Introduction
Rapid changes in market trends and consumer behaviors are considered as the top enemies of profit-driven organizations. In some cases, even not-for-profit organizations see these two factors as the biggest sources of management problems and concerns. Various business planners and analysts believe that continuous learning in the workplace should be promoted in order to prevent unnecessary losses in resources and even a widespread collapse in operations.
Making sure that every organizational team member is equipped with the most appropriate knowledge and skills set, and making sure that they are appropriate for the current market trends and behavior is therefore essential in maintaining optimum levels of efficiency and productivity in the workplace. The objective of this paper is to summarize and review key points and principles from the book Continuous Learning in Organizations: Individual, Group, and Organizational Perspectives by authors Sessa and London.
Chapter 1: The Meaning of Continuous Learning
The term “continuous learning” is more subjective than objective. It is very relative because different people could define “continuous learning” in a variety of ways. They could for example perceive it as the process of continuously gaining knowledge regardless whether they are related to their job descriptions or not. The highlight of the first chapter was to establish the operational definition of “continuous learning.” This is rather vital because using different meanings and interpretations would most likely result to readers coming from different springboards of knowledge. The meaning and points of the book can be distorted because of that.
The authors described continuous learning as a rather risky process. This is because it basically introduces the idea that the company workers who were trained to critically think and employ the best ways to improve productivity and efficiency can further improve their performance and in some cases, are doing something wrong. Another highlight of the first chapter was the discussion about the open-systems model of learning wherein key types of learning namely the adaptive, generative, and transformative types of learning were introduced. Furthermore, various practical strategies in promoting continuous learning in the workplace using various schemes such as group to individual, individual to group, organization to individual, and individual to organization.
Identifying the meaning of the term continuous learning is definitely important. Doing so alone can already be used by business managers as benchmarks or indicators that would enable them to determine whether they are treading on the right track or otherwise.
Chapter 2: Understanding Individual Continuous Learning
The focus of this chapter was defining continuous learning in an individual level and identifying examples how individuals can continuously learn in organizations. The authors defined individual continuous learning as the process of learning that could satisfy passion, drive, compulsivity, and an individual’s tendency to be curious of the things related to his or her job requirements.
Continuous learning is not a one-step process; it demands a great deal of time and effort. The use and importance of providing feedback were also highlighted in this chapter. According to the authors, feedback is an integral part of a learning cycle and that all types of learning can only occur when all processes involved in the learning cycle are already finished.
Trying to learn new things without first knowing whether that new thing is in line with an individual’s personal goals or the goals of the organization would more often than not lead to futility. Also, let us not forget that giving feedbacks is essential because it basically serves as a learner’s guide to make sure that their actions and behaviors move them closer to their goals.
Chapter 3: Individual Characteristics Affecting Continuous Learning
This chapter focused on the different characteristics which can be found on the individual learner that could affect the degree to which he or she could learn. The authors suggest that even though every normal human being can learn, there are some who exhibit higher potentials to learn and there are also some who exhibit minimal learning potentials.
There are also some people who learn even without having to go out of their comfort zone while there are also some who require going out of that zone in order to learn. The point is that every person demands a different set of requirements or conditions in order to be good at effectively learning something. The objective of the individual learner now would be to figure out those needs and satisfy them first before proceeding to the proper learning process.
The issue being discussed in this chapter about individuality in learning can be best explained by science and medicine. However, the fact that the authors’ statements in this chapter is backed by related literatures plus the fact that most, if not all, of their statements seem logical and make sense, is sufficient enough to show that learning can be very dependent on the what type of learner an individual is.
Chapter 4: Facilitating Individual Continuous Learning
The objective of the authors in this chapter was to breakaway the readers’ attention on the individual learner and diverts their focus on the factors that influence the learning process such as the environment the learners are in. The authors described the organizations which the learners are a member of are learning environments themselves. Every workplace is a learning environment because they basically stimulate and at some point even require individuals to learn a whole bunch of things that are more often than not related to their job descriptions.
Of course, every organization is unique in its own way and so it would only be normal for individuals to acquire varying gains in skills and experience. For example, Employee A may have larger gains in learning than Employee B because Employee A came from a more mentally-stimulating learning environment. In fact, results like these are more common that there is already a whole industry that is dedicated to keep workplaces as mentally-stimulating as possible.
