IBM

How does IBM transform individual learning into organizational learning?

How does IBM transform individual learning into organizational learning?

Introduction

For IBM, learning is a strategic enabler of change — an indispensable tool that supports new initiatives, re-skills our workforce and prepares us to address key market shifts and organizational transformations, such as those associated with the rapidly approaching on demand era. The fact that IBM spends about US$750 million annually1 for learning initiatives represents a firm commitment to the belief that learning enhances productivity, enables development of employee potential, empowers employees and teams to innovate, and extends organizational knowledge to suppliers, partners and clients. Through a continual process of learning transformation, IBM has established leadership in learning, as defined and measured by business values, that is, how learning directly enables IBM's businesses to win and grow in the competitive marketplace.

There is perhaps no other term than “learning organization” that triggers so much attention and discussion in organizational literature these days. Lest this term become so clogged up with marginal values or white-washed with so many unintended interpretations that it becomes a senseless technical jargon, the present writer restocks existing writings in this domain with the intention of restoring the term to its proper context.

Epitomized as the re-emergence of an organization as a biological entity that embraces collective characteristics, “organizational learning” is viewed as a conceptual reincarnation of organizational development of the 1970s (Argyris, 1978). Associated with its rise are its diverse definitions that range from philosophical, mechanistic, educational, adaptive and organic connotations. Quite consistent with Otala's argument (1995), the definition so adopted should satisfy the pragmatic need of rapid external changes. While the significance of this assertion requires further exploration, suffice it to say here that such a process is complex and essential for the continued existence of an organization.

Re-conceptualization of “organizational learning”

Scattered around the literature on organizational learning are three sets of variables that should be highly integrative but which are either being pursued separately or without mutual acknowledgement. On the other hand, it is difficult to conceive how these variables - dimensions, processes and objectives - can exist in isolation when they are describing inter-related phenomena.

Dimensions of organizational learning

In Senge's Fifth Discipline (1990), five capacities, or dimensions that transform organizations into “learning collectivities” are mentioned. Some reordering of these dimensions, however, is necessary in order to better appreciate their logical sequence of occurrence. If we follow Senge' own argument that “organizations learn only through individuals who learn” (1990, p. 139), the first dimension of mental models, or the subconscious, taken-for-granted beliefs that limit one's thinking and colors one's perception, will need to undergo changes. Implicit and explicit in the mental reorientation is a propelling force that overwhelms individual natural tendency to be in a state of inertia. In other words, the psychological fears and concerns for less-than satisfactory organizational performance, as Amburgey et al. (1990) describe, become overshadowed by the possibility of job loss or extinction (Haveman, 1992) so that individuals are stirred up to ...