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This paper aims to focus on academic library managers’ learning practices in the context of cooperative work supported by computational artefacts. Academic library managers’ everyday work is mainly cooperative. Their cooperation is supported predominantly by computational artefacts. Learning how to use the computational artefacts efficiently and effectively involves understanding the changes in everyday work that affect managers and, therefore, it requires deep understanding of their cooperative work practices.

Focused ethnography was conducted through participant observations, interviews and document analysis. Ten managers from a university library in Sweden participated in the research. A thematic method was used to analyse the empirical material. Computer supported cooperative work (CSCW) and work-integrated learning was used as the conceptual lens.

Five learning practices were identified: collaboration, communication, coordination, decision-making processes and computational artefacts’ use. The findings show that learning is embedded in managers’ cooperative work practices, which do not necessarily include sufficient training time. Furthermore, learning was intertwined with cooperating and was situational. Managers learned by reflecting together on their own experiences and through joint cooperation and information sharing while using the computational artefacts.

The main contribution lies in providing insights into how academic library managers learn and cooperate in their everyday work, emphasizing the role of computational artefacts, the importance of the work context and the collective nature of learning. It also highlights the need for continual workplace learning in contemporary knowledge work environments. Thus, the research generates contributions to the informatics field by extending the understanding of managers’ work-integrated learning in their everyday cooperative work practices supported by computational artefacts’ use. It also contributes to the intersection of CSCW and work-integrated learning.

Informed learning can be enlivened through explicit and persistent attention to using information to learn during collaborative design activities. The resulting information experiences and accompanying information practices in the workplace, when combined with systems principles, can produce transferable individual and group (and, ultimately, organizational) capacity to advance knowledge in ever expanding professional contexts.

In development in North America since 2003, the Informed Systems Approach incorporates principles of systems thinking and informed learning though an inclusive, participatory design process that fosters information exchange, reflective dialogue, knowledge creation, and conceptual change in workplace organizations. It also furthers expression of collaborative information practices that enrich information experiences by simultaneously advancing both situated domain knowledge and transferable learning capacity. Integrated design activities support participants’ developing awareness of the conceptions of information experience and informed learning, in a cyclical and iterative fashion that promotes and sustains continuous learning.

A shared learning focus evolves through intentional use of information to learn, including collective reflection on information sources, collaborative practices, and systems functionalities, which further participants’ topical understandings and enrich their information experiences. In addition, an action-oriented intention and inclusive participatory disposition ensures improvements of real world situations.

To report the outcomes of an organizational change project at California Polytechnic State University in San Luis Obispo, California, USA. Interactive planning and systems thinking provide a robust foundation for rethinking workplace activities, so as to prepare staff members for enhanced participation in an increasingly digital information environment.

The methodology takes the form of a case study.

Organizational development tools activate and extend participants' knowledge, skills, and abilities through purposeful dialogue that cultivates holistic perspectives. Enhanced appreciation of campus constituencies' differing needs and preferences, complimented by ongoing user‐focused data collection and analysis, informs strategic systems and services redesign. This practice serves to promote continuous learning, even as it advances the organization's digital migration. Results‐to‐date suggest the efficacy of this staff development approach, which uses constructivist “building on what we know” learning strategies to develop nimble organizational responsiveness, amidst dynamically changing external circumstances.

Provides information on a staff development approach.

The purpose of this book is to open a conversation on the idea of information experience, which we understand to be a complex, multidimensional engagement with information. In developing the book we invited colleagues to propose a chapter on any aspect of information experience, for example conceptual, methodological or empirical. We invited them to express their interpretation of information experience, to contribute to the development of this concept. The book has thus become a vehicle for interested researchers and practitioners to explore their thinking around information experience, including relationships between information experience, learning experience, user experience and similar constructs. It represents a collective awareness of information experience in contemporary research and practice. Through this sharing of multiple perspectives, our insights into possible ways of interpreting information experience, and its relationship to other concepts in information research and practice, is enhanced. In this chapter, we introduce the idea of information experience. We also outline the book and its chapters, and bring together some emerging alternative views and approaches to this important idea.

This chapter highlights the varied scope of research in the emerging information experience domain. First, I share my perspective as educator-researcher on information experience and its association with informed learning. Then, in six methodological snapshots I present a selection of qualitative approaches which are suited to investigating information experience. The snapshots feature: action research, constructivist grounded theory, ethnomethodology, expanded critical incident approach, phenomenography and qualitative case study. By way of illustration, six researchers explain how and why they use one of these methods. Finally, I review the key characteristics of the six methods and their respective benefits for information experience research.