Social Learning Outperforming Remote Learning
As workplaces are becoming increasingly remote and offering the option for working outside of the office, employers need to find new ways to stay connected with their employees. In doing so, they’ll likely consider remote learning and social learning to see which strategy works best for them to train and stay up-to-date with their team. Considering psychology in the workplace is actually important and will help shape a cohesion between the office space and its employees.
What is social learning?
Social learning is a cognitive learning theory that asserts that this type of learning is affected by responses to outside environmental stimuli. The psychologist who developed this idea, Albert Bandura, identified observation (environmental), retention (cognitive), reproduction (cognitive), and motivation (a mix of environmental and cognitive) as the core elements of this type of learning. With social learning, it’s expected that people will learn from observing others and then imitating them following their observations to replicate what they’ve observed to be “normal” behavior. Often social learning is used by psychologists to point to criminal behavior and aggression. In the workplace, you might see this through the cliche water cooler conversation.
What is remote learning?
True to its name, remote learning is when student and instructor are not physically in the same location and aren’t in a traditional learning scenario. Therefore, learning takes place using video conferences, online forums and discussion boards, email, and other online tools. Students submit materials online to teachers and they are then often given grades and correspondence using some sort of online tools.
Which is better for your office?
According to Forbes, it’s expected that social learning will actually outperform remote learning in 2019.
A Bloomberg study about the two types of learning in the workplace says, “Social learning can take place in informal one-on-one encounters, among teams in the course of real-time problem-solving, communities of practice, through social software, expertise directories, and more.” About 50 percent of companies are already using social learning, the study says, with two-thirds planning to implement a similar strategy moving forward.
Through social learning, it’ll promote autonomy amongst coworkers to increase overall learning. It’s also nice to get away from the trend of online classes and remote activity. In fact, the Forbes article points to the fact that even in successful online classes, there are forums and discussion boards that allow for more social learning tactics to be employed.
