Beyond the Learning Organisation

Paths of Organisational Learning in the East German Context

Mike Geppert

• Publisher: Taylor & Francis
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9781138739796
• eBook ISBN: 9781351729956
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Business
• Subtopic: Business General
• Index: Business

This title was first published in 2000. In contemporary management literature, the idea that managers and organizations should learn and provide widespread capabilities for learning to learn is gaining popularity. Some see reflexive thinking and learning as being the proper response to the transformation of industrial society. However, this study is not concerned too much with the reasons for learning, but is more about how actors and groups of actors actually learn and the resources at their disposal for learning. The study aims to show that differences in social context do matter, and analyzes the organizational learning process in the political and social transformation of East Germany.

1  Introduction

In contemporary management literature, the idea that managers and even organisations should not just learn, but create widespread capabilities for learning to learn is gaining in popularity. The concept of learning to learn which Bateson (1992, pp. 219–40) called ‘deutero-learning’ is seen as the most important life skill at the edge of the new millennium (Honey, 1999, p. 9). The reason for the increasing interest in the creation of learning skills can be understood as a consequence of modernity. Well-known arguments in certain sociological discourses look upon reflexive thinking and learning as being the proper responses to the transformation of industrial society into a ‘risk society’ (Beck et al., 1986). Similarly, management research interprets advancing competition in global markets, the loss of lifelong job prospects, and the rising obligation of individuals to assume more responsibility for their life and work etc. as threats requiring an improvement of the familiar methods by which people learn (Honey, 1999). Consequently, this author and eight other ‘so-called learning gurus’ recently published ‘A declaration on learning’ to inspire and promote thought and debate about the benefits of learning for management, for organisations and for society as a whole (Honey, 1999).

This study does not, however, wish to negate in its entirety this thesis, which impressively underlines the recent surge in interest in the topic of learning in modern capitalist societies. Our problem with such arguments is that the conclusions reached by such experts are often ostentatious and have little relevance for and differ from what actually happens when actors learn among each other. However, it is not our intention to debate the outstanding importance of organisational learning for the purpose of comprehending the problems arising within the transformation of well-established management and organisational practices. And yet in contrast to customary organisational learning approaches which focus on organising and planning in order to develop promising learning recipes, our study is concerned with the social practice of organisational learning.

This project is a departure from common organisational learning approaches used to develop a particular sociological understanding of organisational learning processes. Both conceptually as well as empirically we introduce a particular perspective of analysis, the enactment concept, to study organisational learning as an interactive process. We want to accent the social embeddedness of organisational learning and thus consider how actors and groups of actors actually learn. Through the application of a comparative research perspective, we will show that differences in social context do in fact matter. Consequently, we will confront some of the fairly tentative arguments in the traditional organisational learning debate such as the influence of organisational slack resources, participation, experiences of others or planning, with the concrete learning practices.

This study is an attempt to combine the arguments of two seemingly different academic research approaches. On the one hand, there is the widespread discussion inspired by intervention researchers such as Argyris and Schön, (1978,1996) or Senge (1990) in which not only the importance of organisational learning is emphasised, but also the necessity to create learning organisations which are seen as a kind of tool with which to meet the challenges of the global economy. Higher-level learning in particular is interpreted as a more or less context-free course which can be voluntarily created with the help of skilful intervention research. On the other hand we have neo-institutionalism, one of the most popular approaches in current organisational sociology, which views the idea of managerial voluntarism with scepticism. Whereas the first approach stresses higher-level organisational learning as a chance to create more human, participative and emancipatory work forms in modern organisations, neo-institutionalism emphasises that the chances for such forms of organisational learning are limited in typical organisations because institutional structures and frames within capitalist societies are constraining. In this sense it is believed that institutional pressure allows managers little room to develop strategic choices. In conclusion, the conception of this study not only critically addresses the neglect of social institutions in common organisational learning approaches, but also reconsiders some neo-institutionalist arguments which overestimate the role of institutions at the expense of the role played by creativity and the emergence of strategic choices within the processes of organisational learning (e.g. DiMaggio and Powell, Meyer and Rowan).

We started our research project by concentrating on the analysis of organisational learning processes in the social and economic transformation of East Germany. Thus, when we look back over the course of our research process, we have to confess that the focus of our research project shifted over time from being a study of managerial and organisational processes in East German firms, to one of theory building. But it should be also clear that, if there ever was an ideal ground for practising organisational learning very widely, then it was in East Germany in the transformation of socialist combines into capitalist enterprises. Accordingly, it is an ideal testing ground in order to examine if and how learning concepts are applied in practice, and what we can learn from this, in turn. It was also to be assumed that organisational learning endeavours, in this context, were not institutionally neutral, to say at least. On the basis of our comparative research design, a certain understanding of the dialectic relationship between organisational and institution building was developed. In retrospect, we can insofar conclude that the quite remarkable conditions of societal change appeared to be beneficial in helping us better to study the consequences of micro-level learning processes on the macro-level of society and vice versa.

