Joe Sabado – Higher Education & Technology Leadership

Even the most skilled and brightest futurists in the 1990s could not have predicted the upcoming massive changes in the first decade of 2000 in higher education by consumer technologies such as the web, social media, cloud, and mobile computing. I still remember a job interview in the late 1990s for a university web director position. I was asked to present my vision of the university in the next decade and the role of the web and other technologies. Nowhere in my mindset were the consumer technologies that changed how we in the universities and students now do our day-to-day activities and business processes. I am intrigued and curious about what the higher education of 2020 would be like. I read predictions such as this “Higher education in 2020: three key forecasts from new report” and this (“College 2020”)  as well as Gartner IT Predictions for 2014 and Beyond to get a sense of what to expect. However, the accuracy of these long-term predictions remains to be seen. However, even as I remain cautious about the validity of these predictions, I know that I better keep up with the trends, even if these trends are not part of what could be considered part of my job.

Yesterday, I spent a few hours with some student affairs directors brainstorming about communications in our division. I’ve been told in the past that our role as IT is to provide the tools, and the departments are the ones who communicate with students. Frankly, I’ve never believed in the idea that IT is just a tool/utility provider. I think the value of IT comes not only from the infrastructure we manage but also from the innovation and transformation of business processes that became possible because of our partnership with our business units to develop new systems and methods to do our business. With this mindset, I approach communication and the role of IT. It is also with this mindset that I view my role as an IT manager/leader. To be an effective IT leader, I need to keep up with the preferences and demands of our students, our staff and other customers, including how they would like to communicate. I need to keep up with technologies and the mindset that come along with them.

I was recently asked if IT should be involved in communications and marketing, to which I responded, “I don’t see any reason why IT should not be.” Traditional thinking of IT probably does not include communications and marketing as part of their responsibilities. Still, the way I see it, given that technology is such a big part of communication these days (as it has been in recent years) and in the future, IT folks better start re-considering this traditional view.

The increasing convergence between IT and marketing/communication led me to think about what my career in the future would be. A few years ago, the idea of a social media/communication/marketing position and a videographer reporting to me in IT would probably not have been an idea well accepted. After all, that’s not what IT does. It’s perhaps not a conventional arrangement to have these positions in IT in many organizations, even to this day. Thinking a few years ahead from now, I wonder how the role of IT will evolve.  Will IT, as an organization, be combined with other departments, like marketing and communication, and be seen as part of a digital service organization? With this evolution, how will my role and responsibilities change?  Ten years from now, will I have a career I would never have envisioned as it does not exist today?

As I think about the possibilities and the uncertainties of the future, what I do know and what I’ve committed myself to is to continually learn and understand emerging technologies, the changing nature of higher education, the changing demographics of our students, as well as their preferences and demands. Learning is a process, and it takes time. Learning is a journey that’s not always a straight line. Along the way, I’ve been introduced to ideas and people I did not expect to meet. So, while I do not know what my career holds in the future, I will continue to prepare and learn towards whatever the destination will be.

Do you ever think about your “learning objectives” when you have a new project or when confronted with challenging situations at work? Do you ever assess/reflect what you learned after? This is a practice I’ve come to embrace not only to model what I expect from my students in my role as an educator, but it has also provided me a better perspective in how I approach my work. In adopting a learner’s mentality, I have come to view mistakes as learning opportunities and that learning doesn’t happen in a sequential timeline, but rather it involves some detours and challenges along the way. This has allowed me to be more patient, not only to myself, but to my colleagues as well. Adopting a learner’s mentality encourages me to be resilient during moments of frustrations. The thought of “what can I learn from this?” often changes how I view a situation.  I have come to believe in the concept of constructivism – the idea that learning is social and collaborative.  As important, having a learner’s mentality provides me with the mindset to look forward and not stagnate when it comes to personal and professional development.

