Introduction
Learning in organization is the term given to a company that facilitates the learning of its members and continuously transforms itself. Learning organizations develop as a result of the pressures facing modern organizations and enables them to remain competitive in the business environment. A learning organization has five main features; systems thinking, personal mastery, mental models, shared vision and team learning.
DEFINITION:
"An organization that facilitates the learning of all its members. Later redefined this as "an organization that facilitates the learning of all its members and consciously transforms itself and its context", emphasizing that change should not happen just for the sake of change, but should be well thought out. Some definitions are broader, encompassing all kinds of organizational change, not just change through learning, whereas others include specifics about how a learning organization works. Seng defines learning organizations as "Organizations where people continually expand their capacity to create the results they truly desire, where new and expansive patterns of thinking are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set free, and where people are continually learning to learn together."
Characteristics;
A learning organization exhibits five main characteristics: systems thinking, personal mastery, mental models, a shared vision, and team learning
Systems thinking. The idea of the learning organization developed from a body of work called systems thinking. This is a conceptual framework that allows people to study businesses as bounded objects. Learning organizations use this method of thinking when assessing their company and have information systems that measure the performance of the organization as a whole and of its various components. Systems thinking state that all the characteristics must be apparent at once in an organization for it to be a learning organization. If some of these characteristics is missing then the organization will fall short of its goal. However O'Keeffe believes that the characteristics of a learning organization are factors that are gradually acquired, rather than developed simultaneously
Personal mastery. The commitment by an individual to the process of learning is known as personal mastery.. There is a competitive advantage for an organization whose workforce can learn quicker than the workforce of other organizations. Individual learning is acquired through staff training and development; however learning cannot be forced upon an individual who is not receptive to learning. Research shows that most learning in the workplace is incidental, rather than the product of formal training; therefore it is important to develop a culture where personal mastery is practiced in daily life. A learning organization has been described as the sum of individual learning, but there must be mechanisms for individual learning to be transferred into organizational learning
Mental models. The assumptions held by individuals and organizations are called mental models.. To become a learning organization, these models must be challenged. Individuals tend to espouse theories, which are what they intend to follow, and theories-in-use, which are what they actually do. Similarly, organisations tend to have 'memories' which preserve certain behaviours, norms and values. In creating a learning environment it is important to replace confrontational attitudes with an open culture that promotes inquiry and trust. To achieve this, the learning organization needs mechanisms for locating and assessing organizational theories of action. Unwanted values need to be discarded in a process called 'unlearning'. Wang and Ahmed refer to this as 'triple loop learning
Shared vision. The development of a shared vision is important in motivating the staff to learn, as it creates a common identity that provides focus and energy for learning. The most successful visions build on the individual visions of the employees at all levels of the organization, thus the creation of a shared vision can be hindered by traditional structures where the company vision is imposed from above. Therefore, learning organizations tend to have flat, decentralized organizational structures. The shared vision is often to succeed against a competitor, however Senge states that these are transitory goals and suggests that there should also be long term goals that are intrinsic within the company
Team learning.
The accumulation of individual learning constitutes Team learning . The benefit of team or shared learning is that staff grows more quickly and the problem solving capacity of the organization is improved through better access to knowledge and expertise. Learning organizations have structures that facilitate team learning with features such as boundary crossing and openness. Team learning requires individuals to engage in dialogue and discussion; therefore team members must develop open communication, shared meaning, and shared understanding. Learning organizations typically have excellent knowledge management structures, allowing creation, acquisition, dissemination, and implementation of this knowledge in the organization
Perception:
Perception can be defined as a process by which individuals select, organize and interpret their sensory impressions, so as to give meaning to their environment. Perception is a complex cognitive process and differs from person to person. People's behaviour is influenced by their perception of reality, rather than the actual reality.
In comparison to sensation, perception is a much broader concept. Sensation involves simply receiving stimuli through sensory organs, whereas the process of perception involves receiving raw data from the senses and then filtering, modifying or transforming the data completely through the process of cognition. The processes of perception consist of various sub-processes such as confrontation, registration, interpretation and feedback.
