (Working Out Loud), Austin Kleon (Show Your Work) and such, I still encounter bemused looks when I bring up this topic. I wrote about the strategies and benefits of working out loud earlier here and here. In this post, I want to break down the activities based on the tools/platforms we already have at our disposal, and often access on a daily basis. These tools are free, easy to use and accessible to all as long as we have a device (smartphone, tablet, computer) and an Internet connection. A bit more conscious thinking behind why, when and how we use these platforms can transform our daily meandering interactions into purposeful habits around learning, sharing and community building. This thought was triggered by David Kelly's presentation - Social Media, Social Learning, and Curation where he highlights the role each of the social tools/platform can play in our sharing and learning. 

Before I get into how each of the tools facilitate and inspire #wol, I want to highlight that the process of working out loud is not only restricted to synchronous sharing of what one is doing at the moment with a closed group or team. Working out loud ranges from specific, objective-driven collaboration (as in the case within project teams) to just sharing of thoughts and ideas with the wider social networks. The former leads to focused learning and the latter leads to serendipitous discoveries. These wider implications are brilliantly captured in the diagram by Harold Jarche below. 

The different elements of working out loud from sharing with purpose and leading with generosity to building relationships, engaging in visible work and learning are all achieved through thoughtful and generous use of the different tools. I have discussed each platform based on my usage pattern and preference; the order in which they are listed is not a reflection of the  tool's inherent quality or characteristics. 

Twitter: The trigger question, "What's Happening"? that Twitter greets you with is a great initiator to begin "working out loud". Summarizing what you are doing, learning, or being challenged by in 4~5 tweets of 140 characters each can be very useful in sharing it with the outer world and in putting one's work process and learning in perspective. Articulating a dilemma or a question or a learning adds clarity and often brings insight. These kinds of summation comes out of reflection - a key component in the learning cycle. Adding relevant (#) hashtags make the tweets easy to find later. In effect, it can act as a set of notes of one's day's learning aggregated and filtered via hashtags and shared with the broader world. Any response to the tweets brings additional insights and new  perception. The additional advantage is the ability to @mention individuals and thus share with definite folks or direct questions at specific individuals. Working out loud on Twitter therefore has dual advantage of collaboration & cooperation as well as the ability to seek direct help. Small working out loud circles can use Twitter effectively through facilitated tweet chats as well. It may require a facilitator to add cohesion and keep the live conversation on track. 

When is it most useful to use Twitter?

Sharing and #wol on Twitter is most useful when one is engaged in the activity -- it can be a project, a subject/skill/topic one is trying to master, a client challenge or any other activity. Sharing on Twitter encourages synthesizing the work in micro-chunks, reflection and collaboration. Because of it's byte sized updates, Twitter encourages live conversations and exchanges -- a hugely advantageous aspect of #wol. 

LinkedIn: It's a professional networking platform that offers various collaboration and sharing features like "Share an Update", "Upload a Photo" or "Publish a Post". While it's not a platform where one may be comfortable sharing updates regarding semi-complete work-in-progress projects or the day's challenge, it still offers possibilities of reaching out to a wide network of experts and professionals across different domains. LinkedIn's Group feature offers interesting #wol possibilities since these can be kept Open or Private as per the group's objectives. Creating private groups can help to eliminate inhibitions around sharing and create a safe environment. A group facilitator can channel discussions and encourage participation. Since LinkedIn is a professional network, trolling is likely to be controlled. The "Publish a Post" feature encourages thoughtful sharing around one's area(s) of expertise and passion. Since it's primarily a professional network, this also builds credibility, enhances your brand, and becomes a one point of reference to showcase skills and experience. Other professionals in the same field stand to gain from your sharing and you can come to be perceived as a thought-leader in the space. 

When is it most useful to use LinkedIn?

LinkedIn is most useful when #wol has been given some time to crystallize such that the sharing is more cohesive and holistic. It might encompass the entire process one followed when managing client expectation or the approach one took to learn about sketch-noting and implement the learning. Abhijit Bhaduri's post, Want To Improve Listening Skills? Try Sketchnotes is a great example of the latter. After reading the post, I have a better sense of how to approach sketchnoting, a skill I've been trying to pick up for some time. 