This study consists of six chapters, including this introduction. In chapter 2 we start with a brief discussion about the origins of common organisational learning approaches. After that we focus our attention on the arguments of one of the most prominent schools in the organisational learning discourse, the intervention research approach. Our illustration of how organisational learning is understood by these scholars reveals that those within the mainstream of this research tradition have concluded that the creation of learning organisations is the ideal response to dealing with the challenges of a global market economy. The first part of chapter 2 finishes with a summary of some key arguments of common organisational learning approaches. The second part of this chapter begins with a critical reflection on the basic ideas of intervention research and confronts them with the main arguments of neo-institutionalist approaches which emphasise the role of institutional environments in understanding the transformation of modern organisations. However, we will see that both concepts would appear to have a one-sided view about the role of institutions within the process of organisational learning. Whereas intervention research underestimates the role of institutions in the organisational learning process, neo-institutionalism overestimates the manner in which institutions influence organisational behaviour. At the end of this chapter we therefore recommend trying to understand and analyse organisational learning from an enactment perspective. Here, the concern of inquiry turns from analysing individuals who learn in order to overcome learning blockades and the question of how institutions force organisational actors to complete adaptive learning modes, to an examination of how actors and groups of actors socially construct the constraints and chances with which they are confronted in the ongoing process of organisational learning.

In chapter 3, the methodological part, we explain the development of our research design. It will be accentuated that our study must be seen as an experience-based project where every chapter has a specific function in the research process as a whole. As such, the study is in and of itself a learning process. Therefore, the company studies in chapter 4 have a more descriptive function, while the discussion in chapters 5 and 6 is more concerned with conceptual questions relating to the comparison of organisational learning in different social contexts and a reflection on the role of institutions within the learning process. Besides the illustration of the different phases in the research process, we also give information about the content and the number of the interviews, and explain the selection of our three case studies and interviewees.

Chapter 4 contains trajectories of learning in three East German companies and begins with an abstract about the origins of the firms we have analysed. What follows is an illustration of the process of organisational learning from a process perspective where we describe how internal and external interrelations were transformed after the ‘wall came down’. The influence of these processes on participation and human resource management is also examined. Each case study report finishes with a brief synopsis recapitulating the starting conditions and the enacted conditions, closing with remarks about the further learning prospects of the firms.

The observations in the company studies served as the bedrock for the comparative discussion of our empirical findings in chapter 5. According to our suggestion put forth in chapters 2 and 3, we will apply seven leading arguments within the conventional organisational learning debate as a guideline to explain and compare the differences in how actors and groups of actors in each firm actually learn and thus create chances and limitations for future organisational learning. As a result of this critical deliberation, we will see that the meaning of key patterns which were accorded a great deal of categorical significance in conventional organisational learning approaches such as manner of participation, planning or learning from the experiences of others can mean something quite different within the context of the learning practices of these three firms. The argumentation of this chapter ought to be read as a detailed illustration of our thesis that the micro-dynamics of organisational learning cannot be discussed with disregard for the institutions which constitute and are constituted by the manner in which actors actually learn with and from each other.

The final discussion in chapter 6 refers back to the main objective of this study to develop a closer understanding about the dialectic between organisational learning and institutions. Correspondingly, we reflect on the results of our comparative research project from a more theoretical angle by pointing to three institutional tensions which actors and group of actors face when they learn interactively with each other. However, next to the relational dimension, in this chapter we also stress the significance of local cultural systems for the emerging dissimilarities in the processes as well as in the outcomes of interactive learning patterns in each of the companies analysed. In conclusion, we stress the benefits of the enactment perspective developed here and suggest analysing paths of organisational learning. Such an analytical concept circumvents both the undersocialised nature of conventional organisational learning approaches which simply neglect the role of institutions in the creation of deutero-learning, as well as the oversocialised view of neo-institutionalist scholars who simply see no place for deutero-learning because of the compelling nature of institutional isomorphism.

