Learning organizations: an introduction

Many believe that successful companies beyond the year 2000 will all need to operate as learning organizations. Stimulating this vision have been Dr. Peter Senge of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Dr. James Milojkovic of Stanford University. As a learning organization, all members of a company will learn more about other parts of the organization and more about essential processes such as: helping each other learn, sharing, cooperating, leading, and participating in organizational decisions. This learning together will change existing stratifications, such as "bosses make decisions and employees implement the decisions without being consulted." A learning organization is a group of very different people who work together closely; bosses learn to treat each person as a responsible adult and hourly employees learn to participate in decisions. Learning organizations have a strong commitment to continual change. Each participant is expected to personally learn and grow. Everyone is expected to be open and share information, all while being tactful. The question that is continually before everyone in the company is "how can we do better?"