An Extinction Level Event is a scientific term to describe a widespread and profound decrease in life on the planet. When we talk about the stages in Earth's history, there have been several points in its history where Extinction Level Events (E.L.E.) have occurred and usually for a variety of reasons.Extinction Level Events in BusinessThe question that needs to be asked is:"Are there extinction level events in the business world and if there are, what brought on these events?"Many businesses in the digital age are like your grandfather's pocket watch. When they are first wound up, all the parts worked beautifully in harmony with each other. Then as time went on, you noticed that the watch started losing time which may have been caused by minor hits against objects or even dropping it a few times.Credit: www.ishareimage.comSo, you re-set it, winding it a little tighter, demanding more efficient performance from all the parts but not changing its overall structure since it has always worked well the way it is, in the past. As the watch suffers more hits and drops and you wind it even tighter, the parts can no longer move in harmony with each other and they become paralyzed or freeze up. The watch self destructs in that it comes apart.If you apply this analogy to business organizations, the "hits and drops" represents the impact of technology on business and some businesses inability to adapt, to innovate and most importantly, to engage their employees as sources of innovative solutions for a healthy company future.Examples of Businesses That Failed to Adapt and InnovateConsider the cases of three companies that are no longer with us, companies that suffered extinction level events:Kodak: The Kodak Company is an example that I have used before but it is such a clear example of a failure to follow through in adapting and innovating. In 1975, Kodak engineer, Steve Sasson created the very first digital camera. The following quote sums it up:"...Historically, Kodak was built on a culture of innovation and change. It’s the type of culture that’s full of passionate innovators, already naturally in tune to the urgency surrounding changes in the market and technology. It’s these people - those excited about new ideas within your own organization - who keep your company moving ahead instead of falling behind. One key to avoiding complacency is to ensure these innovators have a voice with enough volume to be heard (and listened to) at the top..." (Forbes, 5/02/2012)Blockbuster:  Blockbuster had several opportunities to buy a little DVD rental by mail company called "Netflix" back in the early 2000's. The CEO demonstrated a great deal of short sightedness by refusing the Netflix CEO and co-founder Reed Hastings when he proposed that Blockbuster buy Netflix for $50 million. By the time Blockbuster shuttered its doors for good, it had lost $1.1 billion and was valued at $24 million. Meanwhile, Netflix was valued at $13 billion.Credit: www.froot.nl  Borders Book Sellers: In the 1990's Borders and its competitor, Barnes & Noble combined for a 40% control of the book selling market. However, Borders committed three main mistakes that speaks to an inability to adapt. First, it outsourced their online sales to a little known retailer known as "Amazon" between 2001-2008. Secondly, it neglected E-books while its competitors came out with E-readers such as Kindle(Nov. 2007), the Nook (2011), Apple Ipad (April 2010). Borders didn't release Kobo untill 2011. Thirdly, it robbed its company of vitality by being tied down with long term leases on its physical properties.Credit: www.cleveland.comWhy Do Some Companies Today Face Extinction Level Events?As an instructional designer or E-Learning advocate, have you ever been asked to give a presentation to high level decision makers on the benefits of an E-Learning strategy? At many of these types of meetings and presentation, its a good idea to be a good student of body language. Do their eyes glaze over when you mention E-Learning? Do they sit with a defensive posture with arms folded looking as if they have better things to do with their time than be listening to you? Perhaps you need to make the truth of what the company that resists adapting and innovating, really faces. Perhaps, Jack Nicholson, a well known actor can make it crystal clear to them:Credit: www.thegreatepiphany.wordpress.comWe hope that we can make it so that company CEO's will realize that the truth is that engaging their employees is not enough to create a culture of innovation within the business organization. What employees have to offer must be valued and continued collaborative efforts encouraged so that organizations will not only survive the digital age but will prosper in it. Creating an learning culture within the business is the key. So, when there are rumours of an extinction level event within the organization, CEO's and COO's can confidently say: "Not On My Watch!"Next... A solution that makes use of the collaborative efforts of employees with advice from Steve Jobs

All last week the media outlets were warning parents that school districts received an email about an unnamed elementary school and  there would be a mass shooting at the elementary. The threatening email was made to several individual email accounts in the Northside Independent School District. All districts had their elementary campuses on a soft […]

