When Does an Organization Actually Learn?

In this activity, you asked to review a sample case then decide whether you think the business has demonstrated single or double-loop learning and explain why. Recall from your textbook that double-loop learning is necessary for organizations to make transformativeand not just incremental change. As a HR professional, it is important that you be able to recognize when a potential solution doesn't address the root cause.

Remember that a learning organization doesn't simply improve its processes. It tests its assumptions, scrutinizes its values, and questions its own thinking. Where single-loop learning asks, How can we do what we are doing better?, double-loop learning asks, Why do we think this is the right thing to do? Organizations that fail to use double-loop learning lose an important competitive advantage.

Read the case that follows then answer the questions below:

The Case: Organizational Learning at Fords EFHD

In order to deeply embed organizational learning in our infrastructure, we have paid particular attention to our reward and recognition practices. One of the challenges we had to overcome was our tendency to reward results over improvement efforts.

If product managers are promoted based solely on the success or failure of their launch, they will be less open to sharing their most successful strategies (for fear of losing their competitive edge over other managers) and less willing to share their failures (for fear of looking bad), both of which decrease the learning opportunities for the division as a whole.

To overcome this tendency, we have tried hard to reward commitment to organizational learning. In the last three years, the program managers that have been the most honest and most open with their learning both in terms of things gone right and things gone wrong have been promoted. In one of those cases, the launch was less successful in terms of the hard metrics, but the manager did a wonderful job of making sure that all current and future managers knew what went well and what didnt.

When these promotions were announced, the message was clear: these people were recognized not only for launching their products successfully, but also for supporting organizational learning throughout EFHD. Learning is now seen as a critical metric for whether people exhibit the leadership styles necessary to be part of top management at EFHD.

Source: The Organizational Learning Goal at Fords EFHD by David Berdish for Systems Thinker

Questions

Open a new document in Microsoft Word and answer the following questions: (2 points each)

1. What type of learning was this organization using? Explain why you think this.
2. What problem was this type of learning causing the organization? How?
3. What behaviour reinforced or supported this type of learning? Why?
4. What change was introduced? How did it shift the focus of their learning?
5. What were the characteristics of this change? (knowledge sharing, continuous improvement, and risk taking for example) Based on your textbook, how did these characteristics support the qualities of a learning organization

If you use any other reference other than the source provided please write the reference. Thank you,