Learning

Integrating Learning and Work

Posted November 21, 2011 in Humanize, Learning

Check out this awesome presentation about integrating learning and work. This is precisely along the same lines as what Maddie and I talk about in Humanize. The fourth human element we talk about is Courageous. In creating a more courageous organization, the cultural aspect is “learning.” Learning needs to be baked in at the cultural [...]

The Problem with Committees

Posted November 18, 2011 in Humanize, Learning, Managing People - 9 comments

Here’s the problem with committees: They exist. I’m only partially joking here. This comes from a comment I left on a post on Eric Lanke’s blog (which, by the way, has shifted from the Hourglass blog to simply “Eric Lanke,” so be sure to switch your subscription). He had written about an experience he had [...]

We Have No Idea What We’re Doing

Posted November 14, 2011 in Humanize, Individual Development, Leadership, Learning, Managing People - 7 comments

Whenever I get some time to think deeply about things related to the workplace, like how do we make work better, or what is leadership, or what is management, then I end up inescapably coming to the conclusion that is the title of this post: We have no idea what we’re doing. Sorry to be [...]

Rethinking Measurement

Posted September 8, 2011 in Change, Learning - 4 comments

Thanks to David Patt, whose comment on an Acronym post pointed me to a really good article by Matthew Forti about measurement for nonprofits. The Acronym post was from Scott Briscoe, building off of Joe Rominiecki’s notion of “loveable losers,” those programs associations have that lose money but provide enough value to justify the negative [...]

Learning and Theories

Posted June 30, 2011 in Humanize, Learning

With all my book writing, it’s been hard to keep up with my reading, but I want to point out the excellent issue of Harvard Business Review from April of this year on failure. Not surprisingly, most of the articles about failure have a common theme: learning. That’s the real value in failure–being able to [...]

Note that “Learned” is Past Tense

Posted June 27, 2011 in Humanize, Learning

First, I want to point out a cool new feed that Maddie created related to our book, Humanize. Maddie is an amazing curator. She had to put on hold her “link love monthly” posts on SocialFishing because they took too much time (but those posts would keep me reading for more than a month!). She [...]

Brain Development and Complexity

Posted June 10, 2011 in Individual Development, Learning

I am a big fan of Robert Kegan. He is a specialist at Harvard in adult development, and I first started following his work during my graduate program in Organization Development at Georgetown back in 2001. One of the main points that he and his colleagues make is actually simple: Our brains continue to develop [...]

Learning and Change

Posted June 1, 2011 in Change, Learning - 1 comment

As I mentioned last week on the SocialFish blog, social organizations are serious about learning. Not just learning at conferences, but deep organizational learning. While I doubt there are many who would argue against me on that (who's going to say that learning is a bad idea?), I still don't see a whole lot of [...]

The Hard Work of the Middle

Posted December 20, 2010 in Change, Learning - 2 comments

We love to focus on the beginning and the end. We like to develop our strategic plans, and we like to have our celebrations or evaluation meetings. But we don't often like what happens in the middle. That's where it isn't working, or it's not done, or it isn't like we planned, or there are [...]

Your Suck List

Posted December 14, 2010 in Change, Learning, Truth

I did some work last week with a volunteer group that was half way through it's year of activity. They were at a point where they wanted to look back at how the experience has been going so they could make adjustments for the second half of the year. So at the beginning of my [...]

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