About Paul

I'm the director of sales and marketing at Dashe & Thomson. I've worked in sales and marketing with various organizations, including 3M, the Minnesota Timberwolves, Ionix Medical, and the Itasca Project. I live and breathe Minnesota sports and love golfing, boating, skiing, traveling, and attending live music.
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AR: Augmenting the Reality of Learning

AR: Augmenting the Reality of Learning

by on March 6, 2012 in Augmented Reality

Introduction to AR

Augmented reality (AR), as defined by the infallible Wikipedia, is a live, direct or indirect, view of a physical, real-world environment whose elements are augmented by computer-generated sensory input such as sound, video, graphics or GPS data.  It differs from virtual reality in that it modifies the real world instead of replacing it with a simulated one.

Like many of you, my first look at augmented reality (AR) came via 80s action movies (e.g. Robocop and Terminator).  These half-man, half-machines were seen to have superpowers, due in large part to their AR.  They would simply look around and instantly get the identities of people close by, a description of their weapons if those people were armed, and detailed maps of their surroundings.  Futuristic performance support, if you will.

At the time, this computer-generated reality was nothing less than fiction.  It was a world so foreign, we could …

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We’re the Same, But We Like Different

We’re the Same, But We Like Different

by on October 17, 2011 in Learning Retention, Learning Style Theory

So…do you remember the last time you heard someone make an excuse for forgetting a vital piece of information, claiming it’s clearly not their fault because they are a visual learner?  Well, turns out they were full of it.

Doug Rohrer, a psychologist at the University of South Florida, has looked very closely at the learning style theory over the last several years and has found no evidence to suggest that multiple learning styles exist among different people.

Similarly, psychologist Dan Willingham at the University of Virginia says teachers should not tailor instruction to different kinds of learners.  He claims we’re on a more equal footing than we may think when it comes to how our brains learn.

Both psychologists recommend scrapping the learning style theory altogether, and instead, believe we should figure out similarities in how our brains learn, rather than differences.

So what does this mean for training …

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Strengthening Social Learning In the Workplace

Strengthening Social Learning In the Workplace

by on September 13, 2011 in social learning

The training industry has seen plenty of debate around whether or not organizations can and should take steps to strengthen social learning.  Everyone agrees that social learning is very important and that somewhere between 70% and 80% of all learning is done socially and/or informally.  Many thought leaders in the industry believe social learning is something that happens spontaneously and continuously, and that any attempt by an organization to capture, share or strengthen these critical informal learning processes instantly formalizes them.

I just don’t buy it.  Harold Jarche defines social learning as “the lubricant of networked, collaborative work.”  I love that definition!  But Harold, Peter Isackson and Jay Cross go on to argue that the fundamental key to the success of [social learning] is the notion of “self-organized groups who learn on their own.  If education is to become truly non-invasive, it must refrain from defining both the goals and …

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Social Learning Has Its Place…And Informal Learning Does Too.

Social Learning Has Its Place…And Informal Learning Does Too.

by on August 11, 2011 in Informal Learning, social learning

Two weeks ago Jane Hart wrote an article titled, Social Learning: to be or not to be?, in which Jane expresses her dislike of the term Social Learning (big S, big L).  Jane claims that “Social Learning has come to refer exclusively to the use of social media in top-down, formal learning.”  She also states that “social learning (small S, small L) happens continuously – freely and openly – in everything we do – in work, learn and study.”

Although I usually agree with Jane and am humbled by her otherworldly stature within the learning community, I’m going to pick a bone here.  I’ll begin by saying that an overwhelming number of terms we use within this industry are so vague, ambiguous and all-encompassing that it’s hard to fit anything into a nice, neat category.

That being said, I believe Jane’s first misstep occurs when she uses the term …

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The Three Critical Success Factors for Successful ERP Deployment

The Three Critical Success Factors for Successful ERP Deployment

by on July 28, 2011 in ERP Training

Over the last two decades, the ERP market has grown by leaps and bounds.  The ERP system has become an integral part of any large, successful enterprise.  Analyst reports suggest that the ERP market is currently about $40 billion in total revenue, consistently ranks among the top IT spending priority for enterprises, and is expected to grow to over $50 billion by 2013.

Yet many analysts and data indicate that more and more ERP implementations are failing to meet their stated objectives.  According to the Project Management Institute (PMI), nearly 70% of all ERP deployment projects fail, are late or go over-budget.  Panorama Consulting, in its “2010 ERP Report,” found that 57% of such projects take longer than planned, 54% go over-budget, and 41% fail to realize at least half the expected benefits.

ERP deployments are large in scope and have many moving parts, impacting nearly the entire user …

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