[best] 70:20:10 is the talk of the town

The discussion that intrigued me most on blogosphere and related communication channels over the past month has been the talks on the 70:20:10 model. If you have never heard of it before, it is a model that suggests we learn 70% from our (tough) experiences, 20% through others and 10% via formal learning. The model is not new, very simple to understand and adopt, and its origins are usually quoted in the Center for Creative Leadership's 1996 book 'Career Architect'.

The month started with an article in Learning Solutions Magazine "Beyond the 70:20:10 model". It begins like this:
“I’m reminded of an old adage from a Professor of mine who used to remind me on a regular basis that ‘not all models are right, but some are useful.’ Unfortunately, I’m not convinced that 70/20/10 is actually useful either.”

The author goes on to question the lack of empirical and peer reviewed evidence of the model and reminds us of other 'urban legends' in the learning field. When faced with a simple model suggesting something matters for 70%, most people will respond by focusing all of their efforts on the big chunk and that indeed is not the point. Then the author suggests to focus rather on Ebbinghaus' learning curve.

I do not think the 70:20:10 model is a divine commandment, or a law or a magical recipe. But it can indeed help us to re-tune the learning environment in line with our acknowledgement that experience and feedback, social interaction and context - next to formal training interactions - are vital and undervalued components of development.

One month later, beginning of August Charles Jennings created an excellent article "Social and workplace learning through the 70:20:10 lens." I'm quoting his 'disclaimer' here:

‘Proof’ 70:20:10 is a reference model or framework. It’s not a recipe. It’s based on empirical research and surveys and also on a wide sample of experiences that suggest adult learning principally occurs in the context of work and in collaboration with others (as the great educational psychologist Jerome Bruner once said ‘our world is others’).
70:20:10 is being used by many organisations to re-focus their efforts and resources to where most real learning actually happens –  through experiences, practice, conversations and reflection in the context of the workplace, not in classrooms. They have found the 70:20:10 framework a useful strategic tool to help them transform the way their organisations allocate resources and approach employee development – whether it’s leadership, management or individual contributor development.
Anyone trying to 'prove' that the percentages fall in exact ratios, or anyone searching for peer-reviewed papers demonstrating the same is not only wasting their time, but clearly doesn't 'get it'. 

Below is his slide deck that illustrates the points of his article. I favorited it the moment I saw it.
The 70:20:10 Framework

View more presentations from Charles Jennings

Other things I enjoyed reading in July are:

• Cathy Moore's checklist (or should I say slider list) approach for strong e-learning design
• Via Harold Jarche's blog I stumbled upon a model called "experience, performance, reflection" once more illustrating the importance of reflection on one's own experience as a driver for learning and performance.
• I think regardless of the terms and conditions we sign, we should all be able to manage (and delete) whatever date we put into whatever social media site. So I was happy to learn a bunch of Googlers created the site dataliberation.org with tools on how to get stuff out of Google services.
• And Inge wrote an excellent article on MOOCs.