Should We Be Focusing More On Digital Literacy?

One of the most common failures of technology deployments of any kind is the lack of focus on adoption, change management, and training. Assuming that everyone understands “the basics” and that the technology is “intuitive” masks some of the more fundamental gaps in digital literacy.

Over the past couple months, I had conversations with two fellow MVPs who focus on this topic: Tracy Van der Schyff and Asif Rehmani. Both write and present on this topic quite often, and convinced me that it would be a great topic to tackle as part of this #CollabTalk TweetJam series.

To clarify, “digital literacy” and “computer literacy” are not the same thing. Where the latter focuses on efficient use of our computers and related technology, as Tracy outlines in her blog, “Digital literacy is the ability to effectively and critically navigate, evaluate and create information using a range of digital technologies. It requires one to recognize and use that power (Definitions.net).”

For our next community discussion, we’ll discuss the definition of digital literacy, its impact on digital transformation, and the things you should consider (and avoid) as you build out your own strategy. Join us for this #CollabTalk TweetJam on Tuesday, March 31st at 9am Pacific / 12pm Eastern as we convene to discuss “Developing a Strategy for Digital Literacy.”  Participate in the discussion with other members of the community as we share ideas, discuss pain points, and agree-to-disagree on the tools, methodologies, and KPIs that drive our businesses.

You can join the community discussion using Twitter and the #CollabTalk hashtag or your favorite Twitter platform. You do not need to be an “expert” to participate in the online conversation, and can ask questions, comment on the questions posed, or just “lurk” in the background. These online discussions are open to anyone — you do not have to be on the panel to participate.

This month’s tweetjam and our amazing stats are once again being sponsored by our friends at tyGraph.

If you have never participated in one of these tweetjams, it’s pretty simple: anyone can jump in and share their thoughts, or just lurk in the wings and absorb the wisdom of the crowd. Either way, it’ll be a TON of content to consume in a single hour. You can follow the live session using the Twitter UI of your choice (Twitter.com, Hootsuite, Tweetdeck, whatever). How it works is that I’ll post a series of questions every few minutes, and people will respond to Q1, Q2, Q3 and so forth with A1, A2, A3, always including the #CollabTalk hashtag with their answers. Feel free to reply as often (or as little) as you’d like, ask your own follow up questions, share relevant links, re-tweet others, and engage with the audience.

The questions we will discuss during the session include:

1. How does your organization define Digital Literacy, and what does it mean to you personally?
2. What level of education and training does your organization provide today, and what have been the outcomes?
3. What do you consider the most effective training mediums, and why?
4. What do you consider the greatest barrier to user adoption of cloud technologies?
5. Do the technologies we use today support or promote digital literacy? What can be improved?
6. How is the importance of digital literacy changing during these unprecedented times?
7. For organizations building their digital literacy strategies, what 3 things should they consider?

As always, there will be side-questions, side-conversations, and wise-cracking throughout. This is open to the public, so please join in the discussion! The dialog is always thought-provoking and fun.

Participating on this panel (so far):

• Melissa Sassi (@mentorafrika), digital inclusion advocate, global head of IBM Hyper Protect Accelerator
• Asif Rehmani (@asifrehmani), consultant, trainer and SharePoint MVP at VisualSP
• Tracy Van der Schyff (@tracyvds), Office Servers and Services MVP and principal at The GUIDstuff
• Wes Preston (@idubbs), SharePoint MVP, evangelist,  and owner at TrecStone
• Sean McDonough (@spmcdonough), SharePoint MVP and chief technology officer at BitStream Foundry LLC
• John White (@diverdown1964), SharePoint MVP and cto at UnlimitedViz and tyGraph
• Sue Hanley (@susanhanley), SharePoint MVP, portal, KM, and SharePoint consultant
• Hal Hostetler (@TVWizard), Microsoft MVP and senior field engineer and social media coordinator for Roland, Schorr & Tower
• Ed Senez (@edsenez), president at UnlimitedViz and TyGraph
• Mathew Gilbertson (@MatGilbertson), Microsoft OneNote MVP, and director of Tablet PC Australia
• Heather Severino (@Hfitz11), Office Apps & Services MVP, MCT Regional Lead, MOS Master, MCP, MT and owner at TeachUTech
• Eli Robillard (@erobillard), SharePoint MVP, musician, fly-fisher, collaboration technology guy
• Mike Fitzmaurice (@mikefitz), vp of north america and chief evangelist for WEBCON
• Thomas Stensitzki (@stensitzki), Office Apps & Services MVP and owner of Granikos GmbH & Co. KG
• Kevin McDonnell (@kevmcdonk), senior technical architect at Ballard Chalmers
• Nikkia Carter (@ladygwenavear), worldwide modern workplace tech strategy lead at Microsoft, worldwide commercial business (WCB), one commercial partner (OCP) tech team
• Martina Grom (@magrom), co-founder of atwork.at, Office 365 MVP and Microsoft Regional Director
• Ragnar Heil (@ragnarh), Office Servers & Services MVP and Microsoft alliance manager EMEA for Quest/Metalogix
• Kurt Kragh Sørensen (@KurtKragh),  intranet consultant and owner of IntraTeam.com
• Laura Rogers (@WonderLaura), SharePoint MVP, consultant, and owner of IW Mentor
• Raphael Koellner (@ra_koellner), Office Servers & Services MVP, consultant at Bechtle IT-Systemhouse Cologne
• Nick Brattoli (@Byrdttoli), Microsoft MVP, founder and lead consultant at Byrdttoli Enterprise Consulting
• Rick Garcia (@SilentRick), SharePoint project manager at United Airlines
• Stacy Deere-Strole (@sldeere), SharePoint MVP and owner of Focal Point Solutions
• Tobiasz Koprowski (@KoprowskiT), Data Platform MVP, founder and consultant at Shadowland Consulting
• Harjit Ghaliwal (@Hoorge), Microsoft MVP, IT Pro, technology & social media evangelist
• Jeff Willinger (@jwillie), Office 365 MVP and independent consultant
• Adam Ball (@AdamCBall), co-founder of COUCUG, Teams and Skype for Business MVP
• Kipp Sorenson (@kbes), SharePoint consultant at JourneyTEAM
• and your host, Christian Buckley (@buckleyplanet), Microsoft MVP & RD, founder & ceo of CollabTalk LLC

If you would like to be included on one of these panels, please drop me a line via email, LinkedIn, or Twitter. And thank you again to tyGraph for your support of these CollabTalk tweetjams! And finally, if you are interested in being a sponsor of a future tweetjam, please contact me. Our next tweetjam will be held on Thursday, April 30th.