Positive workplace perceptions
It's like the two sides of a slice of bread: Just as there is some common behaviour that cause negative perceptions in the office, there are also behaviours that tend to garner far more praise than they probably deserve.
In an earlier feature, we covered negative workplace perceptions and how eliminating some seemingly innocent behaviours could lead to greater career success. In this article, we will look at how some of the smallest actions or behaviours can make a big -- and often undeserved -- positive impression on your boss.
Industry leader perception of workplace safety
Abstract:
This study investigated the perceptions of workplace safety held by industry leaders who were near completion of a Master of Business Administration (MBA) degree. This was a qualitative study that utilized interpretive as the theoretical framework. The study sought to answer four research questions. (1) How do participants conceptualize workplace safety? (2) How have personal life experiences of archival documents to gain a greater understanding of the MBA curriculum and other opportunities that are available to industry leaders to learn about workplace safety. Archival documents that were explored included: (1) Historical texts and articles on the development of the MBA; (2) The MBA curriculum of the school attended by research participants and that of the University of Michigan, which was used as a benchmark; (3) The curriculum of the American Management Association; (4) The web site of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA); (5) Journal articles on workplace safety leadership. The research also included the interview of five participants who were near completion of their MBA and who had experience working in a position of industrial leadership. Interviews were conducted on an individual basis.
All information from the archival investigation and participant interviews was explored to identify themes. These themes then revealed the following major findings of the research with respect to the four research questions: (1) Participants conceptualized workplace safety as being an integral part of how they executed their leadership role within their respective organizations. (2) Each participant shared personal life experiences that have helped to shape their perception of workplace safety. (3) The MBA program has played no role in developing participants' perception of workplace safety. (4) Participants indicated the need to continue their engagement in workplace safety through such activities as conducting facility inspections and delivering safety communications to employees.
My objectives of the study
This study helped me to learn the following things:
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ï€ ï€ ï€ To know how to maintain levels of innovation and remain competition
To be better placed to respond to external pressures
ï€®ï€ ï€ ï€ ï€ To have knowledge to better link resources to customer needs.
ï€ ï€ ï€®ï€ ï€ To know how to improve quality of outputs at all levels
ï€ ï€ ï€®ï€ ï€ To know how to improve corporate image by becoming more people oriented
ï€ ï€ ï€ ï€ ï€ ï€®ï€ ï€ ï€ ï€ ï€ ï€ ï€ To know how to Increase the pace of change within the organization
Emergence
Organizations do not organically develop into learning organizations; there are factors prompting their change. As organizations grow, they lose their capacity to learn as company structures and individual thinking becomes rigid. When problems arise, the proposed solutions often turn out to be only short term (single loop learning) and re-emerge in the future. To remain competitive, many organizations have restructured, with fewer people in the company. This means those who remain need to work more effectively. To create a competitive advantage, companies need to learn faster than their competitors and to develop a customer responsive culture. Argyris identified that organizations need to maintain knowledge about new products and processes, understand what is happening in the outside environment and produce creative solutions using the knowledge and skills of all within the organization. This requires co-operation between individuals and groups, free and reliable communication, and a culture of trust.
Literature review
According to
Benjamin Schneider, john j. parking ton and Virginia m. Buxton.( 1980)
Assumptions underlying the use of perception-based diagnoses are also explained. Results revealed some strong relationships between employee perceptions of branch practices and procedures in relation to service and customer perceptions of service practices and quality..
According to
D. G. MacK«ji University of California, Los Angeles A Theory for Language and Other Cognitive Skill 1988.
The Organization of Perception and Action provides a coherent and innovative synthesis of available data, challenges classical theories, and offers new insights into relations between language, thought, and action.
According to
Inkpen, A. C. and Crossman, M. M. (1995), Believing Is Seeing: Joint Ventures and Organization Learning. Journal of Management Studies
This paper develops a conceptual framework for the study of organization learning and applies it to learning in joint ventures (JVs). The framework presents a multilevel view of the phenomenon, suggesting that learning in organizations occurs at the individual, group and organization levels. The framework integrates behavioural and cognitive perspectives of organization learning and delineates both learning processes and outcomes..
