Building Learning Organizations Research Articles

Building learning organizations: The individual‐culture interaction

AbstractLeaders working to transform the culture of their organization often observe that the reason the organization is not changing is that the employees themselves are not changing. However, employees who have been hired and promoted for years because of their ability to compete internally find it difficult to exhibit such qualities as openness and willingness to participate when top leaders determine that these qualities would benefit the organization.Based on a recent study, this article presents findings on how critically reflective employees change their organization and on which factors within the corporation encourage or inhibit their learning. It examines programs for change in light of current learning theory and offers suggestions for developing and encouraging critically reflective employees.

Management practices in learning organizations

Organizational learning will become even more critical as organizations face permanent “white water.” Peter Vaill, who coined this term, indicates that, in the old days, managers could simply paddle their canoes around on calm, still lakes and go anywhere they wanted to go. Today, those same managers have hit white water, and there is no end in sight. Building learning organizations requires that leaders develop employees who see their organization as a system, who can develop their own personal mastery, and who learn how to experiment and collaboratively reframe problems. Regrettably, too many leaders focus their attention on “adaptation”—a patterned response to events based on “old programming” (to return to Zuboffs machine metaphor). Not only do they practice adaptive learning, they also reward it. In generative learning organizations, leaders and employees give up these reference points and learn to accept, embrace, and seek-not simply change-but transformation. Despite the inroads made by Japanese and other competitors into new technologies, many U.S. firms still remain on the forefront of product and process innovation in a great many industries. New industries are forming every day, while many others are converging and consolidating. These changes represent opportunities for U.S. managers bent on becoming fast and aggressive learners. Organizations that foster generative learning as part of their underlying reward system and culture are able to improve their sources of competitive advantage because mistakes are translated into valuable learning experiences. Given the fervent pace of technology diffusion and change, firms need to be able to experiment with a host of different approaches to product and process development, some of which may not be initially successful. But, given a learning orientation, all of these approaches will provide new insights that could be applied to future endeavors. Yet, generative learning in many ways works against the experience and training of managers accustomed to reward systems and cultures that foster adaptive learning. The process of “un-learning” previous mindsets is a difficult task in itself. Inculcation of such organizational features as empathy, humility, and personal efficacy are vital first steps to help the firm move away from static, risk-averse patterns of behavior to proactive, risk-taking learning.

Mental models

The discipline of managing mental models—surfacing, testing, and improving our internal pictures of how the world works—promises to be a major breakthrough for building learning organizations.

Shifting the Paradigm for Health Care Leadership

In his article, Bruce Vladeck maintains that health care have fallen short of the demands placed on them over recent years--often responding in reactive and self-protective ways to their environment. Vladeck calls for new generation of health care leaders who would recognize the qualitative difference between health care leadership and leadership in other fields; would adopt a long view creating within their organizations a purpose and culture that attempts to identify and fulfill important and continually changing community needs; would communicate effectively to both internal and external constituencies; and would inspire others to follow their leadership. His call for a new generation of implies a gap between the demands placed on today's health care and the skills and values they currently possess. This gap, however, may be even greater than Vladeck has led us to believe and will undoubtedly widen. Not only must health care executives in the '90s lead organizations of today, they bear the responsibility for preparing their organizations for a new century. Throughout his article, Vladeck assumes that the current system will prevail during the coming decade. Our research indicates a paradigm shift for the delivery of health care and the demands placed on health care leaders. In the next century, we expect to see health care moving away from its present fragmentation toward a seamless, continuum of services. Executives must begin to design and steward these new rather than continue to search for better ways to manage health care organizations as we know them today. The culture, structure, and systems of tomorrow's health care organizations demand a new type of leader--a transformational leader whose responsibilities are organizational in nature. Leaders will focus less on accomplishing tasks and more on developing people and managing processes. Traditionally, we have viewed as heroes--those special individuals who rise to the top during a crisis, setting the direction, making all the decisions, and energizing the troops. This myth, however, reinforces a short-term focus, neglecting the benefits of learning, thinking, and acting on all levels of complex organizations. The leader's new work, according to management expert Peter Senge, is to build learning organizations, organizations that are creative and can adapt readily to change. The rate at which organizations learn may become the only sustainable source of competitive advantage. Rather than charismatic decision makers, tomorrow's are designers of organizations where people are continually expanding their capability to shape the future. A transformational leader has the capability to shift the focus from problem solving to creating new visions that challenge the prevailing mental models. Creating organizational purpose is not enough. Leaders must promote a shared vision of the future that permeates throughout the organization and provides the guiding focus for current and future activities. They must communicate a personal passion and conviction that flows from a fundamental belief in that vision. TEAM LEADERSHIP Leaders must recognize their personal strengths and weaknesses--using their time and skills for high-leverage activities and orchestrating others to accomplish objectives and realize organizational vision. The health care leader's ability to build and manage teams becomes one of his or her most critical competencies. Health care organizations are so complex and the demands on so varied that it is impossible for one individual to fulfill all expectations. No single individual can operate today's complex internal organization, work effectively within the community, and direct the future of the total health care system. Leaders must possess the ability to choose and inspire a team of people with the diverse skills to accomplish the job. …