Reflections

In April 2011, I started this blog - with three postings about my doctoral studies. I reflected on what motivates me in formal education - focusing on how important it is for me to combine formal and informal learning.

In February 2012, I began writing on assignement 3 in module 804 Leadership and Project Management in Distance Education. I started with a traditional format of a academic paper. Halfway through the assignement, I wanted to link to some papers and publications I have produced in the past - and suddenly, I saw my existing blog as an obvious solution. When I first got started to post, my blog emerged and it turned into assignment 3. So, I left the traditional paper and for four weeks, I have worked on the blog daily - reflecting on my work and studies, reviewing literature, designing the blog, adding journals, tools and other resources. It is quite another genre than a traditional paper. A blog never stops. Every posting has to be a complete text: you cannot expect people to read all your postings.

Eventhough, I have wrote and edited blogs before related directly to my work and my personal life, I have never worked on a blog linking work, academic studies, past, present and future perspectives. It has been an interesting process in which the blog has emerged on basis of what I have read, observed, reflected and acted on. It has also been an important period in my work life. On one hand, I have simultaneously worked on a Singapore case study on leadership in higher education. On the other hand, I was struck by lightning when my leader was not reinstated - so I have learned new things about leadership in practice in higher education. Formal and informal learning has been intensely interacting.

I am sure, I will work on the blog in the future. It will emerge - and my blog-postings from March and April 2012 will have a different meaning when I look at them in 2013.

Finally, permit me to assert that I have tried to work as a bricoleur - with "knowledge of resources, careful observation, trust in one's intuition, listening, and confidence that any enacted structure can be self-correcting if one's ego is not invested too heavily in it" (Weick, 2001, p. 63). It has been my hope and dream! I will let others decide whether I succeeded.

Reference
Weick, K. E. (2001). Making sense of the organization. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing