How to manage a learning organisation
A concept that continues to attract the management experts and practitioners is 'the learning organisation'. Such an organisation encourages everyone who works in it, or who has contact with it, to learn. It focuses on the 'learning habit': so that any activities undertaken for reasons of production, marketing, problem-solving, or customer service, for example, will also yield a harvest of learnings, reflections, insights, and new ideas for action. To turn your company into a learning organisation, take account of the following points...
1. Learn to learn-or you won't survive.
Mike Marquart writes that our large dinosaur organisations with pea-sized brains that flourished in the past cannot breathe and survive in today's new atmosphere of rapid change and intense competition. The survival of the fittest is quickly becoming the survival of the fittest-to-learn, he says. The advocates of learning organis-ations warn that traditional models won't cope in today's rapidly changing and increasingly technological society. The real issue today is one of knowledge management.
2. Focus on your people.
A learning organisation is achieved only if its people are eager to learn new ways of thinking. Peter Senge's message in The Fifth Discipline is simple-the learning organisation values and believes that competitive advantage derives from continued learning, both inductive and collaborative. He believes that people should be encouraged to put aside their old 'mental models', learn to be open with others, understand how their organisation really works, agree on a shared vision, and work together as a team to achieve a common purpose. In Senge's own words, a learning organisation is
'a group of people who are continually enhancing their capability to create their future… by changing individuals so that they produce results they care about and accomplish things that are important to them'.
From hiring the right people to creating an environment in which people are free to fail, your influence as manager will be vital in this regard.
3. Reflect on your new leadership role.
Senge sees the manager of a learning organisation as an ideal-the 'servant leader'-appealing to deeply held beliefs in the dignity and self-worth of people and the democratic principle that a leader's powers are given from those led. Together, manager and staff must develop towards a shared vision based on mutual trust and risk-taking.
