Organizational Learning - Report Example

Name: Institution: Course: Date: Introduction Organizational learning is seen as the practice of creating, transferring, and retaining knowledge within a specific organization. This in turn improves the organization as it gains skilled and experience labor as a result of organizational learning as knowledge is passed across the board. Organizational learning is seen to draw much of its argument that is based on the assumption that organizations are capable of creating and instilling intelligent behavior. It is argued that in a nutshell, organizational learning is based on the aspects of who is learning, what is being learned, where it is being learned what is the influencing factor behind the learning, and how the learning occurs. The basis of who is being learned revolves around individual, group, organization, inter- organization, industry, and city. On the other hand, what is being learned revolves around skills, competencies, knowledge, and custom. Similarities in approaches to assumptions about learning Learning is seen to have a psychological aspect where learning is perceived to be affected by the state of the brain, where cognitive, motor, and perceptual skills are applied. Cognitive skills are based on thinking reasoning, remembering, problem- solving, and frames of reference. Perceptual skills are based on interpretation, values, attitudes, ethics, and identification. Motor skills, on the other hand, revolve around dexterity, hand- eye co- ordination, movement, acting, and driving. Skinner (1953) argues that motivation is based on the view of behavior consequences and that only observable outcomes matter in his theory of operant conditioning. It is in this perspective, that learning is seen as a sequence of behavioral or action- based knowledge that can be transferred from one context to the next. In the case 1 study of a State Government agency, there are over 3,000 employees which is a manageable number to instill learning skills on, as they can be routinely supervised effectively. The State Office in their workforce has a technical staff that is highly skilled. The State Agency in recent years has been routinely hiring graduates, who undergo vigorous training for two years in the organization. It is in this view that the learning skill is instilled in the psychological sense. These graduates are fresh from school thus their state of the brain, reasoning and thinking skills, and their hand- eye co- ordination is still intact. Similarly, the Global Professional Services (Accounting) Firm is an active recruiter of young and fresh from school graduates from all disciplines that span from accountancy, business- related course, and law. These are all technical courses, where graduates are expected to undergo learning in the institution. It is in this perspective that accountancy graduates undergo two to three years vigorous training. Given that the learners are young; their cognitive, perceptual, and motor skills are still intact for learning. The major difference to assumptions about learning in case 1 and case 2 The main difference between case 1 on State Government agency adoption of learning among their workforce, and the case 2 on Global Professional Services (Accounting) Firm learning system adoption is on mentoring and job coaching. The Global Professional Services (Accounting) Firm has approached the services of mentors and job coaches that help instill learning for the employees in the company. The State Agency, on the other hand, depends on the skilled workforce to instill knowledge; this demotivates the staff from attending the learning session, which in turn led to low staff turnover on the State Agency. This is where the sequence of behavioral or action- based knowledge comes in. Organizational learning is characterized by theories of organizational behavior that tends to explain the psychological perceptions and the theory of individual skills that includes; knowledge, attitudes, capacities, and other personal traits. These personal traits are influenced by phenomena such as group dynamics. It is in this view that the application of where is it being learned at is put into perspective, and the workplace vs. educational setting is compared. Workplaces are seen to have pedagogy of practice that is formulated by their unique forms of learning curricula, which are fundamentally different from educational settings or contexts. Collective and group learning is mostly associated with companies or entities that are shaped in a particular way and have a characterized capacity that helps them to learn. These characterized capacities are; size, membership, structure, group behaviors, task complexity, and interdependence. In group or entity learning, the notion of ‘group thinking’ suffers a set back at times as there is deterioration in efficiency, moral judgment, quality, tendency to drift by members, pressure to not be innovative and conform. Members also adopt a ‘social loafing’ tendency of making less effort than as individuals, this in turn harms one or two members of the group who take an inequitable workload that results in tension and resentment. Collective learning is seen as a complex combination of interactions between members, which is based on inter- relationships that generate unique patterns of behavior which result to unique learning configurations. In putting in place a structured working organizational learning framework, practitioners should adopt the phenomena of ‘collective learning’ as it is seen as the emergent practice. The Linkage between the organization’s approach to learning and its strategic priorities Organizational learning in case 1 on The State Agency and case 2 on Global Professional Services (Accounting) Firm have both embraced organizational learning in their specific and unique way swiftly in a bid to improve the staff productivity and service to their clientele. They have both embraced organizational learning as it is the driving force of organizational growth in the current business world. This has seen the State Agency employee staff in the human resource office to oversee the adoption of organizational learning that include a senior manager, a manager and other learning officers. The Global Professional Services (Accounting) Firm has set a whole department committed to Organizational Learning, which is charged with the task of overseeing organizational learning in the specific firms. These measures have proved to be effective in instilling organizational learning in both cases as the workforce especially the new graduates joining the organizations undergo vigorous and effective training. Learning is seen to occur as a process, and linearly, where it exists in two types that are formal and informal. Learning occurs on the basis of experience, discoveries, emergent, and complex. It is in this sense that organizations are seen to have a special type of workplaces that are purposive, instrumental, and integrated as some enterprise. Organizations have a power- relations influence and another kind of relations such as the need for affiliation, task, and interpersonal. They do represent a socio- cultural place of work and learning, where they often integrate work with learning such as off- the- job- training. It is in this sense that learning is seen to emerge in two loops mainly the single loop learning that elaborates the actions in learning leads to results that shape the future actions. The other loop is the double loop learning that emerges from beliefs that guide actions that lead to results that shape the future actions that lead to more helpful and accurate