Organizational Change Management

The learning organization model has been promoted by Senge (1990) in the USA and by Pedler (1989) in UK. Learning organizations are places where people continually expand their capacity to create new results they truly desire, where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set free and where people continually learning how to learn (Senge, 1990).

There are 3 levels of learning (Argyris and Schon, 1978): Single loop learning is adaptive, restrictive and non challenging. Problems are solved on a day-to-day basis, errors may occur again, because their root causes are not identified. Double-loop learning is generative, challenges current norms and assumptions. Creation of new knowledge and patterns of thinking. Triple-loop learning is a learning how to learn. Doing things differently. Encompasses both single and double-loop learning into an ongoing process of evolutionary change and innovation.

Senge’s work (1990) has led to the development of five disciplines, which are aimed at enhancing an organization’s capacity to learn:

1. Personal Mastery – the ability to clarify goals and objectives and develop a strategy to achieve them. Is centrally to do with self-awareness – how much do we know ourselves and the impact our behavior has on others.

2. Mental Model – beliefs, values, mind- sets that determine the way people think and act.

3. Shared Vision – the ability to develop a collective vision in order to ensure greater commitment to the achievement of goals and objectives.

4. Team Learning – the ability for people who work together to learn more.

5. Systems Thinking –the ability to understand the relationship between all the parts of the organization that influences organizational performance.

OL encourages people at all levels of the organization to learn regularly and strictly from their work. It has systems for capturing and learning information and moving it where it’s needed. It values...