If it is our intention to encourage a collaborative atmosphere among employees with respect to real world problem solving germane to the business organization, it can't end at that point. Just as in the past brick and mortar education systems, if a real world issue is tasked to learners and it doesn't go beyond the four walls of the classroom, then it is merely a contrived scenario with no connection to real consequences in the real world.Credit: www.oecdeducationtoday.blogspot.comThere has to be a demonstration on the part of decision makers within a business organization with regards to the following:We want to use the skillsets that employees bring to the organization to foster a learning culture that is good for the health of the organization.If we admit that the people we have sought out through recruitment are intelligent individuals committed to our vision, then we have to be prepared to consider their contributions as vital to the interests of the business organization.We want to ensure that the forum that is made available for the voicing of innovative ideas and strategies is a priority for this organization and that the CEO and COO will make it a priority to be at the forum to hear, question and even collaborate with groups putting forth the ideas to further refine and apply what they hear.We want to engage our employees and have them network with employees at our branch offices around the globe, utilizing all of the strategic intelligence that we have access to through our contacts in the business world. This collaboration should utilize all of the digital communication resources available to us to make the collaboration effective.We want to convey to our employees that growth in their learning is something that we want to nurture and keep track of. A learning profile will be set up for each employee that they will have access to and mentoring will be made available to help in their personal growth.Credit: www.yourstory.comAs Steve Jobs remarked, the key is to make use of the intellectual capital that is available in the employees you have. In order to accomplish this there are two elements that need to be in place.Credit: www.dionhinchcliffe.comAggressive Recruiting of  TalentOne of the problems with the recruitment efforts of some companies is that they are still using approaches and protocols that were standards in the 90"s. In this century, you have a generation that has grown up in a digital world. Operating and living in this digital world has allowed them to develop skillsets dealing with digital literacy that comes as natural to them as breathing. Also, with the advance of technology, these skillsets have become hot items in the global economy and as a result of the principle of "supply and demand", the demand is outstripping the supply. This means that competition for individuals with such skillsets, on a global scale, is becoming fierce. These skilled individuals have digital footprints across the web and by cruising the web to gather information about these individuals, the nature of their "brand" starts to come into focus. Social media is just one area that has become important in gathering intelligence. Professional networks such as LinkedIn can reveal much about the expertise of individuals who might prove to be instrumental to the future health of a business organization. The point is that you can not just sit back, post job descriptions, collect resumes, conduct interviews and then decide. You do need to be proactive and search out and recruit potential talent because you can be sure that the only way that your competition an beat you is to recruit that talented individual before your company does. The chart below should send up a red flag for you and tell you that change is needed.Credit: www.digitalstrategyconsulting.com   Keeping the TalentIt is one thing to recruit talent but to keep the talent happy within your business culture requires a consideration of human needs. One of those needs is the sense of community and belonging. Living every day within a cubicle will not keep this generation's loyalty because it is a generation predicated on social connection. What can you do to create this type of encouragement without it becoming a source of distraction from business goals? Make it part of a collaborative learning culture is one potential solution.Credit: www.scottscollege.school.nzLife-long learning is important to the new knowledge and skillset creators in the 21st century and this connection between life-long learning outside the business organization and inside must be in synch. In the description of Global Learning Portals in past posts, I have suggested that creation of a collaborative learning and innovation culture includes opportunities to engage the skills and talents of employees in business organizations which will open doors of opportunities in the digital economy but it all starts with a renewed vision.Credit: DADA 2014Next....When An Irresistible Force Meets An Immovable Object....Evolution of Ideas Takes Place??

I know this is an easy but does anyone have step by step instructions or know of a video to show how to display your iPhone or iPad on a PC/Mac laptop? What kind of cable is needed so a projector will mirror the iPad image during an online and offline presentation for virtual and […]