According to
Richard Choueke, Roger Armstrong, (1998) "The learning organisation in small and medium-sized enterprises: A destination or a journey?", International Journal of Entrepreneurial Behaviour & Research This paper is a consequence of several years of research and management learning activity with small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), which focused on the development of the organisations and the concomitant development of managers within those organisations.
According to
Antonacopoulou, E. P. (1999), Training does not imply learning: the individual perspective. International Journal of Training and Development,
Using recent empirical findings from an in-depth study in the Financial Services Sector in the UK, this article provides new insights into the association between training and learning from the individual perspective.
According to
Harry Matlay, (2000) "Organisational learning in small learning organisations: an empirical overview", Education + Training,
. Most research in this area, however, focuses upon large businesses. In this type of firm, it appears the concepts of "organisational learning" and "learning organisation" can be, and often are, used interchangeably to describe learning-based individual and collective development..
According to M. P. Pérez, A. M. Sanchez and M. P. de Luis Car nicer (2002) in their book
Benefits and barriers of telework: perception differences of human resources managers according to company's operations strategy. Telework as an integration of Information and Telecommunication Technologies with Human Resources management, means a new job organisation paradigm for companies working in the New Economy
According to Deb Stewart, (2001) "Reinterpreting the learning organisation", Learning Organization,
Examines the theoretical and practical development of the concept of the learning organisation (LO).. Provides a brief review of the current LO literature in the context of learning and organisational learning, and the theoretical tensions existing between these concepts Treats the LO as a metaphor in order to explore the possibilities for its re-interpretation
According to
Angela Edmunds and Anne Morris 2000,
The literature .problem of information overload in business organisations: a review
This paper reviews the literature on the problem of information overload, with particular reference to business organisations. Both perceptions and the actual effects of information overload have been exacerbated by the rapid advances made in information and communication technology, although it is not clear cut as to whether the Internet has worsened or improved the situation.
Thomas Garavan, (1997) "The learning organization: a review and evaluation", Learning Organization,
Undertakes a critical review of the confused and confusing literature on the learning organization. Draws on both psychological and organizational perspectives, and focuses on the distinction between organizational learning and the concept of the learning organization. Concludes with a consideration of the issues involved in creating a learning organization..
SA Journal of Industrial Psychology, (2005)
Job insecurity: Review of the international literature on definitions, prevalence, antecedents and consequences
According to Hans De Witte
This article reviews the literature on job insecurity. After defining the concept and its components, the prevalence of job insecurity among workers is discussed. Next, various antecedents are charted, and the consequences of job insecurity for the health and well-being of individuals and for their attitudes and behaviours towards organizations are discussed..
Steven Henderson, (1997) "Black swans don't fly double loops: the limits of the learning organization?", Learning Organization,
States that in order to remain competitive, organizations must scan and analyse environmental turbulence, formulate appropriate strategic plans and implement these through a change management process. In short, the organization must routinely learn and relearn about its environment, and learn new ways to change and implement policy and process
.
According to
Ricardo Chiva, Joaquin Alegre, Rafael Lapiedra, (2007) "Measuring organisational learning capability among the workforce", International Journal of Manpower The present study sets out to propose and validate a measurement scale that aims to capture the organisational capability to learn, based on a comprehensive analysis of the facilitating factors for learning. The organisational learning capability scale consists of 14 items grouped into five dimensions: experimentation, risk taking, interaction with the external environment, dialogue, and participative decision making.
According to
Antonia Ruiz-Moreno, Victor J. Garcia-Morales, Francisco Javier Llorens-Montes, (2008)"The moderating effect of organizational slack on the relation between perceptions of support for innovation and organizational climate", Personnel Review. The paper reviews the different contributions to the study of the relation between dimensions of the organizational climate, perceptions of support for innovation and organizational slack.
According to
Constantine Andriopoulos, (2001) "Determinants of organisational creativity: a literature review", Management Decision,
. Organisations increasingly aspire to become more creative and capitalise on the benefits of creativity, and perceive the development of conditions that encourage creativity within their working environment as a long-term process rather than a quick fix to their current problems.
