Workers learn more in the coffee room than in the classroom. They discover how to do their jobs through informal learning: talking, observing others, trial-and-error, and simply working with people in the know. Formal learning – classes and workshops – is the source of only 10 to 20 percent of what people learn at work. Corporations overinvest in formal training programs while neglecting natural, simpler informal processes. Read more →

Humans are sight mammals, proposes e-learning guru Jay Cross. They learn almost twice as well from images and words as from words alone. Visuals engage both hemispheres of the human brain. Pictures translate across cultures, education levels, and age groups. Yet, most content of corporate learning is text. Schools spend years teaching how to read but only hours on visual literacy. It’s high time for us to open our eyes to the possibilities, Cross asserts. Read more →