This past week, I attended a seminar hosted by, Microsoft, Proton Media, a 3D virtual meeting company, and Erica Driver from Thinkbalm.
The title of the event was, “Life Sciences 2010“. It is difficult to say what the focus of the seminar was. Several topics were discussed. As I walked into the lobby I was greeted by Proton Media employees and a book signing by Tony O’Driscoll for his new book, “Learning in 3D“, which he co-authored with Dr. Karl Kapp. My expectation was that the focus would be on learning in 3D virtual worlds in the context of the life sciences industry. That is not what we covered. The seminar was focused on how to manage the cacophony of information, that we deal with everyday, bring it together and make meaning out of it. And with 3D virtual spaces we do not have to manage the information alone, we can invite others into the mental dance in a form of distributed cognition (Hutchins, 1995).
Erica Driver gave a very nice presentation and presented the challenges that we face specifically in the life sciences industry today.
- We are facing more and more mergers and acquisitions. This topic is close to my heart. The company that I work for is in the process of the merger and integration process. It is a very stressful and ambiguous process. You are bringing together two global corporate cultures that have evolved for nearly a century.
- In the life sciences industry, the life cycle to bring a new product to market is anywhere from 10-15 years. During this time, team members come and go, business units re-organize, regulations change and even the needs of the patients change. It is really difficult to keep a consistent ongoing process over such a long period of time.
- We need to practice better cross divisional, cross disciplinary collaboration and communications in the 21st century life sciences industry.
So the question is, how can 3D virtual collaboration environments help to address these issues? This was, I suppose the focus of the seminar. I was hoping for a greater emphasis on creating learning organizations through the use of 3D virtual environments but the focus was truly around the collaboration capabilities of 3D virtual environments which is the current header title line on Proton Media’s website, “Virtual Collaboration for Business.”
I sketched a drawing as Erica and other panel members discussed a concept that suggests that 3D virtual environments have the potential to merge or unify disparate data and information that comes to us in many forms through the business day. These include all forms of information content through web sites, email, voice mail, instant messaging, online learning content, social networking discussions, .. etc. So how do you bring it all together and make meaning out it? How do you construct knowledge that is useful out of all the information streams coming at you every day through multiple channels? Sound familiar? It is starting to sound like constructivist theories for learning.
Another point made is that we live in a 3D context all the time. We do not work and collaborate on a flat 2 dimensional surface. We meet, collaborate, problem solve and learn in a 3 dimensional space. However most of us stare into a iPhone, Blackberry or laptop at a 2D screen with multiple channels of information which can sometimes be quite overwhelming. So imagine bringing all that information together in a single room and placing it on the walls, in 3D charts and graphs and even 3D objects. Now walk into your room of information with a few friends. It is sort like inviting friends into your mind to see how you are bringing it all together in a synthesis of contextualized information. Let’s add a bit here, take a little away there, analyze it and synthesize it some more. It is truly a cognitive extension of you brain, a place to keep your thoughts in a 3D virtual folder.
The space doesn’t have to look like your cluttered desk. It should be your happy place like the middle of a field with some trees, birds chirping and maybe a babbling brook. Place your stuff there, move it around, think about it and when your are ready, invite some of you colleagues in to add some of their thoughts.
References
Hutchins, E. (1995). Cognition in the wild. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press.