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Jane Dysart posted this in Conferences, Organizations on June 21st, 2011 This is my day for The Atlantic. Another great article, the first three parts of a 5 part series on the future workforce & the skills necessary:
1. Sense Making: The ability to determine the deeper meaning or significance of what is being expressed (also known as critical thinking about which Rebecca and I were talking in our SLA workshop — Thinking Strategically & Critically; Seeing Possibilities)
2. Social Intelligence: The ability to connect to others in a deep and direct way, to sense and stimulate reactions and desired interactions (what Rebecca & I and our friend Stephen Abram discussed at the SLA Marketing Section breakfast last week — building relationships, aligning with customers & senior managers — hope someone took notes!)
3. Novel and Adaptive Thinking: Proficiency at thinking and coming up with solutions and responses beyond that which is rote or rule-based.
4. Cross-Cultural Competency: The ability to operate in different cultural settings
5. Computational Thinking: The ability to translate vast amounts of data into abstract concepts and to understand data-based reasoning
6. New-Media Literacy: The ability to critically assess and develop content that uses new media forms, and to leverage these media for persuasive communication.
Oh no, we have to wait for the last four skills! But aren’t they articulate and right on? Read the full articles for more.
Update: Well thanks to Steve Barth for flushing out the U of Pheonix Research Institute Study, Future Work Skills 2020 where you can download the PDF of
Continue reading 10 Skills for the Future Workforce
Jane Dysart posted this in Conferences on July 30th, 2009 Pic & Tips: http://www.blogohblog.com/page/16/
Some of us are not real visual people (that’s me, tho’ I have been trying to improve), but others are extraordinary. Images and videos are really adding to the learning experience, to gaining attention and making an impression, and so much more. Just saw this article on digital photography tips which reminded me about the Digital Photographer Boot Camp being held at Internet Librarian 2009 on Saturday afternoon in Monterey, CA. Led my Cindi Trainor, Michael Porter, and Michael Sauers, this workshop will be a great way to learn how to create, edit and add images to your website, to your marketing, and more. So if you’re one of those visually challenged, take advantage of learning from these experts!IL
Rebecca Jones posted this in Leadership on June 15th, 2009 I have the incredible privilege of giving a session with Mary Lee Kennedy and Deb Wallace of Harvard Business School on critical thinking at SLA 2009 tomorrow. Unfortunately, Mary Lee won’t be there in person, but she certainly will be there in content and in spirit. Mary Lee embodies critical thinking — viewing “what is” and asking “why” and then doing something about it. Just ask anyone that’s worked with her at Harvard, or, before that, Microsoft and, before that, Digital Equipment. I’d ask “huh?” but Mary Lee would definitely ask “how can we frame this?”
The presentation is up here, but, in a nutshell critical thinking is really about unveiling and questioning assumptions and information that may not be valid. Sounds easy, right? sounds reasonable. Especially since so many decisions and problems we face are complex. There’s often no obvious or even one right decision or solution.
BUT, it’s not easy or even reasonable in many circumstances to keep raising questions about people’s base “starting points” as they discuss potential options. It can be downright risky to suggest to those making decisions that they “re-frame” how they see the situation, or that they set the “sunk costs” of a service or project aside as they examine options. After all, very often we continue to ‘sink costs’ into a service/project even though it’s obviously past its prime or no longer working. As Warren Buffet said, “When you find yourself in a hole, the best thing you can do is stop digging.” So
Continue reading Critical thinking: more than for decision-making, it’s how digital natives engage
Jane Dysart posted this in Conferences on August 28th, 2008 Interesting that these topics are coming up regularly. Recently Daniel J. Caron, Assistant Deputy Minister, Library & Archives Canada spoke at IFLA about “Moving Towards a New Information Specialist Profile“. He talked about the changing environment where technology means not only doing things better, but differently, and also changes user behaviour to which we need to adapt and ensure our authoratative information gets into their space. He emphasized that people want value- added embedded in technologies, and are no longer willing to go to a professional intermediary. He stressed the need to re-think and re-create the legal and regulatory framework because of new digital paradigms. And with no control over information in a world where anyone can be a publisher, information objects appear and disappear and it is difficult to identify authorative information; so information specialists will have some new roles.
And ITWorldcanada.com just published a terrific and very practical article, “30 Skills Every IT Person Needs” which provides lots of great tips and suggestions. They also summarized Forrester Research’s recent look at “16 Hot Roles for IT Pros“. “Hot roles in IT will be driven by the need for local and cross-discipline knowledge, changes in technology, greater emphasis on managing risk and the enterprise, and a limited supply of key roles.” Key roles include: information/data architect and information security expert; data- or content-oriented business analyst, business architect, enterprise architect, and vendor-management expert; enterprise project manager; business-specific or technology-specific experts; desktop virtualization expert, mobile operations and devices expert, and storage
Continue reading Roles & Skills: IM & IT
Rebecca Jones posted this in Uncategorized on May 23rd, 2008 ITBusiness.ca profiles Googles’ failures in “Ten god-awful Google flops & fiascos.” It’s worth scanning, especially the section about Google Answers, which, despite the quality, flopped in the face of Yahoo’s free answers…..and the fact that Google expects employees to 20% of their time pursuing personal projects of interest —- since out of failures rise 1 or 2 significant successes. If we aren’t falling down occasionally, it’s because we aren’t walking on new paths or trying anything new. And that’s really dangerous, especially for libraries and information services. Celebrate service ideas that don’t work — it means that you’ve tried something & learned! Google is just the newest in a long line of successful failures; Einstein, Edison, they all struggled through many “learnings”. Cuz that’s all they are — “learnings”. Check out what we can learn from Google. And here’s the quote of the day I received from the feed to my blackberry: “Thomas A. Edison: “I am not discouraged, because every wrong attempt discarded is another step forward.”
Jane Dysart posted this in Uncategorized on April 22nd, 2008 This article on IT skills just crossed my desk and the following quote refers to technology pros but I think it could be true for information and knowledge pros too! “Technology pros looking to find new work or secure their current jobs should get schooled on wireless, Web 2.0, and virtualization while also boning up on business basics.” So true. Other skills include database management, business intelligence/data mining, application delivery, security and networking.
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