Chapter 5: Understanding Group Continuous Learning
The focus of this chapter appears to be the group learners. According to the authors, learning in groups can be a little bit more complicated than individual learning because individuals have the capability to consciously reflect on things while a group of two or more people cannot. In group continuous learning, it almost always boils down the question how can individuals in a group encourage and benefit from each other and learn as separate and joint entities.
A team is defined as a group of “two or more individuals who must interact and adapt to achieve specified, shared, and valued objectives”. There are literally more factors that a coach or a trainer for example, should consider if he is handling a team compared to if what he is handling is an individual. Therefore, it would only seem logical for the learning process to become considerably harder the more people there are involved.
Once again, the authors make perfect sense in their statements and assumptions in this chapter. Even though learning can be very dependent on an individual, there will always be instances wherein members of an organization will be required to learn things as a team such as when a 5-step or more complicated processes need to be carried out for a specific function. In such cases, group effort and learning would be very important.
Chapter 6: Facilitating Group Continuous Learning
As stated in the previous chapter, handling a group and making them learn to perform something can be very different from handling an individual. However, according to the authors, it is still important to understand the learning characteristics of every group members for the group continuous learning to be successful.
There are of course additional considerations aside from this such as how group members interact with each other, assessing the learning environment, etc. Group learning is dependent on these three main factors: group member characteristics, group characteristics, and situational conditions—these are the factors that directly influence the degree to which the group learns. The authors also stressed the importance of mutual trust, a shared mental model, and cohesiveness in group continuous learning.
I see all of these factors as the legs of a tripod. For example, if there is no trust within the group, the entire group continuous learning process would be unsuccessful and the same happens if any one of these factors is missing.
Chapter 7: Understanding Organizational Continuous Learning
This chapter focuses on the organization as a whole and not only on the individual or group learner. From a hierarchical point of view, one can easily classify organizational continuous learning as the most complicated learning process among the three because here is where everything from individual to group learning is integrated. Another point to remember in organizational continuous learning is that organizations can be composed of hundreds, thousands, or tens of thousands of people unlike groups which can hardly reach a hundred.
The goal of an entire organization can be very different from a group or individual’s goals. Organizational goals are usually expressed as a vision, a set of values, and sometimes, strategies while individual goals are usually centered on personal desires or aspirations. Nevertheless, organizations are still made of these individuals who have personal goals.
Differentiating the structure and characteristics of an individual, a work group, and an organization was for me, the best strategy that could be used in making the readers understand organizational continuous learning. The authors were very vivid in comparing individuals, work groups, and organizations focusing on their differences and similarities.
Chapter 8: Facilitating Organizational Learning
In this chapter, the authors focused on the various ways how organizations could optimize learning in an organizational level. In a way, the considerations were similar with that of individual and group learning because trainers and coaches still have to consider the individuality of every member in the organization and of every group that makes up the organization in order to successfully carry out an organizational learning plan. But then again, the more general or the higher it gets on the hierarchical ladder, the more factors have to be considered and the more complicated things get.
Reviewing the different considerations involved in individual and group continuous learning was a good idea. We should never forget that even though organizations should be handled differently, they are still composed of smaller subgroups and individuals and so the learning characteristics of these smaller functional units should still be considered and in fact, be focused on.
Chapter 9: Future Directions
In this final chapter, the author discusses and reviews the general concepts of learning and basically how organizations could integrate everything and turn all of the three learning process into a vicious cycle.
Personally, I find this chapter rather helpful because it gives the readers the idea that learning should never be stagnant and that organizations should never stop improving and striving to improve. Even though most of the contents of these chapters were already discussed in some of the previous chapters, it never hurts to reiterate the key concepts of continuous learning in organizations.
Conclusion
This book is a good read. It presents both evidence and experience-based information about the topic. The arrangement of the chapters was also organized, making it easy for every reader to understand the thoughts and ideas that the authors were trying to express. Overall, the book exhibits solid information about the different learning processes and strategies that could be used by almost any type of organization, be it a for-profit or a not-for-profit one.
References
Sessa, V., & London, M. (2006). Continuous Learning in Organizations: Individual, Group, and Organizational Perspectives. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
