Dear Client:

Stop a minute to consider what it’ll be like to be literate in the 21st Century…

A profound shift is taking place in the way people communicate, express themselves.
What’s happening?  The 21st Century literate combine images, sounds, words with alacrity to communicate ideas, tell stories, design products, advertise services, hold meetings, explain issues, teach concepts, discuss direction.  Computers themselves are a dimension of the new language, transforming the other elements, enabling the crafting of messages like never before.  It goes well beyond the concept of convergence which is mostly about technology.
21st Century literacy will transform the way we learn, run our businesses, cities.
To compete, companies, organizations, communities must become fluent…
sooner not later…or risk being left behind.  The cumulative evidence leaves no doubt.

In 21st Century terms, I recently learned I’m illiterate and so, likely, are you.  I mean no disrespect here.  I know you can read and write. You’re sophisticated in expressing yourself. You did well in school…made the honor roll…received a college degree. 
But, it’s no longer enough to put words to paper or computer.  It won’t cut it any more.
That sums up conversations I participated in over the last few months with leaders in the 21st Century literacy field.  They persuaded the most skeptical among us.

Some 21st Century literacy descriptors...many from a meeting of “who’s who” experts in the field held in early 2005.  Their thoughts are in a report issued by The New Media Consortium and available on-line at www.nmc.org/projects/literacy/index.shtml.
It’s multimodal.  It includes layers of meaning not assessable by traditional language skills.  Young people are adept at using the new literacy, even prefer it.
It includes creative fluency as well as interpretive facility.  21st Century literacy means having the ability to articulate and create ideas in the new form.
It means learning a new grammar with its own rules of construction.  Hence the need for education in the area.  The grammar is not entirely understood but is intuitive to young people.  Digital natives easily grasp how to combine all the elements to enhance communication.  Think of it as a new syntax…both systemic and sequential.
It lends itself to interactive communication. Much more than words alone, people respond, talk through ideas, concepts.
It provokes emotional responses.  The combination of words, pictures, sound hook people…sometimes more profoundly than with traditional means.

Anecdotal evidence of changes to 21st Century literacy are all around…
It used to be that knowing how to use Power Point was enough…not today
Some companies, organizations are zooming ahead…using the new literacy.
At Hewlett-Packard, internal consultants use elements of 21st Century literacy to design, lead virtual meetings.  Not your father’s conference calls.
At Yahoo, software product designers are using quick-draw techniques to design software.  The images resonate all the way to top management.
I see other examples in working with clients, talking with colleagues…
At a training company, an executive tells how trainees in their early 20’s can no longer be reached with methods that worked only a year or two ago.  A revamp is in the offing.
At a private Dallas High School, teachers are revising their lectures, using new technology to teach history, English, other subjects.

What does your organization have to be good at to claim it’s 21st Century literate?  It’s a broader list than you might think…operating on several levels.  Much of this list comes from a couple of leading thinkers in the 21st Century literacy area…David Sibbet, founder of The Grove Consultants International and Kristina Hooper Woolsey, a consultant and former head of Apple Computer’s think tank. 
Ability to blend words, images and sounds to tell the story, deliver a message.  That means having quick draw capabilities, writing in several dimensions, using sound creatively…and knowing when to use which elements and how to synthesize it all…using a computer.  Everyone will have to be facile in making and understanding non-text documents.
On another level…ability to listen more deeply…using multiple senses, seeing different things in the same context, being a whole learner.  Think extreme receptivity, reperceiving, panoramic thinking.  And combining learning, intelligence AND entertainment.
Ability to talk about talking (as in communication) and to talk in metaphors…
different than just being bathed in talk and metaphors.
Understand any kind of media is a medium that in itself is a message.  PowerPoint pushes information.  Face-to-face implies connection. 

On a third level…ability to make the most of what 21st Century literacy offers…
A focus on being smart, not on writing bunches of reports and valuing them by the pound.  New ideas, new perspectives must be highly valued, even if not always adopted.
Respect for non-hierarchical interconnections.  Even in a hierarchy, professionals must make many connections with colleagues across power boundaries on an ad hoc basis for particular projects.
Identification with team, even as teams change over the months and years.  Professionals must be facile about their identities, moving within the company frequently to get something done.  The company organizations must change often to keep things organizationally fluid.

Several critical uncertainties will affect how 21st Century literacy spreads.  Credit Erik Smith at the Global Business Network for helping to surface these examples:
International technology standards.  Whether, where they go will impact new literacy.
Intellectual property rights.  Will the new communication be protected and how much?
Intergenerational relationships.  Will the kids teach the parents and grandparents how to be literate?  Or will they ignore the old fogies, shut them out as they build their world?
Deeper understanding of cognitive learning.  What about memory chip implants into our brains?  A far out idea to be sure!  But other advances in the cognitive area may have impacts.
Does more information equal more clarity or more confusion?  Maybe the human animal won’t be able to make as much sense of 21st Century language as experts think.
The question of language:  English or Chinese?

In sum, 21st Century literacy together with its opportunities and drawbacks is upon us. As we become more fluent, learn specific ways organizations can incorporate 21st Century fluency into their organizations, we’ll keep you posted.
   

 

Yours very truly,

Principal, Conbrio

 

For more about our processes, tools and practices – including our visual tools – visit our website
at www.conbrioamericas.com, e-mail me at bbancroft@conbrioamericas.com or call me
at 214-941-8199.

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