Facebook: While the platform gained traction as a social networking site where individuals find and stay in touch with lost friends and far-flung family members, I see it increasingly being used as a learning and sharing platform by various groups including passionate photographers, wildlife lovers, travellers, artists and such. Facebook invites its users to "Update Status", "Add a Photo/Video" or "Create an Album". Any or all of these features can be used to share what you are doing, seek other's help or just be a good community member and share one's learning. Facebook Groups are large communities where people are already working out loud in their varied areas of interests and sharing tips ranging from which lens to use when doing macro photography to where one might buy/hire such a lens. The group features encourage #wol in various ways as highlighted in the image below. 

The ease with which a group can be set up and content shared and discussed is a key to attracting users. As is evident, this #wol group set up by John Stepper is not only encouraging everyone to discuss what they think but is also helping to build a community around the concept and build it into a practice. It is therefore quite easy to see how #wol can have far-reaching impact beyond just sharing what one is doing at the moment - it enables skills like reflection, articulation of ideas, building of a personal learning network (PLN), managing one's learning (PKM), and connecting with similarly passionate people across the globe and thus build a learning community of cognitively diverse individuals.  

When is it most useful to use Facebook?

This is a platform that is perhaps most often used by the majority. Because it allows easy uploading of videos, images and text updates, Facebook can be used for any kind of #wol. For team level sharing, there can be private groups. For broader community building, one can have open groups. It is easy to add other interested individuals to the groups and thus build a community gradually. 

SlideShare: Presentations are a great medium for visually capturing complex thoughts and ideas. Synthesizing abstract concepts or showing a process via a presentation and posting it on SlideShare can be a very powerful means of sharing. Designing a presentation calls for multiple skills: visual representation, content design, pattern making and story telling. These skills are advanced meta learning skills that require consistent practice and effort. Crafting a presentation to share on SlideShare once a month or so can be an effective #wol habit that not only communicates your ideas to a wider audience but enhances your processing and meta-cognitive skills. I have tried to combine a couple of blog posts into these presentations: L&D Re-imagines - 21st Century Workplace Learning and Community Management - Towards a Learning Organization. 

When is it most useful to use SlideShare?

It is most useful when you want to capture your ideas in a cohesive flow and make it easy to assimilate at a glance. While it is possible to add comments to presentations on SlideShare, it is not a platform for conversation. It is more suited for sharing of well-thought out ideas in an engaging format. Since SlideShare users can Like, Share and download the presentations, it is best to make each presentation complete in itself. Thus, in contrast to the fast-paced, real time, informal sharing on Twitter, SlideShare requires a more thorough output. 

Pinterest: This can be a unique #wol space which uses the visual medium in powerful ways. Pinterest allows one to create Boards around topics. Within each topic, a user can collate images as Pins which can be shared with a broader network. You can also pin images from other people's boards to your boards, thus creating a rich network of images created/curated around specific topics. I find various boards on topics as disparate as social business to visual thinking very useful. Boards by Sunni Brown or Abhijit Bhaduri on sketchnoting and visual thinking are great learning tools for me. While on immediate thought Pinterest may not seem like a #wol tool, it can be used very effectively as one. It is primarily a curation and aggregation tool that lets you curate images/photogrpahs, infographic, diagrams and models around a topic. It is easy to share the link to your boards or specific pins. Here are the links to a couple of my boards: Future of Work and Content Curation. 

When is it most useful to use Pinterest?
When you have a collection of images (either created or curated) that can be grouped into topics, Pinterest comes in handy. Here is a Pinterest board on using Pinterest effectively. 

Finally, for those keen to begin working out loud, here is a You Tube video by Helen Blunden (@ActivateLearn) called Have I been Working Out Loud? that provides a practitioners' take on the topic. 

7 Strategies to Facilitate "Working Out Loud"

I spent the greater part of the weekend mulling over the practice of working out loud, what makes some folks adopt the habit with ease while others struggle, and what could be some of the possible enabling factors that support working out loud. The more I thought about it, the more it seemed to me that it is one of the fundamental blocks of building a community of practice. A community grows around a domain where practitioners share their insights, knowledge and doubts, the work processes. A community grows through conversation, collaboration, and showcasing of work in progress. Community members learn together, share feedback, take onus of building the domain. Explicit and tacit knowledge gets shared. Take Linux or the GitHub community for example. Talented coders and developers come together to learn, share and co-create. The more evolved and engaged a community is, the more it acts like a "talent magnet". Even as I was mulling over and revisiting my old posts on the importance of communities, serendipity struck. I came across this post by +Abhijit Bhaduri - Talent Communities Must Go Beyond Hiring. Organizations like Google and Apple have become such talent communities attracting the best of the best in their areas of expertise. 