In our age, change is an irresistible force and change management is becoming more and more of an important skill to possess. The immovable objects are institutionalized education and corporate training regimens.Credit: Stuart McIntyre  As a society we place a great emphasis on tradition and this is especially true concerning education and the corporate enterprise. With respect to education, we all have fond memories of the "good old days" when literacy meant reading, writing, and arithmetic and they were the only basics that learners had to possess. There is no other area of human experience that every person has and voices an opinion on more than education. The connections that our societies have made can be reduced to the equation:Good Education = Sound EmploymentThen, along came technology and the Internet and messed everything up or that is what many people think. The same could be said of the corporate culture. In the good old days, everyone knew their place and function. If you didn't follow the flow, you were terminated. However, life in a digital age is no longer that simple. How we deal with change that is brought on by the growing advances in technology, a growing connected world in all aspects of life and the fact of instantaneous communication determines whether we flourish as future healthy societies or become societies defending outdated concepts and practices against the impact of change. The problem is that change in education needs to be managed in a proactive and thoughtful manner with a renewed vision for education in the future. To implement change without careful thought on how to manage its effects leads to resistance which describes the present status of the immovable objects, institutionalized education and corporate training.Credit: www.change.walkme.comThe Immovable Object of Institutionalized EducationQuestion: "How is institutionalized education dealing with change?"If you examine education institutions today, one of  the big issues is how to integrate technology into the classroom. This is claimed by its advocates as putting 21st century tools into the hands of 21st century learners but does this satisfy the needs of education in the digital age? If we put these tools into the hands of learners, it might raise their hopes that finally adults have started to grow up when it comes to technology but has anything actually changed? If it has changed, why is there still a growing number of learners who have technologically advanced classrooms that are still disconnecting from their education.As an example, we are still proceeding with standardized testing which was a product of the old model of education instead of personalized education. Its just that now, we are using high level technology to continue doing what we always have done.Credit: www.transforming.comWe are still using the same static pedagogy which we now have enshrined as best practices. We are still operating from the same tired vision of education. We are still training teachers to teach using the same methodologies, with the proviso that they must use 21st century technology so that the immovable object of education can appear to be a transformative force in the lives of learners. This should not be construed as an indictment against educators who labour under the direction of those holding political power. It is an indictment of those who use their political power to maintain the status quo in education; who use educators, students and the system to maintain a tired and discredited vision of education. They are the ones who starve innovation and essential change through control of funding. More money is spent on the state taking parental responsibilities on to themselves than is spent in re-designing a badly dated education system.The sad truth is that they believe and capitalize on the belief that it is the teachers who are the  problem !Next post.... Business institutions and change management

One of the areas that education and business have in common is in the established resistance to change. Change in business is not new. Businesses have been implementing change ever since the first merchants recognized human needs and made efforts to meet needs. The one difference between then and now is the rate of change as it applies to the business cycle and the extension from local markets to global markets in a very short time span. The problem is that the rate of change as the result of the advancement of technology has increased dramatically and businesses have not invested enough in change management strategies to deal proactively with the changing digital economy. A useful analogy might be to compare traditional business organizations to the tortoise. Like a tortoise, it can handle incremental changes but when threatened by numerous changes impacting the business on multiple fronts it withdraws into its shell.Credit: www.dpbusinessmanagement.comChange Management, Innovation and LearningChange management is often defined within the context of individual organizations but simply put, as defined by Prosci,  it is:Credit: www,change-management-coach.comManaging change in the digital age means dealing with the forces of technology and innovation outside the walls of a business organization in a controlled proactive fashion. This means developing a plan based on an accepted model such as the one illustrated below:Credit: www.hiddenresources.co.ukChange management needs to happen at two levels: the organizational level and the individual level but both levels depend upon the importance of creating a vision as illustrated by Kotter's model shown above. This is the point where the process can seriously bog down and is a reason that change management fails on an organizational level.Credit: www.1000ventures.comIn the 8 Common Errors in Organizational Change Efforts(Leading Change, John P. Kotter), it should be pointed out that steps 3, 4, 5 highlight how the failure of establishing a vision that truly reflects the reality of the 21st century digital economy paralyzes a business organization to the point that it becomes irrelevant as a force within its own sector.Credit: www.blog.roberthalfmr.comThe often asked question by organizations being impacted by change is:"If innovation is the key to our prosperity and survival as a business organization, what can we do to make it work for us?"Steve Blank in an article titled: "Lean Innovation Management-Making Corporate Innovation Work" (June 26,2015) describes three specific horizons of innovation which could be summarized as:Horizon 1 activities support existing business models (company's core business)Horizon 2 is focused on extending existing businesses with partially known business models (represent new opportunities via business model innovation)Horizon 3 represents new or disruptive business models designed to develop collaborative  networks outside the business as well as entirely new marketsThe description above is simplistic on my part but in order to get an understanding of the proactive process, the article is quite informative.So, what does any of this have to do with learning within a business organization?Change management within an organization also has to happen on an individual level, meaning not just the CEO and COO but also in the middle and with those who deal with the employees everyday. Without the engagement of employees, change management fails. Learning within the organization is vital to keep it healthy and moving forward but you need to be fully aware of what is happening in education and teaching in order to understand how it will impact your business through the recruitment of new employees. A recent report titled: "NMC Horizon Report -2015 K-12 Edition" reveals what you should expect in the future learning profiles of your employees.The vision of E-Learning will reform E-Commerce as the new learned skillsets now come into play.Business institutional inertia needs to be overcome so that the opportunities of the future are no longer locked doors!Credit: www.futureofcio.blogspot.comNext....Exploring Interactivity in E-Learning

eLearning Feeds is a site that ranks blog feeds that are submitted and gives them a numerical ranking. I submitted my blog feed quite awhile and then forgot about it and noticed I was at #135! I am not a prolific blogger with a great deal of followers and kind of just do my own […]

