Jay Cross

It was probably about 2004-5 when I first came in touch with Jay Cross and his work. I was moving from education into workplace learning, and his ideas about informal learning struck a chord with me.

The thing about his writing was not so much that it was new and ground-breaking, but more that it set out clearly and succintly things that just made sense.

There have been many times when I’ve pointed people towards his simple diagram comparing investment in learning interventions with the amount of learning that actually takes place. And even more times when I described the difference between informal and formal learning using his graph (shown below).

Graph comparing informal and formal learning

Jay was always gracious and generous when asked for permission to use his work. Although I never had the opportunity to discuss ideas with him, his character shone through in his writing and his videos.

As a community of learning professionals I have lost one of my leaders - who wasn’t afraid to set a direction and go all out for it.

RIP Jay. We’ll miss you.


Posted: 09 November 2015

Tags: Learning design

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