Friendships From Across the World

Posted on May 1, 2016October 28, 2016 by David C. Brake

Photo Credit: Didriks

While many LRNGO users meet to learn from each other locally in the same city, or even from a neighbor down the street, others choose to make their community much wider and go around the world. Of course, this requires using a live video chat platform, like Facetime, Google Hangouts or Skype.

One of the things you may find interesting though, is that even among those LRNGO users using video chat, the percentage who prefer to learn from each other remotely when they have a choice is still the minority. When given the choice, roughly 75% of you prefer to list meeting in-person rather than online.

This reminds us that for the majority, although technology is used to facilitate, in the case where you have a choice, face to face is preferable. At the end of the day, learning from each other (especially one-to-one) is most often still a very traditional in-person proposition.

Learning from each other one-to-one is most often still a very traditional in-person proposition.

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Along those lines, some of you who are Skyping each other from afar for language exchange specifically may be interested in eventually meeting in person if it can be arranged. While facilitating these arrangements directly is beyond the scope of the introductory services we provide through LRNGO, you may be interested to know that there is now a website and online platform doing this.

Launched just last month, TalkTalkBnb is a social network for learning languages from local hosts while traveling. The idea is that travelers receive complimentary food and lodging from hosts (people wanting to improve their language skills) in exchange for helping the hosts learn and practice the traveler’s native language throughout their stay.

We all know that language exchange is valuable for accelerating the learning process and is the most cost effective way to receive the benefits of one-to-one language tutoring, but now it can also be used as a means of “currency” for your travels. That’s a real win/win.

Language exchange can now be used as a means of “currency” for your travels with TalkTalkBnb.

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You can find out more here, and hopefully some of you who have met here on LRNGO and are now practicing language exchange remotely can have the opportunity to travel and meet in person by bartering for accommodations. It’s a pretty cool concept that we hope takes off around the world.

We Are ALL In the Education Business

Posted on August 7, 2014January 24, 2017 by David C. Brake

In the late 90’s, I finally got my first cellphone. I fought it for years.

Photo Credit: Frits Ahlefeldt-Laurvig

The idea that I would be on the phone during my quiet time or drive time talking (and probably working) did not appeal to me in the least. Sure there were social benefits, but I wanted time to recharge, unplug, meditate, and collect my thoughts. In short, I wanted down time. Fast forward to 2014.

Now, it would be almost impossible to live without this device. Why is that? (Long live down time, rest in peace.)

Ask yourself: have you ever gone a day without your smartphone or mobile device? If you unplugged from the net and social media, how long would you last–two days perhaps, a week?

Let’s make this a multiple choice question.

With no mobile device, would you feel:

A. Isolated
B. Uninformed
C. Vulnerable
D. All of the above

For many, the answer is D.

In the end, I needed a cellphone because I couldn’t wait to know things any more. I needed to reach people wherever I was, at times to keep in touch for social reasons, but more often to get things done or grab a quick update from someone to assess and learn what needed to be done next.

Now it’s almost impossible to live without a phone. Long live down time, rest in peace.

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As I write this blog, I’m finding it interesting that there are some keywords I just can’t avoid. This is not for SEO purposes (sorry Google), but rather because I can only describe what I’m saying by using these words and they keep popping up. Do you see a pattern yet?

The fact is, I can’t talk about connecting with other people without using the words “know” and “learn.” (Well whaddaya know?) If you think about it (“think”–there’s another one), it’s engrained in our social language.

In fact, I hate to admit it, but it’s no longer just me on the continuous learning bandwagon. How many times have you seen the word “webinar” in your email box lately? There sure seem to be a lot of free classes these days. And how many seminars have you gone to this year? It seems like a lot of expense to put those on, doesn’t it?

I went to a couple of free business strategy meetings and M&A seminars earlier this year, and I learned a lot. I’m not being facitious, I really did. It was a valuable experience, and I couldn’t help being struck by how much they had to educate me in order for me to become their future customer. And that’s when it hit me:

We are all in the education business now. Every one of us.

Whether you’re educating your future customers, current customers, peers, co-workers, employees, investors, the press, the general public, or friends and family; if you want to stay relevant, people need to understand what you’re doing, how it works, and why it’s important. Things are moving too fast for people to pay attention to anything if they don’t understand its value.

We are all in the education business now. Every one of us.

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I also equate this idea with the reason we received so many questions recently at Lrngo from users wanting to know how to promote their expertise and themselves as speakers; which became the subject of two Lrngo blogs earlier this year. So many people with expertise wanted to gain speaking experience and promote themselves by giving presentations, webinars and classes on their topics, that we had to dig in and come up with the information.

