Learning Organisations
...Will Be Prepared To Cope With Radical Change And Succeed In The Twenty-First Century." -- Peter M. Senge, Director, Center for Organizational Learning, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
What Is A Learning Organization?
Forget your tired old ideas about leadership, says Fortune magazine. The most successful corporation of the 1990's and the future will be something called a learning organization. In essence, it is an organization full of learners at all levels. Arie De Geus, head of strategic planning for Royal Dutch/Shell states emphatically that the ability to learn faster than your competitors may be the only sustainable competitive advantage.
The jury is still out on the TQM initiatives of the 1980's; but the heads of the world's most successful companies agree--the only organizations that will truly excel in the future are those that discover how to tap people's commitment and capacity to learn at all levels in an organization (Peter M. Senge, The Fifth Discipline Handbook: Strategies and Tools for Building a Learning Organization).
At one time or another, says Senge in his book, The Fifth Discipline, most people have been part of a great "team" experience--a group of people who functioned together as one in extraordinary ways, who trusted one another, who complemented one another's strengths and gladly compensated for each others' limitations, and who were committed to goals larger than individual aspirations, and who produced extraordinary results. If you are one of these lucky people, then you have experienced a learning organization--a team that learned how to produce extraordinary results!
At the core of a learning organization are five lifelong learning disciplines:
• Personal Mastery--learning to expand our personal capacity to create the results we most desire
• Mental...
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