Situated Learning and Facilitation

Context, Culture and Content - these are the three words that are the holy grail for any learning initiative and as a facilitator for almost a decade, my constant pursuit has been to marry these three in the classroom. Bring well-designed and curated content, contextualize it to the reality of the audience and support that with a culture that allows reinforcement or practice of the learning - that's essentially a facilitators job description. And I would like to believe I have been able to successfully execute my duties most of the time.

But truth be told, it is almost impossible for me, or any facilitator, to get a the elements of the context right for each participant along with focusing on providing the best learning environment. Even the most brilliant learning programs fail to effectively go beyond the classroom and help participants consistently deploy skills learned in their domain activity. The process of learning is incomplete without the opportunity to experiment, iterate, test and experience the new skills in everyday practice.

If facilitation could climb the walls of classroom (yes virtual ones too) and find its place in interpersonal discussions, meetings, job assignments, stretch projects and brainstorming sessions, the possibilities are infinite, and the carriers could be leaders, managers or almost anyone interested in making things happen.

Without even stepping into a formal learning zone, situated learning can be facilitated by leaders and managers and teams can seamlessly learn from each other in the context of their work. But how can managers start doing this?

The simple answer is by learning facilitation skills. The tougher but more fitting answer is that organizations must start looking at building facilitation skills in people as a part of the internal capability development. Just creating internal facilitators to deliver workshops is not enough, although it is definitely a good place to start. In today's work environment with hardly any opportunity to meet colleagues face to face, people's ability to facilitate can be a game changer in the success of teams and organizations. Imagine if like a facilitator, a leader (or team members) could ensure all voices are heard, the group's conversations and collaborations are elevated further towards the common objective while also accelerating each individual's learning journey... that's where "Situated learning" happens.