Study after study tells us that our corporate training investment budget ratio is backwards. Most of the dollars are spent on formal events such as ILT classroom and eLearning rather than informal and social learning concepts or initiatives. Ironically, the real benefit is felt moreso during informal and/or social learning exchanges.
Which brings me to Learnerprise 2.0.
Andrew McAfee has coined the term Enterprise 2.0 as:
the use of emergent social software platforms within companies, or between companies and their partners or customers”.
If I take this one step further, I would suggest that Learnerprise 2.0 is:
the use of emergent social software platforms as well as formal and informal competence exchange processes, between companies, partners and employees, to improve both productivity and business results
Learnerprise 2.0 ties together the fact learning is as important as the enterprise, and to increase revenue and profits without thinking this way will result in the ‘square peg in round hole’ theorem or result. (ie. it won’t happen)
Rather than investing 2/3 or more of a corporate learning budget to formal ILT and eLearning, why not flip the model and invest 2/3 on informal and social learning components and initiatives. It will help drive the overarching premise of Enterprise 2.0, and it will ultimately help achieve the desired ‘enterprise’ requirement of increased profits and revenues.
Learnerprise 2.0 is not new, but positioning Learning 2.0 without Enterprise 2.0 (and realigning the training budget itself) will ultimately result in catastrophic failure for both sides. It has to happen, and the ‘training org’ has to begin thinking this way and lead the revolution.
You heard it here first: Learnerprise 2.0!! (now I need to trademark and copyright it)