Today, most organizations are caught between the crossroads of traditional training (top down sessions, expert created content, L&D owned programs) and the modern workplace learning practices reflective of networked learning, collaboration and cooperation, user-generated content, ongoing conversation and debate, open feedback and transparent sharing. If we critically examine the characteristics of networked learning, it becomes evident that these are also qualities that foster and enable communities to thrive which in turn pull creative, passionate individuals to the workforce. As Bhaduri points out in his post, communities have always attracted talent. The spirit that drew writers and thinkers to the smoke filled iconic Coffee House of Kolkata is the same spirit that draws people together in communities. 

The fundamental characteristics of individuals who formed these communities were their willingness to share their thoughts, view their ideas, express half-baked opinions and begin conversations - in short, working out loud or "showing their work". This begs the question - how does one inculcate the habit of working out loud and inspire the passion so that people will want to continue doing so. I blogged about Getting Started with Working Out Loud. In this post, I want to focus on the support and environment needed to get people started. I am going to continue using the Coffee House analogy here and there.

What Makes Working Out Loud Easy

1. Safe environment - How comfortable do people feel sharing their doubts and half-baked ideas? Is there fear of ridicule? Given that the organization culture encourages sharing and transparency, it still takes some effort to create a community space that is safe. This is where a community manager can be indispensable. S/he can be a coach and mentor helping people to get started with working out loud, keep the community space free of trolls, and connect individuals to each other and to relevant content/discussions/groups. When individuals see others (especially those in positions of authority and leadership) revealing their vulnerabilities and fears, a safe place is automatically created. It encourages deep conversations, honest feedback and authentic support.

2. Inspirational role models - There are always a few early adopters and trend setters. These individuals are not scared to take a leap and start something new, no matter how silly it may seem to others. They are not afraid to seem weird. However, typically this forms a small percentage of any employee base. The majority prefer to wait and watch before jumping onto the bandwagon. They wait for approvals. The latter need strong role models whose behaviour they can emulate, whose successes and failures are out there for all to see. Each organization will need to find a handful of such people who will demonstrate the habit of working out loud fearlessly for others to follow, who will be the champions. If these happen to be from the senior management, so much the better. 

3. Meaningful conversations - Most often, organizational learning gets locked up as a conversation between 2 or 3 people in their inboxes. When these individuals leave their organizations, they walk away with their tacit knowledge. Their inbox is deleted. The exchanges are lost. The same conversation practised in the open not only invite wider participation, diverse thinking and contribution but is also of immense benefit to others. The organizational hive mind gets captured, context is built and conversation takes place. We all know that true learning takes place through dialogues. 

4. Easy entry and participation - In Coffee House, participation amounts to pulling up a chair at the table of choice, ordering chai and perhaps the ubiquitous cutlet to accompany the discussion. Some folks at the table would know you and some wouldn't. Introductions get casually made. What matters is the participation and the contribution. In the online world, this ease can be created by a community space or platform that is easy to access, like Twitter or Yammer. Some help from a community manager in the case of an enterprise community is helpful. Organizations looking to inculcate the practice of working out loud in their employees will need to provide the support, perhaps with L&D acting as facilitators. 

5. Beyond information sharing - "Working out loud" is not about sharing information. That can be better achieved via reports, datasheets, and meetings. It is about providing the context to the information, the exceptions to the processes, the failed attempts and successes. It's about sharing "how" one arrived at the outcome, not only the "what". When the moving parts, the complexities and the exceptions are openly discussed, conversation automatically happens. People get an opportunity to chime in with their opinions, experiences and solutions thus leading to innovation, co-creation of new knowledge and a better informed community. This kind of sharing is generative leading to improved organizational know-how. 

6. Thinking cooperation - One of the objectives of working out loud is to share our work in progress, show the "how" we do it rather than only the what, and expose the processes behind the outcome. However, we expect and seek responses to what we share. The reality is this may not always happen, and at least not instantaneously. Jeff Merrell makes a very valid point in his post Working Out Loud Lesson: Ignore the Network:

"We write with the full expectation that the network will respond. That’s supposed to be the value of the network, right? It gives us something when we give it something.But I’ve just found that the network is fickle. And I am ok with that.By definition, serendipity happens by chance. If it were predictable it would be no fun."

