Learning organisation culture



What is learning?



Learning is different term than training, development and education. Most of the time these terms are used interchangeably. In context of human resource management, training is a planned process of increase knowledge, skills, attitudes and behaviour of people to increase ability for job related task. It aims to improve performance in direct way (Masadeh, 2012). Learning is developed by individual though experience and it is relatively permeant change. Development is continues improvement of an individual’s effectiveness beyond their current job or task. Education is a process in personal growth in abilities and attitudes. It is independently of its application of work. Therefore it is a broader aspect than training or development.


Developing a highly skilled workforce is a one method of ensuring competitive advantage. Their knowledge and expertise are required to lead the market place. Organization's workforce is getting advantage of each other and therefore it is not affected if one leave the organisation (Dymock and McCarthy, 2006) 



Learning organisation 




Organizations that is necessary to survive in a changing environment, leads to the development of the concept of learning organization .Learning Organisation continually transforms itself by facilitating the learning of all its members. Organizations need to create a climate where the  experiential learning  is effectively managed throughout the workplace and individual learning is used to achieve organizational learning (Rowley,1998).



Kolb, Boyatzis and Mainemelis (2001).have identified four experiential learning styles;

  1. Diverging
  2. Assimilating
  3. Converging
  4. Accommodating

People with Concrete experience and Reflective observation have Diverging learning style. They generate ideas, have broad cultural interest and like to gather information, listen to others with open mind, receiving personalized feedback and prefer to work in groups (Kolb, Boyatzis,and Mainemelis,2001).



Assimilating style dominates people who have Abstract conceptualization and Reflective observation abilities. These people can understand wide range of information and brief , manipulated in logical way. They less focus on people and more focus in ideas and abstract concepts. They look soundness of the theory than practical value of it. Therefore suitable for information and science careers. They prefer to reading, lectures, exploring analytical models in learning situations (Kolb, Boyatzis,and Mainemelis,2001).



Converging styles dominant with Abstract conceptualization and Active experimentation learning abilities. They can find practical uses for theories and ideas, have problem solving and decision making abilities. These skills are helpful for specialist and technological careers. In learning situations these people prefer to experiment with new ideas, simulations, laboratory experiments and practical applications (Kolb, Boyatzis,and Mainemelis,2001).



Dominant learning abilities are Active experimentation and Concrete experience in accommodating learning style. These people have ability to learning hands - on experience. They carry out plans and involving new and challenging experiences, heavily depend on people with practical experience. Action oriented careers such as marketing and sale suitable for these people. It learning situation these people prefer to work with others, get assignments done, set goals, to do field work, and test different approaches (Kolb, Boyatzis, and Mainemelis,2001).



Learning styles can be adopted in organisation's learning development programmes. But it is difficult to organize development programmes suited each people who has different learning styles 



Organizational learning

Three stage process;

  1. knowledge acquisition (by direct experience, others experience, organisational memory)
  2. Dissemination
  3. Shared implementation.



Vast majority of learning in the organization does not occur in formal training settings, and the  "informal socialization strategy and unstructured training is considered to be more influential their formal counterparts "(Chao, 1997).



References



Chao, G. T. (1997). Unstructured training and development: The role of organizational socialization. In J. K. Ford (Ed.), Improving training effectiveness in work organizations (pp. 129–151). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Dymock, D. and McCarthy, C. (2006), ‘‘Towards a learning organisation? Employee perceptions’’, The Learning Organisation, Vol. 13 No. 5, pp. 525-36.

Jennifer Rowley, (1998) "Creating a learning organisation in higher education", Industrial and Commercial Training, Vol. 30 Issue: 1, pp.16-19. Available at: https://doi.org/10.1108/00197859810197708 (Accessed: 26 March 2018)

Kolb, D.A., Boyatzis, R.E. and Mainemelis, C., 2001. Experiential learning theory: Previous research and new directions. Perspectives on thinking, learning, and cognitive styles, 1(8), pp.227-247..

Masadeh, M.(2012)Training, education, development and learning: what is the difference?. European Scientific Journal, ESJ, 8(10).






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