title: A method for assessing and developing features of a learning organization

authors: Sun, Peter Yih-Tong

subjects: learning organization

abstract: The primary objective of this thesis is to evolve  a method for assessing and developing features of a learning organization .  To fulfill this, I approached the thesis by examining several research questions and using multiple research methodologies.  The research questions were not all established at the outset.  Rather, they evolved as features of a journey down a road less traveled.  With this journey came the decision to write the thesis in the first person.

The first research question was  Q1:  What will bridge the divide between organizational learning and the learning organization?   By reviewing the extant literature on organizational learning and the learning organization, I developed a theoretical framework that linked these two streams.  The framework suggests that the extent of divide between the two streams is determined by the extent of learning transfer.  The learning transfer is affected by the learning barriers operating at the levels of learning (i.e., individuals, groups, and organizational).  This led me to my second research question Q2:  What are these barriers to learning transfer and how do they impact the levels of learning in the organization?   I cumulated the dispersed literature on learning barriers, and synthesized the learning barriers into five key dimensions: Intrapersonal, relational, cultural, structural, and societal.  I then used the Delphi technique on 17 individuals to investigate the impact of the learning barriers on the levels of learning.  This generated two additional research questions.  The third research question was Q3:  How do individuals initiate a double-loop change?   This deals with the little researched area of initiation of double-loop change whilst engaging with the interfaces at the levels of learning.  I used multiple case studies to examine this question and found that individuals transit through four distinct stages when initiating double-loop change: 'embedded', 'embedded discomfited', 'scripted', and 'unscripted'.  Once double-loop learning has been initiated at the individual level, it is important that it is transferred across the organization.  Therefore, my fourth research question was Q4:  How does a new shared understanding for a double-loop change develop across the organization?   I did an in-depth, single case based investigation of an organization.  Using Identity and Complexity theory perspectives, I tracked the evolving new shared understanding through four phases: de-identification phase, situated re-identification phase, transition phase, and identification with core ideology phase.

The key insights from examining these research questions, particularly insights from examining Q3 and Q4, enabled me to suggest nine key organizational interventions necessary to overcome the learning barriers and develop a learning organization:  Identifying, developing, and dispersing double-loop mastery; Enabling constructive contradictions; Creating a superordinate organizational identity; Building emotional intelligence (in individuals and groups); Ambidextrous leadership; Strategic support for experimentation; Promoting 'systems doing'; Accessibility of valid information; Institutionalizing scanning across industry boundaries.  When these nine organizational interventions are implemented, they produce five new learning organization orientations: genetic diversity, organizational ideology, organizational dualism, organizational coupling, and strategic play.  These five new learning organizational orientations provide the archetypes of the learning organization.  I then developed an instrument to assess these five new orientations, and did a preliminary testing of the instrument.

While aspects of my work overlaid with previous knowledge, new advances in knowledge were established by:

  Postulating a link between the streams of organizational learning and learning organization
  Synthesizing learning barriers into the five key dimensions, and investigating their impact on the levels of learning
  Understanding the stages of double-loop learning initiation by an individual, whilst engaging with the interfaces at the levels of learning
  Understanding the process of a new shared understanding evolving
  Postulating five new orientations of the learning organization

text: A method for assessing and developing features of a learning organization The primary objective of this thesis is to evolve  a method for assessing and developing features of a learning organization .  To fulfill this, I approached the thesis by examining several research questions and using multiple research methodologies.  The research questions were not all established at the outset.  Rather, they evolved as features of a journey down a road less traveled.  With this journey came the decision to write the thesis in the first person.

The first research question was  Q1:  What will bridge the divide between organizational learning and the learning organization?   By reviewing the extant literature on organizational learning and the learning organization, I developed a theoretical framework that linked these two streams.  The framework suggests that the extent of divide between the two streams is determined by the extent of learning transfer.  The learning transfer is affected by the learning barriers operating at the levels of learning (i.e., individuals, groups, and organizational).  This led me to my second research question Q2:  What are these barriers to learning transfer and how do they impact the levels of learning in the organization?   I cumulated the dispersed literature on learning barriers, and synthesized the learning barriers into five key dimensions: Intrapersonal, relational, cultural, structural, and societal.  I then used the Delphi technique on 17 individuals to investigate the impact of the learning barriers on the levels of learning.  This generated two additional research questions.  The third research question was Q3:  How do individuals initiate a double-loop change?   This deals with the little researched area of initiation of double-loop change whilst engaging with the interfaces at the levels of learning.  I used multiple case studies to examine this question and found that individuals transit through four distinct stages when initiating double-loop change: 'embedded', 'embedded discomfited', 'scripted', and 'unscripted'.  Once double-loop learning has been initiated at the individual level, it is important that it is transferred across the organization.  Therefore, my fourth research question was Q4:  How does a new shared understanding for a double-loop change develop across the organization?   I did an in-depth, single case based investigation of an organization.  Using Identity and Complexity theory perspectives, I tracked the evolving new shared understanding through four phases: de-identification phase, situated re-identification phase, transition phase, and identification with core ideology phase.