That is the crux. It is easy to lose motivation when no one responds. However, we never know when serendipity will take place. It is about being consistent, about showing up and sharing. Apart from anything, working out loud is a valuable self-reflection and learning tool. And cooperation is the key. 

7. WOL is a Mindset, an Attitude - Working out loud is not dependent on an individual's savviness with various social sharing platforms. It's a mindset. We can all remember classmates who willingly shared how they had worked out a math problem and those who wouldn't. WOl comes from the same attitude of sharing with the intent of helping others learn from what I know and the mistakes I've made. As Nigel Young aptly writes in his post, When Working Out Loud isn't Really WOL:

WOL…is a practice and I do this in the office, on my whiteboard, in the collaborative tools I use and even when I speak (I've been known to form new ideas, change them and take new directions whilst actively involved in conversation).  This comes partly back to my previous point that WOL is an attitude and partly down to the fact that the media for sharing and collaboratively working is less important than the action.  

Finally, here is a check-list from Austin Kleon from Show Your Work:

Working Out Loud 101 | Some Thoughts

My posts are usually pretty detailed, researched, and long. I am trying to move to a mode where I'll write shorter posts more regularly on specific topics, questions posed to me, or an aspect of modern workplace learning that interests me. I will keep my longer posts for topics I am researching on and deep diving into. These will probably be one per fortnight or so... 

Today's post is triggered by a question a colleague asked me yesterday. I happened to mention "working out loud" as a practice that is fundamental to social and collaborative learning, and drew a completely blank stare. While "social learning" as a phrase, concept and strategy is fairly well-known by now, the concept of "working out loud" hasn't yet garnered that level of popularity. It is still restricted to a community of folks interested in Personal Learning Networks and Personal Knowledge Management, followers of blogs by Harold Jarche, Jane Hart, John Stepper and such.

When my comment drew that blank stare, I thought it would be a worthwhile topic for a short blog post. It's part of spreading the word about the benefits of "working out loud". I realized we take a number of pre-codified behaviours and mindset for granted when practising "working out loud". I have tried to demystify them and put these into simple steps. 

I think John Stepper's description of "working out loud" is still the best:

“Working Out Loud starts with making your work visible in such a way that it might help others. When you do that – when you work in a more open, connected way – you can build a purposeful network that makes you more effective and provides access to more opportunities.”

Here's a nice comic strip style graphic illustrating the 5 key elements of "working out loud". I am not sure who has created it and hence couldn't give the right credits:

The elements of "working out loud" need to be broken down into implementable steps to help someone get started with actually putting it into practise. I am typically confronted with the following questions when I tell someone that they should start "working out loud"...I have inserted my responses below each question. I have tried to keep them concise.

• What do I share?

Share a snippet from the day's work that captures a learning, a mistake made, or insight gleaned. Sharing of roadblocks are also very useful as these help others avoid mistakes we've made. Process sharing provides deeper insight into how a task is done. Keep it brief and simple. The diagram below is a good summary of why one should practise working out loud and what are the likely benefits of this habit. 

• How do I share? 

Sharing  can be done in multiple ways. You can tweet or blog, record a podcast or a video depending on what you are sharing, draw a visual sketchnote, put up an image, and whatever other creative means occur to you. Each platform has its own efficacy and caters to certain content types. Blogs work for more reflective pieces where the learning is complex. Tweets are better when sharing specific learning bytes or insights. Images, graphics, charts can be uploaded on Pinterest to show a process or a sequence of steps. Videos are good for interviews, thought bytes, and such. 

The graphic by Jane Hart illustrates some of the different tools/platforms to use to "work out loud":

• When would I do this? 

If you can't share while in the flow of work, taking 10~15 mins at the end of the day to quickly share a snippet will enforce a habit of reflection, synthesis and evaluation -- all very handy personal learning skills. It is important to initially set aside some time each day to evaluate and articulate one's learning till it becomes a habit. 

• Where do I share? 

If you work for an organization that has an enterprise collaboration platform in place, you could use this platform to share your learning with your colleagues and peers. Otherwise, you can use any platform like Twitter your blog, Pinterest, YouTube, etc. The medium you use will also drive the choice of platform. Once you are comfortable sharing, you can use multiple platforms.

• Who will read what I share? 

Initially, may be very few people. However, as one shares consistently and purposefully, you can see a gradual rise in readership and interaction. As more and more people find what is being shared useful, they will pitch in with their thoughts and comments. This heralds the beginning of a Personal Learning Network (PLN). 