Rackspace and several other major corporate sponsors are hosting a two-day hackathon in San Antonio at Rackspace’s headquarters on June 13-14, 2014. The event is named the "School’s Out Hackathon" (SoHacks). The vision of the two-day event is to create the largest maker-space for students to practice coding and use their creativity to design a […]

At some point in your professional life you experience what we would call an "Eureka!!" moment. Such moments are rare in our lives and even rarer in our professional lives which too often follow predictable patterns. In reading forum postings in the LinkedIn network, I may have come to such a moment and it occurred to me as a question:" When it comes to E-Learning, are we missing the forest because of the trees?"Your first reaction to this question might be "what does that mean?" or simply "I don't get it!" Perhaps that is precisely the problem that "we don't get it!" We spend a great deal of time focused on technology, tools and apps without stopping and stepping back and taking a look to see if there is a greater picture we should be paying attention to. Many of us who work in different capacities in E-Learning, whether in the areas of higher education, government ministries, instructional design  or corporate training recognize and appreciate contributions made by professionals from many countries around the world in E-Learning. We are able to sample the opinions and expertise of these professionals through social media such as Twitter, Facebook and the LinkedIn forums in areas of E-Learning. However, there is a daunting question we need to ask which is:"Do we have a complete picture of the state of E-Learning in the various countries of the world or do we merely have a mosaic with pieces missing?Credit: E-Learning Industry In order for E-Learning to truly evolve to what it can be within a global context, we need a complete picture of the state of E-learning in the world of the 21st century.Why Is This Necessary?If one of our goals in educating and training learners is to empower them to be creators of new knowledge and skillsets, to be innovators for improving the quality of life of global citizens, we need to know the challenges that each of us face in education, technology and innovation.Learners are to become skilled problem solvers who will have to confront complex real world issues. Our focus in equipping them with the necessary skillsets is the realization that:"Many of the problems faced in the connected world of today are no longer just localized distant problems. With the advance of technology and instantaneous communication to the far reaches of the globe, the problems are more global in nature with the ability to impact everyone who shares the planet."A Proposal That Needs to Go Viral! In this blog (www.darkzoneeducation.blogspot.com) for the next few postings I would like to send out an appeal to different regions of the world for their input on the state of E-Learning in their area. The purpose of this appeal is to open conversations that will allow all of us to truly understand the "mosaic of global E-Learning". I would like to entertain these conversations in the professional forums on E-Learning in LinkedIn.com. The conversations should elaborate on three main questions:What is the state of E-Learning in the education sector of your country?What are a few successes you can highlight that you have experienced in E-Learning in your country?What are a few serious challenges that you see now and in the future for E-Learning in your country?Who Should We Hear From? Naturally, we would like to hear from all those who are involved in E-Learning in some way. Government officials, higher education, instructional designers, educators, corporate trainers and even students taking E-Learning. Framing Your ResponsesIn order that conversations not be cumbersome, I would suggest the following:Identify the country you are fromIdentify your professional roleA brief response to the questionsThe questions are conversation starters so that we can get a good understanding of the state of E-Learning in a particular region. Where Do We Start?  These posts will be shared to the LinkedIn forums on E-Learning and innovation, specifically E-Learning Industry and Learnnovators where I hope that we can stimulate some helpful conversations on the state of E-Learning in a global context. I will choose a different region of countries each week but that does not mean that previous conversations need to cease.  Credit: www.nkfu.com Credit: www.europeandestinations.comThis Week--- European countries and Russian Federation---You are up this week! Talk to us!!If you are reading this post, share it through social media so that we can get as many people involved in these conversations as possible. The mosaic is incomplete until you contribute and collaborate. 

I came across a tweet from Time.com that shows an interactive world map showing the presence of tweets that were posted in remembrance of Maya Angelou and thanking her for her literacy contributions and public speaking events when she passed away on Wednesday, May 28, 2014 at age 86. The graphic above shows some of […]