beliefs. In the organizational framework, learning is seen as match between a design for action and its definite outcome. This is initiated by acting defensively and improving existing routines by questioning and reassessing existing assumptions, beliefs, and culture. In a bid to achieve this form of organizational learning, organizations should make the tactic explicit in a way that it develops better reasoning skills among employees. The organization through its organizational learning department should ensure that they engage in self- reflection and an explicit intervention by the use of a facilitator who coaches skills among employees . There are five disciplines of a learning organization they are namely; personal mastery, shared vision, mental models, team learning, and systems thinking. A strong culture of organizational learning is said to exist where staff respond to stimuli that are effected by their actions and alignment towards the organizational values. A weak culture, on the other hand, is believed to exist where there are fewer actions and alignment towards organizational values that must be implemented through extensive procedures and bureaucracy. This bureaucracy and extensive procedures are not necessary in line with the staff actions and beliefs. This therefore expounds on four cultures in the organization that are power culture, role culture, task culture, and person culture. This provides guidance to effectively adopting organizational learning in any organization. It is clear that the relationship between learning, work, and subjectivity are vital in understanding the complexities that accompany identity, learning, and organizational culture. The generation of learning targeted by organizations and its impact to the organizations growth In looking at the case study 1 on The State Agency and case study 2 on the Global Professional Services (Accounting) Firm, they have both embraced organizational learning differently, which has resulted in different realization as a result. In looking at the case study 1, the GOV contains a high number of administrative staff who have been working in the department since leaving school. This in the same perspective shows that instilling organization learning in the state agency will have a lot of discrepancies. This is because workers who have been in the organization for a long time are very slow to adopting changes as they are used to the same old routine. In the state agency, the median age of the staff is in their late 40s, which shows that most of the workforce is old, and thus their learning skills are poor. In looking at the case study 2, the Global Professional Services (Accounting) Firm workforce has a median age of approximately 32 years. This shows that they have a young and rejuvenated workforce that is prone to changes and new knowledge that is being instilled through organizational learning. The firm in its approach to organizational learning has made it mandatory for all new recruits in their first few years to enroll on organizational learning. The company in their mission to make the learning effective and reliable in improving their workforce productivity has approached mentors and professional job coaches. This approach has made the company train their own staff on an often basis that has groomed the workforce towards improving their skills and knowledge that, in the long run, improves the company’s productivity. It is in this perspective that the firm has dedicated a whole department with highly skilled workers to organizational learning. The firm has invested heavily in organizational learning with approximately 6-7% of its payroll dedicated fully to organizational learning. The state agency is seen to target the young generation of graduates in its training programs, while the accounting firm is more biased on the new accounting recruits to improve the accounting efficiency and accuracy towards its clients. Learning within groups is viewed as re- creating and re- distributing collective knowledge based on the group composition, membership, dynamics, behaviors, individual roles and responsibilities, task complexity, and relationship among group members and the leader. Most of the members are seen to take advantage of other aggressive members in group learning as they leave the tasks that are complex to the aggressive members hence unevenly distributing the tasks. Organizational learning is formulated on the basis of a need for the organization that is the difference between the ideal performance and the current performance of an individual, department, or the entire organization. This need develops to a development gap that portrays the difference between the traditional and the proactive need of an organization. Similarly, the organization is most likely to be faced with unanticipated external events, inadequate resources, poor planning, political interference, trying to fix the wrong model, and time shortage in addressing the root cause. The case 1 study case, The State Agency has been faced by a high percentage of many baby boomers in the workforce that bring about a lot of discrepancies in organizational learning. This is seen most of the GOV staff attend the compliance program under the organizational learning only in their reticent bid to seek promotion. The State Agency has adopted the group learning technique in their adoption of organizational learning that has seen a low staff turnover of between 2%-3%. As a result, the agency’s organizational learning has not been practically effective across the board. The organizational learning management program in the case study 2, the Accounting firm has seen it approach the training method in their organizational learning approach that has seen the firm’s staff attend vigorous training in their respective field. They have been motivated by the fact that promotion and salary negotiations upward are inevitable on completion of the course. Human resource has been effectively and actively involved in organizational learning adoption in any organization. They have played a major role in the implementation of organizational learning as they offer professional, value, and effectiveness value. To achieve the effectiveness, the human resource needs to transform itself as well as deliver values and not count on activities. The HR also needs to reposition itself to promote a shared relationship and responsibility with line managers. It is in this very view that communication is proved to be a very vital part of learning, as it is widely recognized globally. The human resource in an organization plays a vital part in enabling communication between the management and the workforce. Communication is often accompanied by listening in an effective organization learning process. Conclusion In conclusion, organizational learning has been seen as a very effective process of instilling experience, knowledge, and maintaining high skills among the workforce. Organizational learning has also been viewed as creating, transferring, and retaining knowledge within a specific organization. It is in this perspective that organizations worldwide ranging from medium to large companies and in equal sense multinational organizations have adapted the practice. It is a practice in the current business world in which organizations implement in gauging the employees output and the employees who are best suited in being promoted. Therefore, organizations that aim at maintaining quality and highly skilled employees should adapt effectively the practice of organizational learning which has been viewed to be extremely advantageous in the business world. Works Cited: Read More