According to
Rysia Reynolds, Anne Ablett, (1998) "Transforming the rhetoric of organisational learning to the reality of the learning organisation", Learning Organization.
It has become generally accepted that "people and not capital add the competitive edge" (The Sunday Times, 17 November 1996). . These are invariably packaged as initiatives which promise competitive advantage through people. The research confirms the hypothesis that reliance on rhetoric alone can be dangerous and costly and identifies the problems associated with this approach.
According to
Ian Chaston, Beryl Badger, Eugene Sadler-Smith, (1999) "Small firm organisational learning: comparing the perceptions of need and style among UK support service advisors and small firm managers", Journal of European Industrial Training.Surveys of small firm advisors and small manufacturing firms were undertaken. These surveys revealed significant differences of opinion between advisors and owner/managers over the need to utilise organisational learning to upgrade management practices.
According to Ryan Grainger and Denise tolhurst 2005 in ACM International Conference Proceeding Series.
Organisational factors affecting teachers' use and perception of information & communications technology
About the Journal
. The purpose of the study reported in this paper was to explore what organisational factors affected teachers' use and perception of ICTs, and the use of a new learning management system . The study focused on three factors affecting the use and perception of ICTs: the characteristics and perceptions of leadership; the nature, relevance and usefulness of training; and, management approaches to IS/IT system implementation.
According to francs berkhout, Julia hertin, David m. Gann 2001 From the issue entitled "Economy, Politics and Institutions: From Adaptation to Adaptive Management in Climate Change"argues that adaptation to climate change has many similarities with processes of organisational learning. The paper suggests that business organisations face a number of obstacles in learning how to adapt to climate change impacts, especially in relation to the weakness and ambiguity of signals about climate change and the uncertainty about benefits flowing from adaptation measures.
According to Richard Common in policy studies, 2004 under organizational learning under political environment
It seeks to demonstrate that a conceptual synthesis between policy learning and organisational learning has an important contribution to make in terms of developing an understanding of how and why policy transfer occurs. Although the concept of organisational learning is now fairly well established in management approaches for improving organisational effectiveness, its current attraction is largely a result of the same environmental pressures that have allegedly globalised policy-making
According to
Perception Mitchell, V.-W Risk and Reduction 1995: A Literature Review. British Journal of Management,
Despite there being a considerable literature concerning risk in organizational buyer behaviour, necessary reviews of the area are not easy to find. it attempts to organize, describe and appraise the current literature with a view to gaining a critical perspective for the benefit of future researchers. The discussion begins with the way managers view risk and factors which affect that perception and then considers the role of various risk reducing strategies employed in the organizational setting..
According to
Barbara B. Brown and Albert Wiswell, Chair 2003
The purpose of this research was to investigate the relationship between employees'
Perceptions of their immediate supervisors' relations-oriented and task-oriented leadership. Relations-oriented leadership behaviours explained the greatest amount of variance, affective commitment, somewhat less variance in normative commitment, and no variance in continuance commitment. The results for task-oriented leadership behaviors revealed the same pattern of relationships with the different types of organizational commitment, only weaker.
Methodology
Research methodology Discuss the research design research problems important of study scope and significance of the study sources of data questionnaire sample design stastically techniques used and the objective of the study and limitations of the study
Research design
Research design can be thought of as the structure of research -- it is the "glue" that holds all of the elements in a research project together. We often describe a design using a concise notation that enables us to summarize a complex design structure efficient purpose with economy is procedure .it is the conceptual structure within which research is conducted and it constitutes the blue print for the collection measurement and analysis of data .it includes an outline of what the researchers will do from within the hypothesis and its operational implications to the final analysis of data
There are three types of research design techniques
descriptive
exploratory
causal
The research design used is exploratory,as in exploratory we have to explore the information regarding particular research ,since we know bit about learning and perception in organization, but we need more knowledge about it.
