As I left
Anaheim and the Health Care Management Division of the Academy of Management, I
felt the excitement associated with stepping away from “everyday” work and
engaging with colleagues in an exploration of new ideas. Much like what occurs
hopefully at our Annual Meeting for many of you, AOM and the many other
disciplinary focused meetings enable an in depth exploration of content and
pedagogy issues. We investigate, network with colleagues, and gather
alternative, diverse perspectives. It may give rise to new or newly assembled
ideas that can link disparate sources of information that may spark innovation.
On the
plane home, I stumbled across an editorial in a recent Academy of Management
Journal on the digital workforce and the workplace of the future. The editorial
was a tightly crafted examination of how familiarity with digital technology is
and will continue to shape the work environment. The combination of stimulation
of ideas from the meeting and the editorial, made my mind race. What are the implications
of the digital transformation for us as health care management education
professionals and equally important for the students we prepare. How will the
digital environment specifically impact health care organization, financing and
delivery? How will a digital world influence how we teach and what we teach?
These are all questions that have long been a part of our thinking and in some
ways it is reassuring that the impacts of the digital world identified in the
editorial (strengths and weaknesses) were not entirely new.
Two
points of insight that I gained: digital transition may take time and as
educators, we need to consider how this transition to digital fluency
influences what we do. With respect to time, it was interesting that the
editorial discussed one factor used to differentiate the generations by
defining “digital natives” or those raised with access to information
electronically essentially from birth from “digital immigrants” or those who
were exposed later in life but “rapidly adopted technology as it became
available.” The dichotomy is a great scheme for classifying individuals and is
clearly important as we consider using technology in education and in
healthcare. The simple dichotomy ignores probably the largest portion of
the current workforce, and even some of our students. That is the group that I
call “digital tourists.” The digital tourist visits a new and sometimes strange
land, tries the food, may adopt the dress and customs but usually happily
returns to the safety, security and familiarity of home. Many members of the
work force of the future will not be fully comfortable navigating in the
digital world. Not that they won’t be forced to engage and muddle through but
will never become “digital immigrants.” How do we accommodate those folks as we
design our educational models and the future workforce? Do we leave them
behind?
Many of
you are saying that there can’t be many digital tourists remaining and soon
most of them will have aged out of the workforce. Others, however, recognize
those students and may know many workers in that category. I began working a
real job in the late 1960s and early 1970s in agriculture in a harvest and
packaging organization. Most of my work was pure “grunt” but to my amazement, I
realized that one aspect of my value was that I could read and write unlike
many of the full time workers in the plants. We filled forms, read rules on
safety, and a number of other paper and pencil tasks that had to be done before
we went back to college or would fall upon senior management during the off
season. They accommodated to a still illiterate workforce by temporarily
recruiting a skill, at low wages, to keep the overall workforce productive.
This was long after reading and writing were defined as a basic job skill.
Eventually,
we will all become digital natives but eventually may be many years or decades.
What we teach and how we teach today must meet the needs of all types of
students to enable them to function effectively in an increasingly digital
future. Assuming too much familiarity or competence will not work for the
“tourists” and may not work for the “immigrants” or even all of the “natives.”
Why does
this matter to me in my current position? Clearly members can read and write
but collectively we have highly variable capacity to navigate in the digital
world. We continually strive to become more current in our communications with
members and engage digital aids for developing your individual profile,
responding to surveys, registering for meetings, participating in webinars, to
name a few. Sometimes we have to rely on more ancient means of communication
such as email, phone or snail mail. The consideration of variability in
capacity made me realize how important using multiple means of communication
continues to be for our members.
I am now
reinvigorated by this form of continuing education. Hope that you have
recharged over the summer and are as excited about the Fall as I am.
Enjoy and work to recognize the “tourists” that you teach or work with.