Apprenticing to improve knowledge work skills
Tacit knowledge and software usability. I spent some more time last night sorting out my friend Larry's weblog. He's a psychologist who specializes in Asperger's Syndrome. Larry's really interested in open-sourcing his ideas and would eventually be an ideal candidate to run a Radio Community Server that would be a knowledge exchange for the AS community of interest. So I've been watching his experience with Radio very closely. ... [Jon's Radio]
It's hard to comment on Jon's materials because, as usual, he's spot on. Here's an extended reflection on the tacit knowledge that goes into using all software effectively. Current marketing practices focus so much on "out-of-the-box" experience that they obscure the tremendous importance of tacit knowledge in using any tools. software included, effectively.
Apprenticeship works. That's the fundamental truth underneath communities of practice. Etienne Wenger and Jean Lave have demonstrated this powerfully in their work at IRL, which is well documented (Situated Learning , Communities of Practice, and Cultivating Communities of Practice). It works because it appears to be one of the most effective ways to unlock tacit knowledge.
Technology skill appears to be about explicit knowledge, yet is no more so than any other area of skill. Using technology effectively depends thoroughly on tacit knowledge accreted over time.
Why don't more organizations pair up technologists and business thinkers? For one thing, it can be a painful experience for both parties. We actually followed a strategy along these lines at DiamondCluster. We would staff strategy projects with both a regular business strategist and a technology architect. Moreover, we did not set one in charge of the other, but kept them as co-equals (easier said than done of course). Our most effective results came from those partnerships that were forged, precisely because it forced the two to begin to unpack their tacit knowledge. We also had our share of partnerships between techie and strategist that crashed and burned.
Here, though, I'm thinking of a slightly different partnership. One of two knowledge workers paired to improve their overall capacity for knowledge work by apprenticing to each other. The key is that the pair must see the pairing as an opportunity both to improve immediate performance and to learn.
10:18:18 AM Google It! 
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