Exploratory research is a type of research conducted for a problem that has not been clearly defined. Exploratory research helps determine the best research design, data collection method and selection of subjects. It should draw definitive conclusions only with extreme caution. Given its fundamental nature, exploratory research often concludes that a perceived problem does not actually exist.
Exploratory research often relies on secondary research such as reviewing available literature and/or data, or qualitative approaches such as informal discussions with consumers, employees, management or competitors, and more formal approaches through in-depth interviews, focus groups, projective methods, case studies or pilot studies. The Internet allows for research methods that are more interactive in nature. For example, RSS feeds efficiently supply researchers with up-to-date information; major search engine search results may be sent by email to researchers by services such as Google Alerts; comprehensive search results are tracked over lengthy periods of time by services such as Google Trends; and websites may be created to attract worldwide feedback on any subject.
The results of exploratory research are not usually useful for decision-making by themselves, but they can provide significant insight into a given situation. Although the results of qualitative research can give some indication as to the "why", "how" and "when" something occurs, it cannot tell us "how often" or "how many".
Exploratory research is not typically generalizable to the population at large.
The aim of this paper is to know what is the perception and learning in management and what are its importance in the organization..
Sources of data
Primary source
The data is collected by survey method. This is a process by which first hand information is collected. This method is needed for meeting the specific objective of research study. The questionnaire and interview technique is used to collect the data and information from current and non existing user.
Questionnaire is a set of questions, which an interviewer asks the interviewee. The purpose of interview is to answer question honestly. On the basis of answer the conclusion is drawn.
Secondary source
The secondary data is collected in form of information which has already been collected by some one. Along with this some information on Crisis Management , their features are collected from internet.
For more information regarding research methodology and marketing, books from library have been referred.
For this Research we have used the secondary data.
Results
Personal mastery can even be seen as a threat to the organization. This threat can be real, as Senge points out, that "to empower people in an unaligned organization can be counterproductive". In other words, if individuals do not engage with a shared vision, personal .Even within a learning organization, problems can stall the process of learning or cause it to regress. Most of them arise from an organization not fully embracing all the necessary facets. Once these problems can be identified, work can begin on improving them.
Some organizations find it hard to embrace personal mastery because as a concept it is intangible and the benefits cannot be astery could be used to advance their own personal visions. In some organizations a lack of a learning culture can be a barrier to learning. An environment must be created where individuals can share learning without it being devalued and ignored, so more people can benefit from their knowledge and the individuals becomes empowered. A learning organization needs to fully accept the removal of traditional hierarchical structures..
Resistance to learning can occur within a learning organization if there is not sufficient buy-in at an individual level. This is often encountered with people who feel threatened by change or believe that they have the most to lose] They are likely to have closed mind sets, and are not willing to engage with mental models. Unless implemented coherently across the organization, learning can be viewed as elitist and restricted to senior levels. In that case, learning will not be viewed as a shared vision. If training and development is compulsory, it can be viewed as a form of control, rather than as personal development. Learning and the pursuit of personal mastery needs to be an individual choice, therefore enforced take-up will not work. In addition, organizational size may become the barrier to internal knowledge sharing. When the number of employees exceeds 150, internal knowledge sharing dramatically decreases because of higher complexity in the formal organizational structure, weaker inter-employee relationships, lower trust, reduced connective efficacy, and less effective communication. As such, as the size of an organizational unit increases, the effectiveness of internal knowledge flows dramatically diminishes and the degree of intra-organizational knowledge sharing decreases.
Illustrating perception with examples below:
Responding to e-mails at odd times
How you perceive it: You are bored, so you spend a couple of minutes before bed checking if there is anything urgent.
How your employer perceives it: You are a dedicated individual who puts work first.
Just one late-night or weekend e-mail can make the utmost impression on your boss. Even if you do it because you have nothing better to do, this never fails to make an impact.
It takes no time at all. If your company has web-based e-mail access or if you have your e-mails forwarded to your personal account (check whether your company has rules against this first), it literally takes minutes to scan through e-mails over the weekend and to make a quick response.
Addressing problems on your own
How you perceive it: Fear and anxiety cause you to push the boundaries and make the odd call on your own.
