I think very energetically that information technology (IT) can be used to
significant advantage in organizational learning, and functioning, as well
as inidivdual learning of many kinds (also an asset for organizational
performance). I have been surprised to find so little attention paid to
how IT can be used to add, and pleased with the citations which arise here
from time to time. One book, in fact, which was relatively focused on
how-to's, only cited what is lost in teleconferencing vs. meeting in
person; but it is often not feasible to meet in person (e.g., for a
development team scattered worldwide it is not only too costly to meet
frequently, but the travel and logistics would steal most of the
producers' time). So teleconferencing allows work to be accomplished (and
much more, e.g., building of relationships among scattered workers) which
would not otherwise be possible.
And, as the discussion here in recent notes adds, the interaction in
teleconferencing, say, is different from that in person, with some
valuable additions. I'm reminded of the often-quoted "on the Internet
no-one knows you're a dog". In a similar vein, Sherry Turkle reported
findings from some 1,000 interviews with multiple user dungeon (MUD)
players in LIFE ON THE SCREEN that went something like "I feel like I can
say anything to anyone". I was quite surprised to find people saying the
same in recent interviews of government bureaucrats. And that they could
do things simply impossible before that I think are potentially valuable
resources for organizational learning and functioning. For example, an
individual employee could interact with a manager of another department
on-line who is virtually unavailable in person due to meetings, travel,
direct responsibilities, etc.
Well, please pardon my rambling - I look forward to any additional
discussion of IT use and organizational learning here. Regards, Debbie
Roth
--Debbie Roth <dr@sprintmail.com>
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>