The key insights from examining these research questions, particularly insights from examining Q3 and Q4, enabled me to suggest nine key organizational interventions necessary to overcome the learning barriers and develop a learning organization:  Identifying, developing, and dispersing double-loop mastery; Enabling constructive contradictions; Creating a superordinate organizational identity; Building emotional intelligence (in individuals and groups); Ambidextrous leadership; Strategic support for experimentation; Promoting 'systems doing'; Accessibility of valid information; Institutionalizing scanning across industry boundaries.  When these nine organizational interventions are implemented, they produce five new learning organization orientations: genetic diversity, organizational ideology, organizational dualism, organizational coupling, and strategic play.  These five new learning organizational orientations provide the archetypes of the learning organization.  I then developed an instrument to assess these five new orientations, and did a preliminary testing of the instrument.

While aspects of my work overlaid with previous knowledge, new advances in knowledge were established by:

  Postulating a link between the streams of organizational learning and learning organization
  Synthesizing learning barriers into the five key dimensions, and investigating their impact on the levels of learning
  Understanding the stages of double-loop learning initiation by an individual, whilst engaging with the interfaces at the levels of learning
  Understanding the process of a new shared understanding evolving
  Postulating five new orientations of the learning organization

year: 2006

title: Surfing life: surface, substructure and the commodification of the sublime

authors: lisahunter

subjects: book review

abstract: Mark Stranger’s first words of his book Surfing Life dedicate the work to his father saying ‘He started this whole thing with the sea for me’. Flicking through the book to get the flavour of ‘this thing with the sea’, I was struck by the appendices*one listing Australian surfing places I know*such as Torquay in Victoria and Lennox Heads in New South Wales and another listing people involved in his extensive empirical material that included a year of ‘travelling around Australia living in a tent’ (xi), while he conducted fieldwork. Some of the names I know and in others I recognize the characters I’ve met. There are significant names from the public surfing world, like Pam Burridge and Gail Austen, which are famous in the competitive world. There are also pseudonymed characters such as Blue, a ‘female less than 26, desert location, long-term resident of the desert camp, bodyboarder’ (257). I recognized such characters in my own research and my own experience of surfing and could relate to some of his ‘insider’ perspectives. These locations, interview material and his own experiences act as the water for his sea washing through his book. This water mixes with contemporary social theory to finish in an argument that subcultures, such as surfing, are ‘integral to the broader dialectical processes of postmodernization’ (253) or if you like ‘an early agent of postmodernization’ (254).

text: Surfing life: surface, substructure and the commodification of the sublime Mark Stranger’s first words of his book Surfing Life dedicate the work to his father saying ‘He started this whole thing with the sea for me’. Flicking through the book to get the flavour of ‘this thing with the sea’, I was struck by the appendices*one listing Australian surfing places I know*such as Torquay in Victoria and Lennox Heads in New South Wales and another listing people involved in his extensive empirical material that included a year of ‘travelling around Australia living in a tent’ (xi), while he conducted fieldwork. Some of the names I know and in others I recognize the characters I’ve met. There are significant names from the public surfing world, like Pam Burridge and Gail Austen, which are famous in the competitive world. There are also pseudonymed characters such as Blue, a ‘female less than 26, desert location, long-term resident of the desert camp, bodyboarder’ (257). I recognized such characters in my own research and my own experience of surfing and could relate to some of his ‘insider’ perspectives. These locations, interview material and his own experiences act as the water for his sea washing through his book. This water mixes with contemporary social theory to finish in an argument that subcultures, such as surfing, are ‘integral to the broader dialectical processes of postmodernization’ (253) or if you like ‘an early agent of postmodernization’ (254).

year: 2012

title: Decolonising professional learning: Weaving a whānau of interest

authors: Pennicott, Katie

subjects: educational leadership

abstract: Raranga (weaving) has been described as an act of decolonisation and resistance. In my experience, learning to weave was more than an act of learning the tikanga (rituals) and methods with which to weave flax and tukutuku (lattice work); it was learning about learning and learning about living, life and all the things that make us who we are. As I experienced and began to understand Māori metaphors such as whanaungatanga, kaupapa, ako and manaakitanga I found that learning the art of weaving shaped me as I shaped the weaving. This thesis ideates a metaphor of weaving to describe a model of cultural and structural school reform that emerged from a school’s teaching and learning collaborations over time. It calls for the weaving of a new, decolonised model of education.

text: Decolonising professional learning: Weaving a whānau of interest Raranga (weaving) has been described as an act of decolonisation and resistance. In my experience, learning to weave was more than an act of learning the tikanga (rituals) and methods with which to weave flax and tukutuku (lattice work); it was learning about learning and learning about living, life and all the things that make us who we are. As I experienced and began to understand Māori metaphors such as whanaungatanga, kaupapa, ako and manaakitanga I found that learning the art of weaving shaped me as I shaped the weaving. This thesis ideates a metaphor of weaving to describe a model of cultural and structural school reform that emerged from a school’s teaching and learning collaborations over time. It calls for the weaving of a new, decolonised model of education.

year: 2020