Difference between revisions of "Sustainable Business Learning Community Conversations, May 2013 - June 2013"

Revision as of 14:09, 29 May 2013

May 23, 2013 Topic: Adult Learning

Topic: Adult Learning

As we work with people who want to run businesses that are sustainable, we recognize that it's all about learning something new; we are all going through a learning process.

Adult learning, building skill and capacity, is different than education.

USDA's short summary of adult learning:

• Adults need to know WHY they should learn something. This is the most important thing to begin with.

• Adults have a deep need for self-directed learning. All day long training classes aren't helpful.

• Important to tap into and affirm the life experiences of the adult learner.

• Important that learning take place as close as possible to the time the need to learn arises; Just-In-Time learning.

• Adults learn best through real problem or life-centered learning. A power point list won't work; adults have to work on real problems.

• Adults are motivated by extrinsic and intrinsic motivators; they want something that they can take with them when the job is done; they want to be able to do something with what they learn.

How would you define who is an adult?

• An adult learner is someone who learns in a non-school environment
• Pam (former teacher) notes that 11th & 12th graders learned best when they taught themselves. Circles, not rows worked best. Everyone learns differently, so having round table format seems to be more stimulating. When they feel their contributions are important, they are more motivated to learn and contribute.

Steve Kahn TED talk on self-perpetuating education: There's greatness in every student.

How does learning happen outside of a classroom setting?

• Learning in community can be very effective. But some people are not raised to think of community as a good thing; rather that we are all in competition with one another. (especially If learners haven't had access to as many resources, they may be less likely to share the resources).

• People who are better at using resources tend to be more successful in the long run. Heckmann People who form strong bonds with family use resources more effectively.

• The need to learn: Need fuels an adult's desire to learn something new.

• Learning can come from relationships we have with those around us. Recognize who you can learn from. Some people can be threatened by others and aren't comfortable working in a collaborative way, but it's important to understand how much others can teach us.

• Co-learning: Something special happens when you make yourself vulnerable to someone else's knowledge so that you can learn. You make a co-learning space that you enter into with that other person and you are confident that both of you will be ok and both will learn something.

• Be ready to listen: Come into a conversation ready to learn something new, knowing you don't know everything and don't have all the answers.

• Understand how you learn:
  • Visual learner - you need to see what it is you're trying to learn
  • Auditory learner - you process new information better when you hear it.
  • Application learner - you need to apply new information in order to be able to learn it well.

If you have a good understanding of how you learn as well as how those around you learn, the sharing of information can take place more effectively.

• Our educational system makes learning a competitive thing, but true learning should not be competitive. If you don't catch on to some new material right away it may just mean that you need to spend more time, or be taught in a different way.

• There is a difference between education and learning: education is an industry; learning is a natural human activity (babies do it all the time through play). All of the stuff around education (i.e., showing up on time, testing, competition) is socialization and not very valuable. The desire to learn is natural - we are all inquisitive, born to learn.

Other comments from the group:

• Allowing people to come up with their own answers creates more learning, (however, doesn't fit into the education box).

• Jon Koller recommends this article about brain chemistry switch: At a certain point in our brain development, we move from being able to learn new things and new ideas to being able to connect the knowledge that we already have in new and interesting ways. (happens in 20's - 30's?) Get article from John (hannah's husband)

• In order to learn how to draw, you have to unlearn what you already know, the symbols in your head, in order to learn how to really draw a representation of what something looks like.

• Tunde: The Society of the Spectacle (find link to book) lets put all the trash in one space, and it becomes a spectacle of all that is wrong with detroit (tunes story about putt putt place). Is it something real or only the representation of something real?

• Finding the right language for something is an important step toward learning _ animal companion - responsible human companion, etc.

• confidence and fear issues: adrienne's nephew is scared when he is able to teach her something, cuz he expects you to know everything. reversing the role of teacher student can be an effective way to learn. if the student can teach the teacher, he can learn a lot more.

• Having confidence in your ability to learn is empowering. If you're afraid of technology or other things, it will cripple your ability to learn new things.

• Build capacity for learning new things. Try to understand what makes new information that you take in relevant or not relevant. As an adult, you might be more deliberate and intentional in how you process and categorize new information.

• Public space is great place to learn - interaction and play can take place. It is an environment in which learning can happen and people can share information. Peggy often comments that she misses a newspaper vs reading news on the computer. On the computer, she looks for specific information - in a paper, she is able to browse, and runs into stuff she wouldn't have seen otherwise. Public spaces are like this; you may run into people in a shared space who you might not have encountered otherwise - the things I found along the way while I was looking for something. Public space has that potential, allowing us to connect in ways we didn't intend to have happen.

