Being a theoretical physicist must be somewhat akin to walking a tightrope between provable reality and sheer fantasy. On the one hand no-one can dispute that apples tend to fall downwards from trees or that if you drop a brick on your foot it will hurt, whilst on the other end of the same scale they are asking us to believe in multi-dimensional space or that every oxygen atom is affected by, and different to, every other oxygen atom in the universe.
Whilst theoretical physicists are playing with concepts, behind them is an army of other scientists all trying to find the Higgs Boson particle or to develop mathematical formulae which will prove or disprove the physicists’ theories. Lurking behind all of this frantic activity has been the ever present worry that the main planks of physics created by Einstein and the theory of relativity don’t always agree and therefore everything that we now think we know may be wrong.
It is no wonder therefore that a lecture given in Oxford University recently has taken the scientific world by storm. An American economist, Eric Weinstein, has proposed a theoretical model of the universe which could unite Einstein and relativity and in the process do away with the need for the elusive dark matter. Whether or not Weinstein’s ideas are eventually proven, the fact that he can step into the debate from outside the mainstream scientific community is being hailed as proof that the internet has opened up the world.
Of course it’s not just scientists who can take advantage from the benefits afforded by the World Wide Web. Businesses which embrace the internet can also transform their entire model. But even with a business which has gone a long way towards the web, the one area which tends to lag behind is that of mobile learning.
Sounds strange doesn’t it? In a world in which virtually everything you want to know is sitting on the net, in which hundreds of new apps are created every day, in which instructional guides and videos are yours at a touch of a button; why do we still gather employees together in a classroom and spend a day teaching them what they could have garnered in a few minutes web searching? The training room still has its’ place, but less emphasis is now required on imparting knowledge in the training room and more should be placed on the application and refining of skills.
The answer is partly down to leadership style and partly to people themselves. Whilst some people have the ability to soak up information and processes from apps, others find it hard to assimilate new ideas unless they have been explained face to face. Understanding how different people learn and choosing the most appropriate learning style for them will go a long way to gaining a measurable outcome.
But in the majority of cases it is the leaders themselves who need to change. Those leaving school now have grown up with the internet and have an instinctive appreciation of search and information gathering from the web. This can sit hard with a leadership style which is used to directing and controlling what is learnt. Attendance in a classroom is tangible; playing on the net is not. To maximise m-learning organisations need to let go, to guide rather than to dictate, and to create the opportunities for learning. Apps to support the development of people aren’t just for staff though, Managers have an increasing set of helpful tools available to them like e-reference tools from People Alchemy (http://www.peoplealchemy.co.uk/) which provides ‘in the moment’ helpful guidance for managers facing very real people issues.
This doesn’t necessarily lead to a free-for-all. Creating a social media policy and working with employees to draw up acceptable guidelines needs to go hand in hand with a move to m-learning. This may take a leap of faith and the company culture may need to swing from control towards innovation but the rewards are there. Not only will learning be more flexible and be applied at the time it is needed but employees will take more control over their abilities and in the process become more engaged.
With m-learning, with or without apps, making a vast difference to an organisation can it also teach us about the rest of the world? Well, in reality the physicists have missed a trick. Everyone in business knows already about the inter-connectedness of everything. You only have to put your coat on to leave the office after a very hard day to know that the act of standing up instantly triggers a long call or urgent e-mail from a client. Forget the maths, business people live the reality and one day there’ll be an app for that as well.
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