There’s been a lot of talk, of late, about workflow learning. To be fair, Jay Cross was talking about learning in the flow of work way back in the late 1990s, but the idea has been recently suborned and become current. Yet, the question remains whether it’s real or a mislabeling (something I’m kind of anal about, see microlearning). So, I think it’s worth unpacking the concept to see what’s there (and what may not be). Is workflow learning a myth?
To start, the notion is that it’s learning at the moment of need. Which sounds good. Yet, do we really need learning? The idea Jay pointed to in his book Informal Learning, was talking about Gloria Gery’s work on helping people in the moment. Which is good! But is it learning? Gloria was really talking about performance support, where we’re looking to overcome our cognitive limitations. In particular, memory, and putting the information into the world instead of in the head. Which isn’t learning! It’s valuable, and we don’t do it enough, but it’s not learning.
Why? Well, because learning requires action and reflection. The latter can just be thinking about the implications, or in Harold Jarche’s Personal Knowledge Mastery model, it’s about experimenting and representing. In formal learning, of course, it’s feedback. I’ve argued we could do that, by providing just a thin layer on top of our performance support. However, I’ve never seen same! So, you’re going to do, and then not learn. Okay, if it’s biologically primary (something we’re wired to learn, like speaking), you’re liable to pick it up over time, but if it’s biologically secondary (something we’ve created and aren’t tuned for, e.g. reading) I’d suggest it’s less likely. Again, performance is the goal. Though learning can be useful to support comprehending context and making complex decisions, what we’re good at.
What is problematic is the notion of workflow and reflection in conjunction. Simply, if you’re reflecting, you’re by definition out of the workflow! You’re not performing, you’re stopping and thinking. Which is valuable, but not ‘flow’. Sure, I may be overly focused on workflow being in the ‘zone’, acting instead of thinking, but that, to me, is really the notion. Learning happens when you stop and contemplate and/or collaborate.
So, if you want to define workflow to include the reflection and thoughtful work, then there is such a thing. But I wonder if it’s more useful to separate out the reflection as things to value, facilitate, and develop. It’s not like we’re born with good reflection practices, or we wouldn’t need to do research on the value of concept mapping and sketch noting and how it’s better than highlighting. So being clear about the phases of work and how to do them best seems to me to be worthwhile.
Look, we should use performance support where we can. It’s typically cheaper and more effective than trying to put information into the head. We should also consider adding some learning content on top of performance support in times where people knowing why we’re doing it as much as what we should do is helpful. Learning should be used when it’s the best solution, of course. But we should be clear about what we’re doing.
I can see arguments why talking about workflow learning is good. It may be a way to get those not in our field to think about performance support. I can also see why it’s bad, leading us into the mistaken belief that we can learn while we do without breaking up our actions. I don’t have a definitive answer to “is workflow learning a myth” (so this would be an addition to the ‘misconceptions’ section of my myths book ;). What I think is important, however, is to unpack the concepts, so at least we’re clear about what learning is, about what workflow is, and when we should do either. Thoughts?
As Jay Cross noted many years ago, “Visualize the workflow of a physical job: produce, produce, produce, produce, produce, produce, produce, produce, produce.
Now visualize the workflow of a creative knowledge worker: nothing, nothing, nothing, nothing, flash of brilliance, nothing, nothing, nothing.”
All that nothing time should be for reflection, not for meaningless busy work, or as David Graeber called them — bullshit jobs — https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullshit_Jobs
In my opinion, you’re right to raise the question of whether “learning” is a misnomer here, and what we should do about it. I wonder what would happen if we rephrased “workflow learning” and instead told the business that we’re going to enable “doing without remembering.” Would they care about the “not remembering” part, or would they instead focus on the fact that someone was able to do something, at however minimal or incomplete level? I fear it’s more likely the latter, which is why we should be clear when offering workflow learning about exactly what its limitations are, and what the likely business consequences and outcomes could be from trying to take this shortcut.
I want to agree that “workflow leasrning” is an oxymoron for exactly the reason you give. Incorporating reflection is more post-workflow learning.
But what about apprenticeship? Isn’t that workflow learning? Doesn’t that suggest the kinds of learning events that are appropriate to consider still in the flow?
When it comes to learning, I use Schunk’s (2012) definition: learning is a lasting change in behaviour or in the ability to behave in a certain way, as a result of experiences. Learning is a complex cognitive and social process, which is difficult to ‘grasp’. This process involves action, feedback and reflection, among other things. I have also often argued that you should be cautious in stating that you also learn when you work (see, for example, here, here and here). Performing work does not automatically lead to new insights, knowledge or skills.On the contrary, new insights often arise thanks to reflection.
Often, employees perform routine tasks without consciously reflecting.
In this respect, I think it is useful to distinguish between ‘double loop learning’ and ‘single loop learning’. In ‘double loop learning’, you basically ask yourself: are we doing the right things, how am I going to do other things? ‘Single loop learning’ is mainly about: how am I going to do things differently? A problem of the workplace then is that you often cannot sufficiently distance yourself from certain processes and concepts. While this distance is important for arriving at new insights, and for ‘double loop learning’.
I do think that your interpretation of performance support is somewhat limited.I get the impression that you mainly focus on being able to process information just-in-time. While performance support also focuses on skills (e.g. by ‘copying’ behaviour). Furthermore, I do not exclude the possibility that performance support can also lead to a sustainable change in behaviour, and that this may involve reflection (but perhaps afterwards). This does involve learning.
I’ve always gravitated to Connectivism (Siemens 2005) in todays societal information seeking behaviour and workplace information seeking behaviour. In connectivism the starting point for learning occurs when knowledge is actuated by learners connecting to and participating in a learning community. Learning communities are defined as “the clustering of similar areas of interest that allows for interaction, sharing, dialoguing and thinking
together” (Siemens, 2005).
This has always sat better for me in a workplace environment. I have questioned the concepts of learning in the flow of work in todays automated workplace. When computing was limited, I can see evidence that knowledge had to be actuated. It required reflection and in some cases, demonstration of competence. Workflow in todays workplace, requires expediency and outcomes. It does not provide for reflection. There would also be an argument that it should not cater for reflection. Enter Taylor, Fayol and Maslow discussion …… :)
The advent of AI will focus our attention on the work requiring reflection and learning as the “workflow” slowly becomes automated. Maybe constantly training AI will be where learning in the flow of work happens?