• How do we make an environment more amenable to learning? Engage people's curiosity - make people interested and comfortable sharing. Google is well known for having created workspace that engages its employees and nurtures curiosity, creativity and learning. Employees are encouraged to work at their own pace, in a space that makes them comfortable.

May 16, 2013 Topic: Developing the Workshop Format

Comments from last week - Asking Questions:

• Organizations that you work in are holding questions. Be able to provide leadership that supports the asking of these questions. What are the really important questions being held by the organization and how do we get the richness of them? What might the possible answers might be?

• Example: There are many little questions we ask every day at the Green Garage: can we have natural ventilation today? can we compost more? Each of these questions supports the higher level question: how can we be more sustainable today?

• Perhaps that one big Question IS what you are and your work is to answer that question.

• Think of the business owner who encourages customer questions because he's learned that many other customers will have the same questions. By finding answers to those questions he finds that he's able to get his business to a place that is beneficial to those he serves.

• Can questioning and perseverance be in conflict with each other? At what point do you stop persevering and start to question your previous assumptions, or questions you thought you had already answered?

• Henry Ford failed several times before he successfully establish his car company. Did he every question his ability to run a company, or that people would want to buy cars? Or did he focus on questions that allowed him to refine his business approach? Questions can be about refining and evolution of ideas.

• Questioning something isn't always an indication of doubt. It can be part of an ongoing process - have I gone deep enough?

• Revisit and reevaluate your original assumptions: You can start with a set of valid assumptions but then you move forward with your business and the context changes fundamentally, so now those assumptions are no longer valid. The way you calculate and forecast may have to change - a discontinuous change. What kind of fundamental changes might you have to make? You have to know when to go back and question foundational assumptions.

• Can your fundamental questions be too specific?
  • Ex: Kodak's question: How do we make the best film - but if no one uses film anymore, wouldn't it be better to ask, how do we best capture moments?
  • Ford: How do we make the best cars? If we no longer use cars, then a better questions might be, how do we best transport people?

• Just because an answer works for one person doesn't mean that its the right answer for you.

• Businesses fit into natural cycles. Just like living things, not all businesses are supposed to last forever. To fight from going under at all costs might not be the most prudent thing.

• Not all questions have to be answered, or, at least, answered right away. We get a lot of visitors to the GG and there are some questions that Tom won't answer. The most frequently asked: What's the payback? This is a question that comes from a borrowed paradigm (investment --> payback, all within a pretty short amount of time). But in the conventional sense, that's not the right question to ask. He has to begin with the context first in order to answer this question: what does payback mean?

• Profit is the primary goal in this country, so if you step outside of that model, it's hard to answer people's questions about what you do. You have to spend time framing the context of the work you do - it takes a lot of time to get people to understand.

• Questions as a pulse - if Bob's not hearing the questions, then he wonders why. Are people not interested? Are they afraid? He looks for patterns of questions to help him understand how his business is going.

• It's important to have the person who asks the uncommon questions - value those people who see things differently and ask the questions you never thought of. Those people might actually have better focus on things than you do.

Today: Developing the Workshop Format

People approached Tom asking for information about specific and practical skill sets relating to their businesses. So we decided to do workshop-style meetings in order to work on growing those skills. Workshop meetings will be held the 3rd Thursday of each month. We hope to help those leading 3D business to continue to grow their skills and competencies. Each meeting will last 1 1/2 hours. The first half hour will be for presentation, the remaining hour, one of the businesses will present their situation and the other attendees can discuss and comment. (Case study learning style)

12 habits of sustainable business (falling under the 3 dimensions of a sustainable business):

Economic:

• profitability management
• management information
• funding capital and ownership
• quality and continuous improvement

Environmental:

• energy
• no waste
• water
• toxicity

Community:

• organizing for growth
• learning organization
• growing the vital community
• sustainable relationships

Capstone piece: Leadership - priority setting, project management, intersection between economic, environmental and community

Other topic ideas offered by the group:

• How do I figure out my break even point?
• How do I grow? (what if growth leads you to bankruptcy???)
• How do you value a service - decide a price? discounts?
• How to develop non-conventional business models?
• Developing a chart of accounts
• Managing client/customer relationship systems - processes
• What does quality mean?
• Understanding costs, fixed and variable costs
• Creating and managing data
• Building good relationships, letting go of the bad ones
• Point of sale systems
• Payroll - taxes, pay rates
• Auditing and financial reporting
• Loans
• Environmental impact analysis
• Flexibility (in systems, equipment)
• Managing inventory

Next week: Adult Learning