• What if no one reads? How is it still useful?

Yes, sharing snippets of one's learning and insights on a daily basis or as regularly as possible is very useful even if no one reads it. It hones critical skills like reflection, pattern sensing and synthesis, provides insights into our own working process and helps us to improve it. It is a very powerful learning tool. Dion Hinchcliffe said in a Tweet:

Working Out Loud is a reflective practice. Is a practice to help ‘learn how to learn’. http://tmblr.co/ZnPyzt1deCxto  @simongterry HT @observadorDG

• What will people think if I share my mistakes?

We are most often held back by our fears of what others will think, fear of being vulnerable. In reality, it is our sharing of doubts and mistakes, asking of questions and admission of not knowing everything that connects people. It not only opens up pathways to collaborative learning but also creates a safe space for others to come forward with their own doubts. People admire those who can be open about their weaknesses. 

Here's a very lucid and concise post by John Stepper on The 5 Elements of Working Out Loud. "Working out loud" has been listed as one of the most important digital workforce skills by Dion Hinchcliffe as shown in the diagram below: 

This is how he describes it in the post:

Working out loud allows one to let the network do the work (see below) and breaks down the silos that have rebuilt up with virtual workplaces and today’s far-flung multinational teams. Perhaps most importantly however is that is the key to unleashing agility using digital networks as it automatically collects institutional knowledge and critical methods, makes on-boarding new employees much easier, and frees up your knowledge to work for the organization continuously while still ensuring your contribution is recognized.

 I hope we can fearlessly work out loud to learn, share and build our PLNs. 

Skills for the Networked World

"...learning is ubiquitous in ongoing activity, though often unrecognised as such - Jean Lave (1993)"

Recently, I read a series of posts and articles related to digital literacy, 21st Century Skills and the behaviours and practices required for working and learning in a connected world. Last week I wrote about MOOCs in Workplace Learning-Part 5: Skill Learners Need Today. I should have actually called it "mindsets for a digital and connected world". Anyhow, getting back to the point, here are some of the interesting and insightful posts and resources on the topic of digital literacy that kept me thinking this week:

• Web Literacy Map
• Framework for 21st Century Learning
• Digital Workforce Skills by Harold Jarche 
• Becoming MOOC by Stephen Downes 
• What are the Required Skills for Today's Digital Workforce? by Dion Hinchcliffe 

As I read through and attempted to distil and synthesize what various experts were saying, the following higher order skills and abilities emerged as critical:

Meta-Cognition 

Metacognition is defined as "cognition about cognition", or "knowing about knowing". …it includes knowledge about when and how to use particular strategies for learning or for problem solving. ~Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metacognition)

The skills and behaviours like working out loud, building one's PLN and PKM, digital sense-making, and such require the sort of meta-cognition skills described above. To be able to effectively "work out loud", an individual needs to be able to parse his or her workflow in a manner that is shareable and captures teachable moments as well. This is driven by a fair degree of self-awareness and self-analysis. One needs to reflect on what s/he does to accomplish a task, plan a project, or manage a team and then share the thoughts and moments. The advantage is that such reflection and deliberate narration of one's work and experience lead to deeper insight, robust understanding and a comprehension of what can be improved. It is akin to shining a light on the processes and thoughts behind them, making them visible not only for the world but also for the self for further improvement and honing. Building one's meta-cognitive skills require deliberate practice and reflection. 

Critical Thinking 

The National Council for Excellence in Critical Thinking defines critical thinking as the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action. -Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Critical_thinking)

That's a bit of a mouthful but aptly captures the skills we need to make sense of the information bombarding us today, to take decisions in the face of flux and ambiguity, to embrace change with equanimity. Gone are the days of limited information vetted and handed down by designated experts. Now it is up to each of us to be able to vet, filter and curate what is necessary. The Seek>Sense>Share PKM model described by Harold Jarche and similar model by others rest on our critical thinking and cognitive abilities. The Wikipedia description adds some pertinent points around critical thinking worth noting: 

• Recognize problems, to find workable means for meeting those problems
• Understand the importance of prioritization and order of precedence in problem solving
• Gather and marshal pertinent (relevant) information
• Recognize unstated assumptions and values
• Comprehend and use language with accuracy, clarity, and discernment
• Interpret data, to appraise evidence and evaluate arguments
• Recognize the existence (or non-existence) of logical relationships between propositions
• Draw warranted conclusions and generalizations
• Put to test the conclusions and generalizations at which one arrives
• Reconstruct one's patterns of beliefs on the basis of wider experience
• Render accurate judgments about specific things and qualities in everyday life

Given the shifts affecting us today, critical thinking is a necessary skill we need to develop and hone through deliberate and conscious practice. 