This trend isn’t as much about 15 minutes of fame as it is about survival of the fittest. The consultant, service provider or company that doesn’t stay ahead of the curve by educating their target market on why they are needed and what makes them different won’t be around very long.

As we shift to the reputation economy and social media shines the spotlight on the expertise of individuals, the move toward constantly educating and re-educating each other is not likely to subside any time soon. In the words of Denis Waitley, “<you can> never become so much of an expert that you stop gaining expertise.” You have to stay ahead of the curve.

In late 2014, I finally joined Twitter. I fought it for years. It’s amazing how much you can learn from one sentence.

Follow me on Twitter @davidcbrake

Why Thinking Globally Is Required Thinking

Posted on March 2, 2014January 24, 2017 by David C. Brake

Global Knowledge Economy

In 1964, a group of top Hollywood film executives piled into a room to screen their latest investment. It was a departure from the normal films of that day, because even though it was filmed in English, the story didn’t take place in the U.S. and the accents sounded unintelligible. The executives were very concerned about making it a commercial Hollywood release, because it seemed so, well…“foreign.”

At the end of the screening, there was total silence. No applause, nothing. No one knew what to make of it. Finally one executive broke the silence and said he didn’t understand a word of it. “I don’t know what any of that movie was about,” he said. Then he added, “but…I think we’re going to make a lot of money.”

The movie was called “A Hard Day’s Night,” and it was about a new musical group called The Beatles. As we all know today, the executive was right, they were about to make a lot of money. What he didn’t realize at the time, was the extent to which that movie would be a catalyst for everything that was about to change.

The technology of radio, television and film was about to come together at a particular point in history, and enable a phenomenon that arguably would change the world by connecting everyone simultaneously in a shared cultural experience that made the world seem a little bit smaller.

I doubt that Hollywood and the entertainment industry were the only entities in the U.S. at that time to see a new emerging world of possibilities out there for advertising and revenue, and realize that the benefits don’t always require this country to appear at the center.

Fast-forward to the Facebook/social media phenomenon, and the mobile chat phenomenon taking place today. One could argue that people in communities were basically already connected, but now local communities are also connected with the outside world in a way that was previously impossible. Does that change anything? I would argue that it changes everything.

Professors with MOOCs & highly paid tutors are finding fame and fortune that was previously impossible locally, now that technology can be leveraged to connect them with millions of people. Millionaire tutors in Asia with over 50,000 fans (ie: students) online are living like rock stars and advertising on the sides of billboards and buses.

There are eSports heroes (yes professional video gaming is now a sport) more famous in some countries than athletes in traditional sports could ever dream of, and influencers of millions whose opinions are sought after and even paid for, simply because they “own” an audience.

These “personal brands” are the results of a new knowledge economy, an economy where the entire world is connected and people promote themselves and participate together in a project-based workforce; based on skill sets and performance, reputation, and proven history rather than credentials.

Are you connected yet? Is your company? How about your competitors?

Did you know that according to data collected by the US Department of Labor in 2005, one third of our economy here in the U.S is made up of freelancers? (Freelancers are defined as self-employed people, or people who work for themselves on the side in addition to their regular job.)

That figure was published BEFORE the recession. Anyone want to take a guess as to what that number is now? I don’t claim to have the answer, but I would be willing to bet it’s significantly higher.

Is there a downside to the acceleration of technology and connecting the entire world? Sure, in fact I’ll be talking about that topic specifically and how it relates to learning and education this week at SXSWedu in a presentation called Survival in the New Knowledge Economy.

As my co-presenter of that event Federico Pistono eloquently explains in his book “Robots Will Steal Your Job”, there are many challenges alongside the possibilities, and we are already seeing casualties.

At the end of the day though, let’s face it: we still don’t know what connecting everyone is going to look like, and the truth is we’re still getting used to the idea. I think many of us as individuals are internally conflicted, much like the entities that are threatened and want to hold on to power, yet are torn because they see the benefits.

Perhaps we are all a bit like China, throwing down the gauntlet that no Facebook is allowed and sticking to the old rules, while at the same time being curious enough to break down borders sending our students in droves to study in the U.S. (It’s bound to have an effect you know; as they say, information wants to be free.) In any case, it’s a challenging yet exciting time for education, learning, and entrepreneurship.

As I’m writing this, I’m in the middle of managing 45 people from around the world on a company project. I’m able to see their faces, track and vet their work, communicate with them as needed, and offer them incentives based on performance. Sounds like an expensive platform I’m using, doesn’t it? It isn’t, it’s free. Sounds like I’m working for a good size company, right? It’s a pre-revenue startup with a two person management team, and I funded it myself.

Tell me that’s not a game changer. It changes everything.