During my residency at Royal Roads University, I encountered the world of academic writing. I had previously done mild research and did not fully understand the world of scholarly journals. As part of one of our team assignments, we were to review scholarly journals and I was fortunate to be on the team to investigate Journals focused on learning. We viewed the journals from the eyes of personas in order to understand motivation and goals. This was very similar to what I have experienced with usability testing with websites and applications. To understand the user you must get into the mind of the user, therefore personas are a great way to bridge the divide.
Traversing the Yellow Brick Road of research was made a little easier now that the team could use the personas to review Emerald Group Publishing‘s journal, The Learning Organization. Most of what I reviewed were case studies that featured practical recommendations as best practices. All very relevant to the HR managers, leaders and researcher and practitioners that would be attracted to this journal. The articles within the journals use primary Quantitive and Qualitative cultures of inquiry.
Limitless learning: assessing social media use for global workplace learning was particularly interesting. The research paper aims to review social media as a transformational tool for international organisations to increase opportunities for collaboration and create learning communities.
This journal resonates with me as I myself and uncovering how a community can be fostered through online collaboration with my peers. We are starting to create our own community of practice for academic research. Sharing our knowledge in real time through our blogs, mobile apps and discussion boards. We share a passion for our subject matter and want to learn how to do it better.
I’ve just walked down this yellow brick road and looking forward to finding what is at the end of it.
Reference
Breunig, K. J. (2016). Limitless learning: Assessing social media use for global workplace learning. The Learning Organization, 23(4), 249–270. doi:10.1108/tlo-07-2014-0041
wenger-trayne (2015).Introduction to communities of practice: A brief overview of the concept and its uses. Retrieved from http://wenger-trayner.com/introduction-to-communities-of-practice/
Stephany Castilla 
One Comment Add yours