Joint International Workshop on Professional Learning, Competence Development and Knowledge Management - LOKMOL and L3NCD

In many organizations most working processes are very knowledge intensive and involve many people working at different locations and on different tasks. The context in which people are working is changing constantly through changing work processes, different tasks or problems to be solved, and evolving technologies which are used at work. These facts require life-long competence development. Competency development takes mostly place during informal learning at the workplace. The learning process is characterized by self-organized activities such as selecting the environment for learning (e.g., Internet), defining learning goals (e.g., related to a work problem), finding and selecting content for learning (e.g., websites or colleagues), and following a preferred learning path. Beside a continuous formal competence development, sharing knowledge among members of the organizations and making ones knowledge explicit for others is crucial. Working and learning takes place in a network of people, tools, environments, and knowledge. These networks facilitate interaction and communication The use of available e-Learning and Knowledge Management applications in a network setting can help to address the challenge of continuous competence development. However, questions arise how these methodologies and technologies of the different domains fit together in order to ensure that the learned can be transferred to the workplace and to improve the performance of each individual? How can we foster interaction and provide a personalized learning experience according to the current situation and context (e.g., flexible guidance for self-directed learning, adaptive content selection and structuring)? How can we better use existing networks for competence development and how can we ensure that learning goals are based on real-world needs? How can we engage learners and actively involve them in the learning process through interaction?