On Thursday 15th October I gave a talk to an audience at Ignite Cardiff in the Wales Millennium Centre entitled: “If I drive a car does that make me a mechanic?”. It was 5 minute presentation in which I was trying to communicate a core message about how we consider, evaluate and measure knowledge in the age of fast pacing technology.
Increasingly we are seeing hundreds of uses of the term ‘Social Media Expert’ or ‘Web Expert’ on websites, titles, business cards, job descriptions and blog posts about “10 signs of a social media expert’. This is not a new phenomena, we have been interested in expertise and knowledge for generations, who has it, how do you recognise it, how do you measure it, how do you store or capture it?
This is especially evident as it pertains to technology. From computer expertise, to database expertise, system expertise, web expertise, social web (media) expertise. However technology is changing so rapidly, and our ability to keep up and keep abreast of the increasing tide of information starts to beg the question – can anyone really be a technology expert?
From this talk, my intention was to pose to the audience to consider that:
- expetise is about knowledge (type, scope, how acquired) not just usage behaviour, something we often use as a proxy for knowledge.
- different knowledge is acquired in differing contexts so although two things might be similar or related, doesn’t mean you have same knowledge in both.
- think about the terms you use to describe your knowledge, experience and understanding of technology, for what we think we know, doesn’t correlate to what we actually know and terms/labels can be misleading.
- If someone calls themselves a social web (media) expert, chances are they are still learning (and that’s ok!) – its a new young and rapdily changing field. We are all learning. But many of us are not experts.
You can watch my talk below at Ignite Cardiff:
You can also view and download the slides from slideshare or through Issuu:
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@Elio_Assuncao Wrote a blog post today about #igniteCardiff talks main key points & slides! Hope it helps! http://bit.ly/2e6mC7
This comment was originally posted on Twitter
@Elio_Assuncao Wrote a blog post today about #igniteCardiff talks main key points & slides! Hope it helps! http://bit.ly/2e6mC7
This comment was originally posted on Twitter
great article and easy to read.
Thanks Elio. It was quite difficult to convey all my thoughts in a 5 minute talk, especially when nervous. But hope this blog post provided some more information for you about my intended message.
check out @drkellypage talking at #igniteCardiff on what makes a social media expert http://bit.ly/2e6mC7
This comment was originally posted on Twitter
Great talk – wish I was there to catch it in person – love the analogy used and the emphasis placed on the 'difference' in knowledge through it's acquisition and more importantly its application (rather than simply usage)…
*claps*
You could have cut that down to about 20 seconds – “Do you use social media or do you understand how to use it? just like can you drive or do you know how to make a car work?” I'm sure your dad was chuffed you got in all the stuff about trucks though!
Comparing social media “experts” with mechanics isn't a good comparison – mechanics would be the people building the stuff – better comparison would be with double glazing sellers