Business Review By David A Garvin, On Building A Learning Organization Essay

Many companies are very keen and ready to clinch Work Base Learning in an organization, not mainly because it provide you with lifelong learning, but also it is an important ingredient of what Senge (1990) has termed as the ‘learning organization’. A learning organization is a place in which the learning and flair of persons is backed and promoted so that the organization itself be able to form its future and it also very important to gain competitive advantage.

For most companies, identifying what a learning organization should be and actually becoming one is tricky at best, impossible at worst. One way that manager's and companies can promote the concept of being a learning organization is to assess whether the company is in need of a short-term fix or whether it is more focused on long-term results. Organizational learning is a long-term activity that will build competitive advantage over time and requires sustained management attention, commitment, and effort. Learning organizations maximize their competitive positions during strong economic times and they prudently train their employees and prepare for change even in turbulent times. As a result, learning organizations and learning

Learning at an organization is more of a self-conducted activity, and is a continuous process that lasts the entire cycle of the organization and the tenure of the employee. Nevertheless, each organization must effectively employ certain training and development activities for new as well as seasoned employees in order to accomplish different objectives:-

I believe that Organizational learning is an area of expertise within an organizational system that studies models and philosophies about the method an organization understands and acclimates (Vasenska, 2013); Organization-wide on going logic which heightens its collective ability to accept, make sense of, and respond to internal and external change. Organizational learning is more than the totality of the intelligence understood by employees. It involves orderly

Batool, H., & Riaz, S. (2011). Factors for making an organization ‘a learning organization’. Retrieved on August 26, 2011, from http://www.trikal.org/ictbm11/pdf/OB/D1132-done.pdf

Week 9 lecture on Individual learning we came across that in an organization learning derives from the individual learning from each member of the organization. Consequently, individual learning is crucial for organizational learning. Learning is defined as gaining knowledge or skill. Thus, learning incorporates two meaning 1) knowing how-to which is implies the ability to act and 2) Know-why, which shows the

Throughout our final semester of study at Maryville, our cohort has studied Peter Senge’s, The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization. Rather than set of management practices, the book describes how organizations, especially those that are sustainably competitive, know how to learn. These “learning organizations” are continuously learning how to work together, where the norm is producing their best. In the book, Senge identifies five essential elements, that when practiced together, create perfect conditions for an effective learning organization. These five practices are Personal Mastery, Mental Models, Shared Vision,

     In his book The Fifth Discipline, Peter Senge emphasizes his model of a "learning organization," which he defines as "an organization that is continually expanding its capacity to create its future." A learning organization excels at both adaptive learning and generative learning.

An organization’s capability to learn and convey that learning into action quickly, is the supreme competitive advantage. The learning organization is the structure that eases the realization of such competitive advantage, it empowers employees, it deepens and enhances the customer experience and cooperation with main business partners and eventually improves business performance. Organizational learning is considered as the suitable process to develop knowledge resources and capabilities/core competencies (human capital, social capital and organizational capital) that engender ongoing values; which in turn yield persistence superior performance; which lead to sustainable competitive advantage within the context of the strategic management.

Stage 4 - Companies in this stage have broad analytic capabilities for solving local problems, but not at the organization level. Due to duplication of efforts and lack of appropriate employee skill sets and attitudes, the organization has some work to do to reach this level of analytical maturity. The CEO and executive team are supportive of analytical focus, but are not passionate about competing on this basis.

Building blocks learning organizations should be skilled in are 1) Systematic problem-solving: A wide range of organizations used this method worldwide since it depends on the scientific method. It starts with making an observation, gathering data/information regarding that observation to form a hypothesis. A hypothesis is a proposed description of the observation made on the available evidence (in the form of data). One of the pioneers of the quality control, W Edward Deming calls it “Plan, Do, Check, Act” cycle while others refer as “hypothesis-generating, hypothesis testing” techniques. This method outlaw’s focus on guess work or intuitive mode of problem-solving considering self-made assumptions. Although the scientific method is time taking than intuitive approach. The former leads to a high-quality solution and support effective problem-solving. One can also derive this as the fact-based management since it first collects data, analyze it, draws conclusions, and decides whether to proceed to the succeeding level or reject the hypothesis or modify to further continue. Various simple statistical tools, for instance, histogram, Pareto charts, correlations, cause and effect diagram assist in data analysis to draw results. The problem-solving method is a beneficial method when it comes to solving a complex problem. Training programs concentrate on problem-solving techniques using exercise and practical examples. Xerox has mastered this approach below. Step 1. Problem

Organization Development (OD) is a deliberately planned, organization-wide effort to increase an organization's effectiveness and/or efficiency, and/or to enable the organization to achieve its strategic goals (2015, Wikipedia).

The world offers significant business opportunities for every company, however, opportunities are accompanied by significant challenges for managers. Managing global operations across diverse cultures and markets represents a big challenge and opportunity for companies. To compete in the global market and be successful, companies must learn the strategies, policies, norms and technology necessary to conduct international business. The opportunities for global expansion are numerous, and attaining success is a matter of developing the right strategy to win local markets and its consumers.

Peter Senge argues that not only we humans learn, but organizations also. However, learning itself may not be enough for the organization to survive in this ever-challenging era. In his book, The Fifth Discipline, Senge introduced five ‘disciplines’, namely systems thinking, personal mastery, mental models, building shared vision, and team learning, that characterizes an organization as a learning organization.

An organization’s survival depends on factors such as increasing their market share in the industry, eliminating competitors, increase bargaining power with customers, successful collaboration; etc. However, perhaps the best way to