Virtual communities of practice: overcoming barriers of time and technology.

Abstract

Barnett et al should be congratulated for their fascinating report into the use of virtual communities of practice for family physician training [1]. It is interesting that the respondents reported time as a barrier to their participation in the community of practice. Undoubtedly, it would have taken them time to take part, but the amount of time needed should be placed in context and compared with the time needed to partake in face-to-face communities of practice. Face-to-face participation would take far more time—not least the time required to travel to the venue of the community of practice meeting. So in truth, virtual communities of practice are far more likely to be time saving. However the feeling that time was a barrier cannot be dismissed out of hand. The fact that trainees felt it to be a barrier may say more about how the medical education community views the virtual world. Do we take learning in virtual communities as seriously as we take face-to-face learning? What would be the response of a tutor or trainer if a trainee requested study leave to participate in online education? Would they be as accommodating as they would be to a trainee who requested leave to attend an event? Is virtual learning something that trainers and trainees see as an activity to be undertaken in users’ own time? These questions are important—not least because time is money in all areas of life and not least in medical education. [2] Second, there was the issue of technology and some users feeling less comfortable using chats and wondering whether webinars might be made available in future generations of the virtual community. With the increasing availability of broadband Internet and the players required for creating and watching webinars, there is no reason why this cannot happen. The users may also discover unexpected benefits from webinars. Foremost among these might be the ability to learn communication and team-working skills, which they will be able to do much more easily by means of watching and interacting with videos. This might be particularly useful for users who have not trained in Australia. [J Med Internet Res 2014;16(7):e185]