Learning Organization

Fundamentals

Learning in organizations is often described as multilevel, meaning that learning can occur at the individual, group, organizational, and interorganizational levels and that learning at one level can [Page 441]affect learning at other levels. The learning that occurs at each level has distinctive characteristics regarding what is learned, how it is learned, and how learning is best accomplished. These differences derive from recognizing that organizations are more than the aggregation of individuals, and therefore, processes such as learning involve more than the accumulation of individual learning. To give a few examples: Context can have a significant effect on individual learning; powerful individuals within the organization can influence what information is transmitted; and social interactions among members of the organization—or with external entities—may increase or decrease the outputs of learning.

In 1990, Peter Senge introduced the concept of the learning organization to describe an organization that continually fosters the learning capacity of its members, enhancing its ability to transform itself in the face of changing conditions. He identified five ways in which organizations can enable long-term competitiveness—systems thinking, personal mastery, mental models, building shared vision, and team learning—of which systems thinking is the most important and integrative. Many practitioners followed Senge’s footsteps and wrote books with their own models of the learning organization. However, researchers have not yet identified a model of the learning organization that is universally applicable.

Learning is a complex process and thus has been conceptualized in a number of different ways. A simple way to think of it is as a cyclical process that links together four elements: individual learning, organizational learning, organizational action, and organizational context.