Learning Organization and Human Resource Development - Case Study Example

 Learning Organization and Human Resource Development Abstract Learning organization facilitates most effective functioning of the organization by making collaborative and collective decision making and by providing highest level of flexibility to the employees in performing their specific roles in production of final goods. Hence this aids in manufacturing of good quality products which result in customer satisfaction and in competing better than other market players which in turn would result in enhancing the efficiency of the organization. The regular training programmes to the employees would be encouraged by the learning organization to upgrade their skills, knowledge, behavioral aspects and attitudes of the employees with a final aim of producing good quality commodity. It stresses much on team work than individual attributes and eliminates the constraints and strengthens the positive factors of organization culture and ensures most effective organization strategies. Learning organizations Introduction Human resource development plays vital role in success of any organization. It aims at providing ideal environment for the employees of the organization so that their productivity would be higher which in turn would help in enhancing the organizational efficiency (Mabey et al., 1998). During this process, it concentrates on the upgrading of knowledge, skills and attitudes of the employees through series of training programmes with a final objective of enhancing the output of the organization. The organization should work in this context as a platform for the learning exercise and hence it provides all favorable conditions for the learning environment. What is learning organization? Learning organization can be defined as any organization which provides a flexible and dynamic learning environment to its employees from time to time. Its main objective in this process is to equip the employees with all the latest knowledge and skills so that they would be in a position to produce good quality and innovative produce which would compete well with the other national and global competitors (O’Keeffe, 2002). The learning organization also brings desirable changes in the behavior of the employees of an organization (Law and Ngai, 2008). Birdthistle and Fleming (2005) revealed that considerable number of micro, small and medium-sized family firms in Ireland exhibited some of the characteristics of a learning organization. Therefore, the strategic review, systems development and cultural change within family firms in Ireland have to be encouraged which have the potential to be learning organizations. In this way, the effective learning organization would result in enhancement of overall efficiency of any organization. All the important components of the learning organization like mental models, shared vision, systems thinking, personal excellence and team building have to be kept in mind while formulating the future plan for any organization. How learning organization contributes to organizational efficiency? The effective learning environment would make the employees of the organization aware about the specific roles to be played by them in achieving the good quality final produce which in turn would lead to higher level of customer satisfaction. It concentrates on the strong linkage between the business and development goals of an organization for efficient strategic framework (Mayo, 1998). Hence, the ideal learning environment would certainly influence the efficiency of the organizations positively and much emphasis is to be given by the team managers to this aspect. In this process, one has to analyze the factors that affect the learning environment positively and negatively so that the corrective measures can be taken to reduce the bottlenecks and encouragement can be given to the positive factors. The learning organization is a continuous process and allows the transformations to happen at any time depending upon the necessity of the organization and context (Wang and Ahmed, 2003). One should make the necessary changes when ever they are required for the welfare of the company or organization. Once the targets fixed for particular time period are achieved, the organizations would revise or increase their targets in terms of sales volume for the next season, hence the learning environment must provide flexibility in expanding the capacity of the functionaries of the organization to come up with superior results. This would be possible by coherence and collaborative working atmosphere and team building exercise facilitated by the learning organizations. The concept of learning organization once implemented successfully can make any organization superior in the market surpassing the competitors by considerable margin (Hoof and Ridder, 2004). This is facilitated by the operation of continuous learning process of employees and team leaders by studying the nature of the products available in the market and by analyzing the needs of the customers towards the product use. In other words, the learning organization provide favorable atmosphere for the employees to learn at a quicker rate than other organizations in the market so that the competitiveness for the product marketing would be very strong. The employees who come up with innovative ideas for the products should be encouraged with incentives so that the other employees also would try to excel in the final manufacture of the goods. The positive principles of learning organizations in different places can be studied and analyzed so that desirable aspects can be learned for the welfare of the organizations. Nyhan et al. (2004) provided an overview of the main challenges emerging from the learning organization. They stressed on the lifelong learning and the creation of a knowledge-based society. It was emphasized that in order to build learning organizations, one has to maintain coherence between the tangible and the intangible dimensions of an organization; and the balance has to be maintained between the organization's learning goals and individuals' learning needs. The efficiency of the organizations would be enhanced by learning organizations by making the employees and team leaders to absorb the external shocks in the market and they take little time to improve the quality of the produce and they eliminate the constraints quickly and modify the final produce with innovative nature (McHugh et al., 1998). Some times, the changes that happen in the organization may be slow and insufficient to face the market competition and hence the efforts must be made to enhance the pace of the changes to be made for producing the good quality commodities. Thorough market survey of the performance of the existing product and the customer response through questionnaires have to be recorded and analyzed thoroughly by a special team so that the future plan for the design of the new product would be made more customer friendly and highly competitive in the market. The effective learning organization would make the mental process of the team leaders and other employees more oriented towards the common goals of the organization rather than their individual aspirations. This would train them in thinking collectively about the welfare of the organizations and get a feeling that their personal career growth would be taken care by the better performance of the organizations. This requires thorough encouragement to the employees from time to time in the form of incentives and study tours and seminars. Another important principle of the learning organization is to convert and transform the individual talents of the employees in to the organizational learning which facilitates quicker learning of the employees and the product quality assurance. Moreover, the concept of eliminating the unproductive habits and culture has to be stressed through learning organizations. This can be made by thorough review of the current happenings and the work culture among the employees and coordination among the team managers and employees in developing a final product. The egos of the individuals have to be eliminated and every employee has to think that he is supposed to be individual component of the company and the welfare of the company comes first than the individual preferences. At the same time, the good habits and behavior of the employees have to maintained and improved (Smith et al., 2000). The approach of the organization should be mainly