How your employer perceives it: He is relieved that you do not need to have your hand held all the time.
Although embarking on big projects on your own can cause you to be labelled a free spirit that is difficult to control, addressing smaller problems by yourself can have the opposite effect and relieve your employer by demonstrating that you can handle things by yourself.
we are dealing with perceptions here, and each person's take on things could be quite different. Keep this in mind and make sure you know your boss well before you embark on these sorts of behaviours.
Don't feel bad for eating at your desk.
Conclusion
If we want to explain , predict, and influence behavior, we need to understand how people learn. In the words of Rysia Reynolds, Anne Ablett, It has become generally accepted that "people and not capital add the competitive edge" (The Sunday Times, 17 November 1996). This belief is often put into practice through the use of frameworks of organizational learning and the concept of the learning organization. These are invariably packaged as initiatives which promise competitive advantage through people.
Why is perception important in the study of OB? Simply because people's behavior is based on their perception of what reality is, not on reality itself.
The world as it is perceived is the world that is behaviorally important.
I have come to the end of a paper that has widened my view on crisis management and how individuals react to sudden and unexpected events. I still believe that the field of learning and perception in organization management has far from exhausted its research potential.
Refrences and Bibliography
www.google.com
www.wikipedia.com
www.siliconfareast.com
www.alagse.com
www.stedaivesandbangkokpost.com
www.googlescholars.com
www.scholar.google.com
www.proquest.com
D. G. MacK«ji University of California, Los Angeles A Theory for Language and Other Cognitive Skll 1988
Inkpen, A. C. and Crossan, M. M. (1995), Believing Is Seeing: Joint Ventures and Organization Learning. Journal of Management Studies
Richard Choueke, Roger Armstrong, (1998) "The learning organisation in small and medium-sized enterprises: A destination or a journey?",
Deb Stewart, (2001) "Reinterpreting the learning organisation", Learning Organization
Antonacopoulou, E. P. (1999), Training does not imply learning: the individual perspective. International Journal of Training and Development
Harry Matlay, (2000) "Organisational learning in small learning organisations: an empirical overview", Education + Training
M. P. Pérez , A. M. Sánchez and M. P. de Luis Carnicer(2002)in their bookBenefits and barriers of telework: perception differences of human resources managers according to company's operations strategy
Editorial Board
Angela Edmunds and Anne Morris 2000, The literature .problem of information overload in business organisations
Thomas Garavan, (1997) "The learning organization: a review and evaluation", Learning Organization
SA Journal of Industrial Psychology, (2005)
Job insecurity: Review of the international literature on definitions, prevalence, antecedents and consequences
by Hans De Witte
Steven Henderson, (1997) "Black swans don't fly double loops: the limits of the learning organization?", Learning Organization
Ricardo Chiva, Joaquin Alegre, Rafael Lapiedra, (2007) "Measuring organisational learning capability among the workforce
An tonia Ruiz-Moreno, Víctor J. García-Morales, Francisco Javier Llorens-Montes, (2008)"The moderating effect of organizational slack on the relation between perceptions of support for innovation and organizational climate", Personnel Review
Constantine Andriopoulos, (2001) "Determinants of organisational creativity: a literature review", Management Decision
Rysia Reynolds, Anne Ablett, (1998) "Transforming the rhetoric of organisational learning to the reality of the learning organisation", Learning Organization
According to
Ian Chaston, Beryl Badger, Eugene Sadler-Smith, (1999) "Small firm organisational learning: comparing the perceptions of need and style among UK support service advisors and small firm managers
ryan grainger and denise tolhurst 2005 in ACM International Conference Proceeding Series
frans berkhout, Julia hertin, david m. gann 2001 From the issue entitled "Economy, Politics and Institutions: From Adaptation to Adaptive Management in Climate Change
Richard Common in policy studies, 2004 under organizational learning under political environment
Perception Mitchell, V.-W Risk and Reduction 1995: A Literature Review. British Journal of Management,
Barbara B. Brown and
Albert Wiswell, Chair 2003
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