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The purpose of this study is to define characteristics and processes that enhance informal learning in a public sector workplace.

Based on interviews and questionnaires, the authors solicited examples of informal learning practices that 40 supervisors experienced during their careers. The examples were content analyzed to define seven broad themes underlying informal learning.

The findings illustrate seven broad themes describing learning activities and processes. The first three themes describe the types of informal learning activities that supervisors found valuable: relationships; learning opportunities enlarging or redesigning their jobs; and enrichment opportunities that provided higher levels of managerial learning. Four themes describe processes for facilitating informal learning: planning processes; active learning and modelling; relationship dynamics; and tying learning to applications.

The value of this study is in presenting a possible framework defining informal learning that describes both activities (the what) and the underlying processes (the how) by which they are delivered. Beyond this, it suggests that there is a close connection between the activities and the processes underlying them.

This paper examines the transformation of the housing typology in informal neighbourhoods located on the periphery of Dakar, Senegal. More specifically, it documents the spatial logics and factors guiding the construction of new multi-storey houses called “villas”, which are significantly transforming the landscape of the city. Studies have thus far examined villas through the lenses of migrants’ investments and lifestyles, associating these houses with new functions and decorative elements and materials inspired by time spent abroad, with innovative ways of building and dwelling that disrupt more popular housing practices. Based upon an architectural survey of seventeen houses and the detailed stories of their construction, this paper argues that while the Senegalese villa is influenced by global networks and symbols of success, it is also deeply rooted in popular housing forms and building practices. Moreover, because house-building processes are predominantly incremental, the construction of this new house type is not limited to migrants and other privileged dwellers. Although at different speeds, most residents are building and transforming their houses according to spatial and constructive logics characteristic of villas. These results have implications for housing policies and programmes because they contribute to challenging assumptions about residential production, new housing typologies and the pivotal actors of these urban transformations.