Part 1 Social Business : Why learning networks?

In this 3 part series, I revisit an article I wrote in March 2008 outlining the significance of networks within the context of learning.

Social, technical and leisure life is increasingly organised around networks. The metaphor (and reality) of the network has come to be seen as epitomising the social, economic and technological changes of the last 30 years. The network is now the fundamental underpinning structure of social organisation – and that it is in and through networks – both real and virtual - that life is lived in the 21st century. Networks are one of the most important organisational form of our time. By harnessing the ‘network logic’, the ways we view the world and the tools we use for navigating and understanding it, will change significantly.

The ability to understand how to join and build these networks, the tools for doing so and the purpose, intention, rules and protocols that regulate use and communications, therefore, become increasingly important skills. This concept of the ‘network society’ calls into question what it means to be ‘learned’ today – what new skills, what new ways of working and learning, what new knowledge and skills will be required to operate in and through these networks? It requires us to ask whether learning systems, premised not upon networks but upon individualised acquisition of content and skills, is likely to support the development of the competencies needed to flourish in such environments.