If you’ve managed to avoid the ice bucket challenge, I can only commend you for managing to stay unplugged from social media on your holidays, you have surpassed me. For the rest of us, this is a cultural phenomenon, which naturally I look through the lens of L&D geekiness to see what we can learn.The act of filming a video clip and posting in on social media is commonplace. However the ice bucket challenge represents the first time for many people that they have successfully followed a multi-step process that they were previously unmotivated to do.
In a corporate setting, when there is a target audience that needs to follow a new process, the typical response has been to provide new materials with detailed knowledge inputs (screen capture e-learning, instructions etc). For the ice bucket challenge there was very little specific guidance. However in its favour there was:
- A clear purpose
- Endorsement by people that others respected
- Peer pressure
- Peer learning
- It was fun.
This evidences that if you get attitude right, then knowledge will follow – people will seek out knowledge when they need it; a far better result for all than being force-fed.
