A learning organisation can be influenced by both common the practices of the individuals within the organisation and those the extent to that are carried within the organisation. It is this cultures that determine to which a given group can attain its objectives. Peter Senge who is among the greatest people, who created a lot of impact in the business world, developed five key tools which can be used in building a learning organisation. For any organisation to realise its set goals then, they should apply these disciplines in their system.
Senge’s disciplines
The shared vision
This discipline is about the common goal of the organisation, it serves the purpose in which everyone within the group works in alignment with it. This vision can only be achieved if all member within the given group work together in harmony with a lot of cooperation. Senge's used this tool as a mode of encouraging all the individuals within the organisation to work together. In the case of any changes within the system all members are supposed to adjust to it in one given direction, not that each one taking his own direction (Andrews & Mickahail, 2015).
Mental models
This refers to the inward thought of an individual or the imaginations or even the images that one has developed in his mind. Within every group, the members are supposed to have formulated a mental picture of what the final outcome of the organisation should look like. This is a very useful tool especially for the leaders of any given organisation. The leaders are supposed to form a reflection of what they expect and thus can guide the other members to formulate the same in their result (Andrews & Mickahail, 2015).
Personal mastery
Everyone should be able to understand himself fully, this starts from his likes and dislikes, the strengths and weaknesses. This can enable one to control himself appropriately while working within the group and thus can conform himself to live within the expectation of everyone within the setup. Each individual can also use his strengths within the organisation positively and thus can bolster the output and complete attainment of the set target. Personal mastery also makes it easy to address all the individuals’ needs as one can be able to speak about it freely.
Team learning
This happen the group starts looking at things from a common perspective. They start reasoning together. They begin sharing their experiences, ideas and skills together. This is because is because the people within this group start building positive relationships which can help in spearheading the spirit in the attainment of the common goal of the organisation
Systems thinking
It involves bringing all members of the organisation together. They then discuss all the ways forward and each member contributes his own ideas in regard to the implementation of the set goals. The leaders also begin using more amicable methods such as dialogues in solving problems. This is very efficient as the decisions made are very fair and unbiased as they are mainly contributed by all members not, a few individuals only.
The characteristics of organisational climate
Position structure
This refers to the way in which duties and responsibilities have been allocated to all members starting from the leadership to the juniors. Individual's autonomy, all the people within the organisation have got a given extent of freedom in which they take on their duties. This means that each member is expected to carry on his duty without any close supervision (Gupt & Goel, 2015).
In order to motivate very productive individuals in the group, the organisation must have a set of structured rewards to the most performing members. This will serve as a motivation to all people thus making everyone try to be the best. Task orientation, the management sets the pace in which the task is performed by the members. Therefore, an organisation which is not task oriented will always give its output at a slower rate.
Relations orientation
If an organisation has got very friendly and understanding managers, who understand their employees, creates a working environment that is conducive and the given morale which makes them be very creative in their skills. They will also tend to work in cooperation with one another (McMurray & Scott, 2013)
Senge's disciplines are related to the organisational learning in that, both stresses on the essence of cooperation within a given organisation. It is clearly shown that when there is a good coordination within an organisation then the massive outcome can be realised. Secondly, both indicate that a good relationship must exist between members of a given organisation, especially how the leaders relates to their juniors within the organisation. The two concepts also stress that for a given objective to be realised in a given organisation. Then all the members must be working together towards a common goal.
In summary, we have seen that the Senge's disciplines and the organisational learning are related. This is because they both highlight the same requirements for an organisation to attain its objectives. They both site a healthy relationship between the leaders and the workers to be a fundamental characteristic of any successful organisation.
References
Andrews, K., &Mickahail, B. (2015). Business and Social Media: Collaboration for the Sixth Discipline. Social Media and the Transformation of Interaction in Society, 158.
Gupta, D. M., & Goel, R. (2015).Effect of organisational climate on teaching effectiveness of teachers working in non residential schools. Asia pacific journal of marketing and management review, 3(3).
McMurray, A., & Scott, D. (2013).Determinants of organisational climate for academia.Higher Education Research & Development, 32(6), 960-974.
