Life Long Learning System Plays an Important Role in Leading Corporate World

Abstract

In the past several decades, we have witnessed unprecedented social and technological change that has had profound implications for the nature of work. Such acceleration of change necessitates flexibility, the ability and ambition to continuously learn, and a willingness to experiment and take risks. In response, many national governments and industry leaders have emphasized the virtues of facilitating lifelong learning at work. Indeed, facilitating lifelong learning has been touted as a solution to remaining competitive. However, lifelong learning is only a concept. For it to be practical, it must be operationalized into steps from which organizations can follow. The extant research literature is scant in telling us how organizations actually implement lifelong learning practices and policies. Hence, the purpose of this paper is to describe how lifelong learning is grounded in practice. We do this by introducing a new conceptual framework that was developed on the basis of interviews with a number of leading edge corporations from Canada, the USA, India and Korea. At the heart of our model, and any effective lifelong learning system, is a performance management system. The performance management system allows for an ongoing interaction between managers and employees whereby challenging performance and learning goals are set, and concrete plans are made to achieve them. Those plans involve three types of learning activities. First, employees may be encouraged to engage in formal learning. This could be provided in-house, or the employee may take a leave of absence and return to school. Second, managers may deploy their subordinates to different departments or teams, so that they can take part in new work-based learning opportunities. Finally, employees may be encouraged to learn on their own time. By this we mean learning after organizational hours through firm-sponsored 5 programs, such as e-learning courses. Fueled by the performance management system, we posit that these three learning outlets lead to effective lifelong learning in organizations. Our model also stipulates that the three avenues of learning are mutually reinforcing. Formal training may enable an employee to participate in a work assignment in a different department. A work assignment may encourage employees to complete e-learning courses to support their work-based learning. Learning on one’s own time may lead to a promotion, and more formal training. In sum, the three ways of engaging in learning are mutually reinforcing. They are directed by the performance management system to ensure that learning is focused on organizational objectives. This paper provides texture to our theoretical model. We demonstrate how leading organizations use performance management systems to encourage lifelong learning. We also provide examples of how formal training is used to meet organizational goals, how work assignments are leveraged so that individuals have the ability to learn, and how organizations are increasingly providing opportunities for individuals to learn on their own time.