Some time along my professional life working at the university, I forgot I work at a learning institution. I somehow forgot that learning does not stop after college. I approached my work completing tasks and projects without really thinking about how and what I should be learning along the way.  I was not intentional about what I needed to learn for my own professional development. The fact that I rarely went to conferences for training kept me in the mindset that I was limited in my learning opportunities and I needed to depend on my supervisor for resources for these opportunities. This attitude changed when I was introduced to the concept of “alternative professional development” which is the idea that learning can happen outside formal training opportunities. Through social media and personal learning networks, I realized I could learn on my own. For years, I thought the only way to learn about student affairs theories and history was through graduate programs. I realized that was not the case. I realized I can create and shape my long term learning opportunities. I’ve adopted this learner’s mentality at work.

How do you approach learning at work?

Image credit: http://www.marksanborn.com/blog/4-learning-priorities-for-the-new-year/

One benefit of formal education is that students are provided guidance throughout their learning process via the curriculum of their studies.  Students are given materials and resources to study from and good teachers not only provide the knowledge and expertise but act as mentors in the education process. Self-directed learners, those who are motivated to learn on their own outside the structure of formal education, face challenges students in formal settings may not necessarily have to deal with. They also have the freedom to design their learning experience that may not be available to students in formal institutions. I am one of those self-directed learners. Using social media and personal learning networks, I have been able to teach myself about topics related to student affairs including student development theory,  technology in student affairs, higher education issues, technology, instructional design, social media and management and leadership.

In the course of learning about these topics, I have had to also learn the process of learning itself. I have had to figure out how to use technology, including social media, and my personal learning networks towards my goal of learning about the aforementioned topics. When I joined twitter on August 9, 2010, I could not have imagined the power of personal learning network and powerful social media are when it comes to informal learning. I have learned a lot since then and the learning process included adjustments along the way. Based on my experience, here are some ideas to consider:

Identify areas of study to pursue. For example, I wanted to learn about student affairs but I didn’t know where to start. I reviewed several student affairs graduate programs online to determine topics to study. In addition, I also regularly monitored topics being discussed on #sachat and #highered.  Monitoring the two hashtags provided me a sense of who are the credible contributors/thinkers which led me to reading their blogs.

Experiment with learning resources and adjust accordingly.  When I shared a diagram of my “social learning network” on twitter, there were a couple of folks who couldn’t believe the number of social networks I use. The diagram actually includes social networking sites I experimented with but may not use regularly. I had to figure out which sites are best suited for learning specific topics. There are sites like Quora and Google+ I rarely use now since I don’t find these sites as valuable as twitter and blogs when it comes to learning about student affairs and higher ed. In the last year, I discovered e-books (kindle) and added them my learning resources. I also started using Evernote as a site to store pretty much anything including notes, photos, web clippings, etc. The beauty and danger of the web and social media is that while there are so much information to consume, it’s easy to get distracted and waste time reading materials not relevant to your areas of study. I think part of digital literacy is the ability to recognize which resources are credible and which ones should be filtered and ignored.

Have a plan and a self-imposed discipline to go with it. There are no deadlines to meet and professors to nudge you to keep learning. Having a plan, including what areas of topics to learn and when to focus on them, is very important. However, be flexible enough in your plan to allow opportunities for experimentation.

This post was meant to provide some general approach to using social media and personal learning networks for self-directed learning. I hope you were able to get some ideas you can apply towards your informal learning. What other ideas would you add?

image credit: http://jfondas.wordpress.com

I sit here in front of my laptop watching the twitter back channel (#naspa13)  and wishing I could have been at the NASPA 2013 Conference in Orlando, Florida. I could have met some of my twitter connections for the first time. There is an immense value to face-to-face interactions when it comes to learning and building communities. I attended NASPATech in Rhode Island a couple of years ago where I learned a lot about technology in higher ed from other folks around the country. I also had good conversations between sessions, at meals, and on our walk to an ice cream shop in freezing temperature at night.

I have been thinking about the ideas of online student services and online education the last few months. It is with this mindset that as I look at the title of this year’s NASPA conference “Bold Without Boundaries”, I start to explore  how we as a profession can extend the boundaries of learning and building communities beyond the physical space  of the Marriott Hotel where the conference is held.

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