A couple of days before Easter I was chatting to colleagues in a pub in Yorkshire (as you do) and we started discussing the – to us - apparent lack of new ideas from the likes of Jay Cross and friends. Well now I’ve been bopped on the nose so to speak with the release of the January 2010 update of Jay and friends’ “unbook” on Informal Learning. The update embraces not only the new opportunities offered by the CLOUD world but also a lucid and learning-made-easy clarification of the fundamental differences between learning and training in a world where change is a constant and, to repeat the old Yiddish saying, “Man Plans – God Laughs”.

A number of books have hit the shelves recently which have discussed the absence of outcomes from business planning and sometimes the absolute futility of strategic planning. Yes, we see outputs such as plans, charts, mission statements etc but they don’t actually deliver outcomes or come to anything remotely like what Mark Moore envisaged as “Public Value”.

Jay and friends clearly illustrate why it’s how people are thinking, speculating, collaborating and delivering while management is planning that makes the difference in every organisation, but they acknowledge there must be value to the organisation from a change in learning culture and models.

How do you quantify the ROI o increased knowledge in an individual or group? How do you value a split-second insight from shared ideas and experience which turns things aoround rapidly? Jay and his friends attempt, with a surprising degree of success, to help resolve these questions and this publication sort of pushes my books on Accelerated Learning, Experiential Learning and Action Centred Learning into the category of background material.

On finding your way around the book, Jay himself blogs :

“If I were reading Working Smarter, I'd begin by selecting a few topics of interest from the book map in the final pages. There's no need to read the book from front to back.”

Well, before I received my copy of the book, (hardcopy paperback I’m afraid - I tire quickly reading from the screen), I’d hoped to be able to point you to a few representative gems in it. That’s not possible because one of the joys of this is the serendipitous “aha” moments. So do as Jay suggests…maybe if you are coming from a very orderly background then you could start with project planning, Page 65. Don’t be surprised if you find yourself missing the end of that section because there on the right-hand page is another equally tantalising topic.

Failing that – turn to page 52 “Cheat-sheet” for what Jay calls “informal learning in a nutshell”.

To sum up : enlightening, informed, evidence-based sufficient for most appetities and worth every penny or Euro.