2 Theories of Organisational Learning, Institutional Settings and Enactment

2.1 Introduction

The discussion about organisational learning and learning organisations is quite popular in current organisation theory. Miner and Mezias (1996) have succinctly pointed out that organisational learning is an ‘ugly ducking no more’. The discussion has gone from the periphery to the centre of interest of contemporary organisation studies. Scientific journals, readers and conferences about this topic have become fashionable. There is a growing interest in organisational learning and its consequences for organisational development both in theory and in practice. Easterby-Smith et al. (1998, pp. 261–3) have identified two central questions in the discussion: 1) how does an organisation learn?; and 2) how should an organisation learn? These two questions are at the centre of two distinct epistemological communities. The first is largely made up of academics, while the second consists more of practitioners such as consultants and human resource managers.

However, beyond this specific research tradition the intention of this study is to approach the problem of organisational learning from a sociological perspective. Such a perspective places the social character of learning within organisations at the centre of its analysis. Organisational learning processes are conceived of as socially embedded into a more less institutionalised social context. In this sense it is assumed that routines and social practices are not so much the outcome of unconstrained learning processes within the learning organisation, but rather emanate from certain institutional conditions.

We will develop the conceptual question of how organisational learning and social institutions are intertwined in three steps. At first, we will return to the main arguments that emanate from the debate about organisational learning. We will demonstrate that the role of institutions in the process of learning has been neglected or underestimated (section 2.3). After that we will discuss how one of the most popular approaches in current organisation theory, the neo-institutionalist approach, discusses the relation of institutions and learning within organisations. We will see that contrary to the rather radical and promising assumptions of organisational learning approaches, the chances to advance the learning capabilities within and of the whole organisation as a system are questioned (section 2.4). At least we will suggest another approach which avoids both the undersocialised assumptions of conventional organisational learning theory, and the oversocialised view of neo-institutionalism (section 2.5).

Adopting Weicks enactment theory (1995a) we will seek to develop an understanding of organisational learning that considers both its institutional embeddedness, as neo-institutionalism stresses, as well as the processes of competence development and group learning, that is central to the concerns of theorists and practitioners of organisational learning.

Contrary to the tendency in organisation science of using rather abstract metaphors to foster an understanding of organisational learning,¹ the main purpose of the present study is to come closer to the actors’ learning experience. Because the existing discussion about organisational learning tends to focus more on cognition and individual learning, one can find only a few attempts that try to establish a link between on the one hand the conceptualisation of organisational learning and on the other hand the social experiences of the actors involved. (Weick and Westley, 1996, p. 441). Such an integrated perspective opens the way for empirical research of processes of organisational learning that is not biased by idealised and normative presumptions about how organisations and their members are supposed to learn.

2.2 The Roots of Organisational Learning in Organisation Theory

Looking back to the history of organisation theory there seems to be a dualistic bias that, if only indirectly, still prevails in the current discussion on organisational learning and learning organisations. One perspective focuses on the formal aspects of organisations. At the centre of this type of analysis are the division of labour, focal and functional processes, organisational structures and spans of control. The alternative perspective conceives of organisations as natural systems. This type of analysis focuses less on the formal structure of an organisation, but instead more on its informal aspects. It thereby seeks to gain a clearer understanding of the human relations within formal organisations. The members of organisations are not treated as impersonal parts of a mechanical system that have to be guided and controlled. Instead scholars working in this tradition have sought to improve work conditions. In this sense the discussion about informal aspects of organisational life can be seen as being in critical opposition to classical management theories that tend to neglect such aspects as human needs, motivation and self-actualisation of man.

In line with the latter, the human relations approach, dualistic concepts of organisation became established. Especially in the modern management literature where a growing number of polar types such as rational vs natural, formal vs informal, mechanistic vs organic, participative vs hierarchical appear. In all these models, the problematic relation between two ideal typical poles of organisational life is being assessed. However, in contrast to the discussion about organisations as rational and natural systems, succeeding theoretical perspectives searched for optimal combinations of both organisational aspects and relate them to the specificity of the organisation’s task environment. These models of organisation are now interpreted as open systems. In this sense it is assumed that organisations are in reality combinations of formal and informal modes of coordination. Such combinations can be seen as the result of differences in tasks, staff, markets and technologies with which every organisation has to deal with its specific environment.²

In the next section we will examine in more detail how the current debate about organisational learning refers to established theories about modern organisations bearing in mind the before mentioned arguments. There seems to be two research traditions to which the organisational learning approaches directly or indirectly relate:

• the socio-technical systems approach, in which learning in and between teams is seen as an appropriate method to satisfy the technical and social needs of organisational syste...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of Figures and Tables
• List of Abbreviations
• List of Interview Partners
• Acknowledgements
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Theories of Organisational Learning, Institutional Settings and Enactment
• 3 Research Design, Company Cases and Methods of Investigation
• 4 Trajectories of Learning in Three East German Companies
• 5 A Systematic Comparison of the Cases
• 6 Intertwining Organisational Learning and Institutional Settings
• References