Informal Self-Regulated Learning in Corporate Organizations

Introduction

The sharing of knowledge between employees is one of the most challenging tasks modern companies nowadays face (Siemens, 2005; Siemens 2006). Organizations have access to vast amounts of tacit and tangible knowledge; but for an employee this knowledge is often difficult to find and its actual value cannot always be judged. As a consequence, active learning and knowledge acquisition seem to be lonely activities, both distinctly separated from regular, everyday work. Knowledge transfer that occurs in formal courses has little impact on the day-to-day work of employees (Weistra, 2005), as shown in Figure 1. That is why training often has a low return on investment. Advances in ICT, through the years, have provided us with new possibilities and opportunities for improving learning. But technology enhanced learning in companies currently often supports a rather traditional single actor learning, such as first generation e-learning where printed matter has been digitalized into hypertexts, or available data-bases that are poorly used, or blended learning scenarios using learning platforms (Siemens, 2006). The learning in these situations remains an individual act with no interpersonal communication or connection to the daily working practice. New concepts of learning are needed to improve training and learning of the employees, through the use of technology.

Figure 1.

Learning activities and their relevance