We’re all digital now, yes?

So, one is visiting Learning Live over the coming two days. What is always an energising and interesting event will be layered with additional anticipation as we proceed through our COVID world. Being in the same space with that many people will be interesting in itself. I think we are all hoping for more than an echo of the past and yet just a little apprehensive of reliving it in our current circumstances. Or maybe that’s just me?

On a personal note, I am particularly interested in hearing the stories and views of what has really happened in the world of digital learning. I am chairing a panel discussion on the topic and I anticipate the theme to be a thread through the whole event. The headlines suggest a genuinely seismic shift from in the room activity to virtual delivery, with little anticipation of a return. My sense, without data (there is so little data in our world), is that developing virtual classroom capacity and capability is the big change for most. Alongside this, the reinvention of what blended learning means without a room to blend with.

Anecdotal evidence from vendors of learning platforms and tools suggests an already warm market heating further as clients take a more strategic stance for their digital plans, following the initial reactions to the first lockdowns of last year. The investment in learning technology providers in this year alone supports this view.

What I am hoping to hear about are stories and signals of transformation from this plunge into digital. The switch to digital delivery is one part of the story but does this take us beyond a new channel for traditional wares? Courses, programmes and content with the first two on screen rather than stage doesn’t transform what learning can mean, to my mind at least.

I am keen to hear if there are new ways of working emerging and creating new opportunities. What experiments are taking place? What did you learn? What kind of prototyping is working for people? Where are the opportunities uncovered form all that digital data? What new products are emerging? Are product management approaches coming to life? What new problems can be solved beyond delivery?

I will be good to be in the room to find out.

Transforming digital learning delivery?