Diversity and Inclusion

There is ample talk of diversity and inclusion in the context of today's workplace which is necessary. However, we tend to conflate identity diversity with cognitive diversity when in reality the two are different. Cognitive diversity tends to get overlooked partly because it is difficult to spot but even more because of our biases. Given that we are comfortable with those similar to us (externally and also in thoughts and worldviews), we rarely seek out divergent opinions and most often fall prey to our confirmation biases. However, in the context of complex and emergent challenges, having a cognitively diverse set of individuals working on it trumps narrow expertise. Scott Page in his wonderful book, The Difference: How the Power of Diversity Creates Better Groups, Firms, Schools, and Societies proves with rigour and clarity how diversity trumps ability in complex problems. 

In this context, it is critical to focus on building PLNs and communities of cognitively diverse individuals. This implies being comfortable with and accepting of different worldviews, heuristics, perspectives and frameworks. Coming back to the point, it is thus important to develop skills that enable us to seek out and learn from diverse people. Diversity, according to Scott Page, adds super-additivity where the sum of the whole exceeds that of the individual parts. Another pertinent article to read in this context is 

Relationship Building

We have reached an era where we may not even meet all our co-workers. Virtual, dispersed teams are the reality today. It is also the age of freelancers. This fabulous HBR article, The Third Wave of Virtual Work by Lynda Gratton and Tammy Johns, traces the rise of virtual work across three waves -- virtual freelancers, virtual corporate colleagues, and virtual co-workers. The point I am trying to make is that this uber connected global world calls for online relationship building and collaboration skills that may not come naturally to us. There are evolving etiquettes (netiquettes) and protocols we will have to inculcate to be effective in our professional and personal lives. While face-to-face interactions are still fundamental to building trust, we will no longer be able to guarantee that luxury going ahead. Building trusted relations through online collaboration and interaction call for a whole new range of manifested behaviours like willingness to share, acknowledging and appreciating others work, participating in meaningful online dialogues and debates, accepting diverse opinions, being generous with our praise, and so on. The most critical is perhaps cooperation. And Harold Jarche distinguishes this from collaboration very nicely by describing it thus: Collaboration is working together on a common problem, while cooperation is freely sharing without any objective. The ability to build virtual relations and work with a myriad range of individuals from different cultures and countries will be increasingly critical in the coming years. It may be fundamental to our success as workers of the 21st Century.

Community Participation

If we are to go with what the article mentioned in the earlier para The Third Wave of Virtual Work says, it is evident that being able to participate in communities is another skill to hone. How is this exactly different from other virtual collaboration? I have referenced Harold Jarche's diagram to explain this:

The sharing, creating, and debating of knowledge around a domain by practitioners of the said domain is the hallmark of CoPs. As is evident from the diagram, when we move to CoPs, we have a mix of strong and weak social ties focused around a specific domain. I consider CoPs to be a subset of my PLN. Most individuals--knowingly or unknowingly--belong to a number of communities. The participatory skill required for this is important today--both within organizations as well as by individual freelancers to remain on the cutting edge, gain greater depth of knowledge and skills in their specific areas, and expand their expertise into related fields. As virtual, independent workers faced with complex challenges, the ability to draw support from CoPs are going to be of paramount importance. Learning does not belong to individual persons, but to the various conversations of which we are a part. And we have to become comfortable holding such conversations in the online world. 

Courage Zone

This perhaps tops it all. A willingness to keep stretching and moving beyond our comfort zones determine success in this network era. It is characterized by agility and adaptability in learning, in the ways we work, and avoiding the "this is the way it is done here" syndrome. It is signified by one's ability to question tacit assumptions and biases that keep us rooted to the past and make the past seem more attractive than the unknown future. It is marked by our ability to analyse and identify our own confirmation biases and tendencies of group think. It takes quite a bit of conscious effort and courage to give up the known, the stable, the comfortable for the unknown, the risky, the new. However, it is better to move ahead and face change than have it thrust on us as it will be by the disruptions and shifts facing us. The diagram below describes it as stepping into our courage zone.