Senge's learning organisation characteristics

In a previous post (here), I mentioned Senge’s five elements of learning organisations: those of systems thinking, personal mastery, mental models, a shared vision, and team learning (2006). In learning organisations, those who lead are kaitiaki and teachers, not those who impose or tell. They accompany the troops, not dictate. They are are the sweeper on the curling rink, allowing the team to continually develop themselves to better understand the complexity of a unified systems model, to clarify organisational vision, to create shared mental understandings, and to create something that is larger than the sum of the individual parts.

So lets walk through what these elements are, in more detail:

• Systems thinking: this is the most important element of a learning organisation - the "fifth discipline" of Senge's seminal book (1990, 2006). It is thought that management may try overly hard to simplify what are very complex systems, seeing the organisation as parts and not as a whole: the organisation is thus not seen as one dynamic system. Taking a higher-level and longer-term view would enable us to more clearly see the impact of our actions - because we are often measured on a short time-scale and on specifics, not systems. While "We [may] learn best from our experience, [...] we [may not...] directly experience the consequences of many of our most important decisions" (Senge, 1990, p. 23). We are likely to remain blind to the ramifications of what we set in motion. We need to think about the interconnectedness of all things.
  
  
• Personal mastery: This is our personal proficiency, our expertise; our vocation or calling. Our professional drive to master the unmasterable; our focus which keeps us in a continual learning mode. And because we are so driven to master our profession, our organisation learns through us. "Individual learning does not guarantee organizational learning. But without it no organizational learning occurs" (Senge, 1990, p. 139).
  
  
• Mental models: These are "deeply ingrained assumptions, generalizations, or even pictures and images that influence how we understand the world and how we take action" (Senge, 1990, p. 8). I have written about mental models before (here), what Daft calls “theories people hold about specific systems in the world and their expected behavior” (2008, p. 133). They are the routine ways of thinking we develop through experience and education, our repertoire (Schon, 1983) and Schon is a good person to draw on here: we need to be reflective to be able to see what happens when our mental models - often our 'sacred cows' - are slaughtered in front of us. Read more on mental models here. 
  
  
• Shared vision: Senge begins with is a simple idea about leadership; that we need to have "the capacity to hold a shared picture of the future we seek to create" (1990, p. 9), or be able to create that capacity as we move forward together. That shared vision is the critical piece of kit that allows us to stay synchronised; in step, in harmony, aligned. It focuses all our efforts on the one key place we are all working towards. Everyone buys in, and the goals are legitimate. Two elements implicit in this shared vision are: a sense of purpose, of agency, that collectively we can do this work; and a longer-term view, that time is less important than the goal being achieved. Senge relates "Once the vision of the product and how they would develop it began to crystallize [...] the team began to work in an extraordinary way. The energy and enthusiasm were palpable. Each individual felt a genuine sense of responsibility for how the team as a whole functioned, not just for 'doing [their] part'" (1990, p. 314-15).
  
  
• Team learning: This is somewhat aligned to the humility of Level 5 leaders (Collins, 2001), and mindset (Dweck, 2006), in that the openness to learning, and mistakes being a part of learning, are key attributes of the organisation and the staff actually learning from 'throwing stuff at the wall and seeing what sticks'. This learning is "the process of aligning and developing the capacities of a team to create the results its members truly desire" (Senge, 1990, p. 236), where what is learned builds on personal mastery, but it fits with the shared vision, and the team can see how it will speed progress. Team learning begins with true, open conversation, or "'dialogue,' the capacity of members of a team to suspend assumptions and enter into a genuine "thinking together." To the Greeks dia-logos meant a free-flowing of meaning through a group, allowing the group to discover insights not attainable individually" (Senge, 1990, p. 12). Senge reminds us that "Dialogue differs from the more common 'discussion,' which has its roots with 'percussion' and 'concussion,' literally a heaving of ideas back and forth in a winner takes-all competition" (1990, p. 12). And while I take his point, I think that is semantics. I don't think of winner takes all in discussion: I focus more on disussion being a collaborative conversation.

However, it is easy to see that if a team, an organisation, or a nation delivers on these five elements, it will be very productive indeed.

Sam

References:

Collins, J. (2001). Good to Great: Why some companies make the leap... and others don’t. HarperCollins Publishers.

Dweck, C. (2006). Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. Baltimore Books.

Schon, D. (1983). The Reflective Practitioner: How Professionals Think in Action. Basic Books.

Senge, P. (1990). The Fifth Discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization. Currency Doubleday.

Senge, P. (2006). The Fifth Discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization (2nd ed.). Currency Doubleday.