aimed at encouraging the individual talents to empower the other employees so that the shared vision and shared learning would be facilitated (Du et al., 2007). The barriers between the top management and employees have to be eliminated while taking a collective decision regarding the product development. This also requires the inculcation of transparent policy from the top management and discussion on the same in an open environment which would develop a feeling of mutual trust among the employees and they work for the organization with utmost dedication and sincerity. One important principle of the learning organization is to make majority of the employees to participate in the decision making process directly or indirectly so that they feel more attachment with the organization (Reid et al., 2007). The research revealed that the current discourses on participatory approaches to education are highly diverse and the training programmes designed for the employees must include these theories and practices of participatory approach. The participatory approach requires frequent meetings of the employees and team leaders in which all the employees would be briefed about the current happenings and policy making of the company. Some people argue that the confidentiality has to be maintained regarding the details of the product and hence the open discussions may be discouraged, but it is partially true. The design aspect of the company and some important strategies of the company to face the competitors in the market can be made confidential where as the regular policy changes in the organization and the performance of the organization can be disclosed openly with the employees. Hence effective learning organizations concentrate on the balance between the transparency and confidentiality depending upon the context. Learning organizations also emphasize on the motivation of the employees so that they strive hard for the production of best quality produce that would be preferred well by the customers. The motivation is a process of mental feeling that the successful completion of task would result in highest level of satisfaction and brings good recognition in the organization. Once the element of motivation is created, the employees would discuss the positive aspects of their job and collaborate well with the management and would try to understand their specific roles to be performed for the production of the good quality commodity. In addition, the motivated employees further motivate other employees by one to one communication regarding the strengths of the organization. In this process, the dynamic leadership is very much required for making the extent of motivation faster and sustainable from top to the bottom. AIDCAS model Learning organizations also concentrate on the development of awareness among the employees regarding the process of decision making (AIDCAS) of the customers in selection of the product. Once they understand this process, they will strive hard to produce the best quality product with innovative nature so that the customer satisfaction would be maximum resulting the higher efficiency of the organization. AIDCAS is nothing but a communication and decision making process that occurs before any customer takes the decision regarding the purchase of commodity in the market. AIDCAS stands for the six processes in order like this: Attention, Interest, Desire, Conviction, Action and satisfaction. The customer initially will pay attention to the commodity once he comes across it through direct observation in the shops or market or through advertisement in the news papers or magazines or electronic media like television and internet. Then it leads to interest related to the product and he would certainly try to get the details of product specifications and features. After studying the features, if he likes the same, his desire would be high and he will be in the process of conviction whether to take it or not? During this process, he may think about the other alternate products in the market and their specific features and their prices. Once he is convinced, then he will take action i.e. purchase. Up to this process, the entire decision making process will be common for the new products. Once he uses the product, he will have experience about the quality and if it is good, his level of satisfaction would be high and hence it leads to regular purchase of the same produce in future. Hence the quality of the produce decides the sales volume of final products of an organization by having repetitive customers organizational learning would always facilitate the ideal learning environment for production of good quality commodities in the market. Smith et al (2007) investigated on the role of the leader in facilitating workforce development and employees' self-directedness for learning in Australia. Data collection was done from 18 organizations through interviewing learning with an objective of assessing the relative feasibility of the implementation of a number of pre-identified strategies designed to develop self-directedness among employees within working environments. It was revealed that the self-directedness has become a vital component of learning and development of individual employees in any organization and the learning leaders would play significant role in this context. Hence, the learning organization must concentrate on the development of new dynamic learning leaders who can bring desirable changes in the behavior and attitudes of employees which in turn would enhance the efficiency of the organization. The learning organization would concentrate on the establishment of a separate crisis management department with in the organization with an objective of facing any serious crisis that arises due to competition in the market and due to customer complaints. The crisis team should be trained in dealing the unforeseen situations so that the shock can be absorbed easily and quickly. Their coordination with all the wings of the organization must be strong enough to get themselves updated about the current happenings and this would prepare them to face any tough situation in the future. Conclusion Learning organization provides ideal environment for coherence and coordination among various employees and team managers which would result in production of good quality commodities with innovative nature. Learning organization also leads to efficient functioning of the organization by making participatory and collective decision making process possible by allowing dynamic leadership to operate. This leads to highest flexibility and clarity among the employees regarding their specific tasks to be performed in different department of the organization. The ultimate objective of the organizational learning is to enhance the efficiency of organization by manufacturing highest quality commodities with utmost customer satisfaction. Learning organization also maintains the balance between the transparency of company policies of production and marketing and current happenings and the confidentiality about the key strategies related to the product design and innovation. The positive factors of the organization culture would be preserved and enhanced and the constraints would be reduced if not eliminated by effective feed back survey from the customers. The AIDCAS model has to be analyzed for production of better quality produce that satisfies the customers at highest level so that the volume of sales would be higher resulting in enhancing the efficiency of organization. The training programmes as part of learning organization should include the latest technical know-how and principles of strategic human resource management so that the behavioral aspects of the employees would be strengthened and their commitment and dedication for the organization would be higher resulting in effective organizational strategies (Harrison and Kessels, 2003). Overall, learning organization allows the process of learning to happen continuously and the employees and team management would learn the lessons faster than their competitors and work collectively and wholeheartedly to produce best quality produce that competes better than other market players and hence enhances the organizational efficiency significantly. References Birdthistle, N & Fleming, P 2005, ‘Creating a learning organization within the family business: an Irish perspective’, Journal of European Industrial Training, 29, 9, 730-750. 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