Publish at December 06 2022 Updated December 06 2022
"The illiterates of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read or write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, re-learn."
Edgar Morin
A learning organization places learning at the heart of its work processes in order to better adapt more quickly to changing contexts. It observes its "organizational behaviors" and installs feedback loops.
The need was first felt in military institutions that seek to understand how to win over the adversary and therefore feel the need to analyze their mistakes. In this regard, the feedback implemented within the Canadian Armed Forces has been inspiring. This desire to progress and to learn from one's mistakes is also identifiable in the great expeditions, in particular polar ones (Lièvre et al 2005), and then large companies have understood the need for learning to be at the center of their strategy, for example the Shell company led by Arie de Geus was a precursor.
Having an adaptable organizational model is one of the great interests in particular to help get out of the limitations of Taylorism. The ambition to become a learning organization also helps to measure the value of an organization or to maintain the reform movement in the public service (Aucoin, 2000). In the public sector the learning organization makes it possible to define, outside of public policy, the criteria for the quality of their work, forcing them to use their intelligence massively to "manage in the shadows what the official organization does not take care of".
This is therefore an opportunity to release new creative energies at all levels. The learning organization also has the challenge of promoting other relationships to knowledge (Oudet 2010). Historically, the organization has been a trainer and has planned training courses, then it has sought to provide qualifications and has distributed recognition. Today, leaders hope it will be learning to adapt, to emancipate individuals and groups and offer them the best reasons to stay and flourish.
Learning organizations are both "ideal types" (Weber), they pose a descriptive and comprehensive vision of organizational phenomena at work and also models of action with a prescriptive vision. Perhaps even a learning organization becomes an ecosystem favorable to the flourishing of homo sapiens retiolus (Heutte 2005), a worker whose level of information has significantly increased, leading to strong porosities between the inside and outside of the company.
The 1990s
What emerges from the identification of research work on the learning organization in the 1990s is the focus of observations on the processes that give organizations competitive advantages, thanks to the best adjustments and regulation of human interactions.
Vertical coordination remains the reference, but it is complemented by collective, community and outward-looking dynamics. The power of connection and calculation is beginning to reveal itself in the service of organizational performance, and its effect is sketched by knowledge management practices and the growing use of databases.
The theme of the learning organization comes into the debate on the evolution of "productive models", with the "exit from Taylorism". In this respect it is possible to rely on the sociology of configurations, developed by Norbert Elias who conceives the social whole as irreducible to individuals and at the same time constituted by their activities. The configurations engaged by a learning organization as a dynamic favors a shaping and a continuous surge of learning.
The 2000s
The search for the potential of human transformation, combined with the potential of transformation of organizations, characterizes the practices valued from the 2000s onwards, including a quest for individual emancipation where the individual takes initiatives and no longer just waits to be coordinated with other work forces.
This combination is expressed through an investigation of horizontal practices, leaving wider margins of initiative to individuals and groups operating in networks, communities or in a variety of collective forms. The question of informal learning, of taking into account emotions and digital potential, suggests a search for new combinations of values combining emotional intelligence, collective intelligence and artificial intelligence. Digital networking enables distributed intelligence and can give meaning and a sense of purpose back to each employee.
In summary the learning organization aims to learn faster than competitors, to adapt to transformations, to make the best use of its internal resources, to have virtuous organizational behaviors (organizational learning). There are several ways to progress in the approach.
It is possible to act on the organization of work to learn. For example, by promoting exchanges or feedback time. Quality approaches with learning and progress feedback loops, lean management are also well identified. There are many ways to enter into a learning organization approach such as On-the-job Training, Mooc, the development of learning teams, the training of trainers, the establishment of informal cross-functional networks, the introduction of professional co-development sessions, the encouragement of communities of interest.
Peter Senge's book "The 5th Discipline" is probably going to provide the most leads to raise awareness of the importance of learning at an organizational level. For him this requires the mastery of five complementary disciplines:
The work of Peter Senge will form the basis of a focus for reflection, research and action on the learning organization represented by Sol International and Sol France.
Sol International, originated at MIT in Boston; it is the coming together of practitioners from companies, associations, government agencies, researchers, consultants, and students, working together to implement learning organization practices. Within the Organizational Learning Center (OLC), Sol International aimed to stimulate exchanges of experiences between large firms engaged in change and learning processes. Sol France is a non-profit association created in January 1999 in a global declension of Peter Senge's thinking.
Sol's spin-off in France was achieved by futurists producing new concepts such as Alain de Vulpian with socio-perception (De Vulpian 2019), which describes the ability to perceive trends in social forms and identify weak signals.
Exploration by learning expedition has been in Sol's history an axis to make the association a learning association. Thus, many trips have been organized to Finland to discover the team academy (Belet 2012), or to the Basque country to understand how the largest cooperative in the world "Mondragon" had developed in collective intelligence.
These trips will inspire larger companies that will actively promote the practices. Sol will appropriate and disseminate to its members multiple approacheshuman element, the appreciative inquiry, the learning stories, learning communities and dialogue circles. A book by Sol France practitioners identifies more than 100 inspired methods for promoting and creating the learning organization. These are more than 230 concepts that are declined and echo the 5 disciplines of Peter Senge
The association is active in intellectual production (Arnaud, 2019, Cristol 2021), for example in the translation of works, including of course Peter Senge's flagship book "The 5th discipline" or "Dialogue - Cheming towards collective intelligence" by David Bohm. The notebooks of Sol France are an aperiodic edition that is interested in identifying exemplary practices to succeed in the transformation of the living from within. Where, metaphorically speaking, if you pierce an egg from the outside the chick dies, if you incubate it it hatches. "What if we laid organizations?" might be the key question. A video channel promotes the dissemination of the whole
Sol congresses are real crossroads of collective intelligence discoveries bringing together members from dozens of countries sharing and exchanging collective intelligence practices promoting learning together.
The collective researcher set up during the covid used Peter Senge's 5 disciplines to understand the functioning of learning organizations. A sociological inquiry film tells the story of how a group of 32 participants join together to reach out to 64 organizations produce 6 research booklets and an online test to understand how they learn. On the occasion of the research, the psychometric test "Cap en 5D" is produced.
Sol France is organized in 4 circles: organization, consultants, researchers, students, to carry out initiatives and share their watches. These circles support initiatives for example that of "into the tribes", travel around the world to meet learning organizations, meetings of sources radical pedagogical training, Inspiration of research topic for example on learning territories, coevolutionary leadership.
Sources
Blog Formation entreprise. The learning organization of very diverse practices
https://www.blog-formation-entreprise.fr/organisation-apprenante-pratiques-tres-diverses/
Lièvre, P., & Rix, G. (2005, June). Learning organization: the exemplary case of polar expeditions. In Colloque de Cerisy "Intelligence de la complexité: épistémologie et pragmatique", under the direction, Jean Louis Le Moigne, Edgar Morin (pp. 23-30).
Aucoin, P. (2000). The public service as a learning organization: sustaining the reform movement in the public service. Modernizing Governance, 155-195.
Felix, C., & Saujat, F. (2015). The teaching profession: an unthought in the role of the institution as a learning organization?.
Heutte, J., de Pablo, E., & Maestre, A. (2005). Status of knowledge in learning organizations: an attempt to describe a favorable ecosystem for the development of the species Homo sapiens retiolus.
Oudet, S. F. (2010). Organizations for learning. An attempt to contribute to the idea of the "learning city". Specificites, (1), 19-38.
Morin, E. (2005). Cahiers de SoL.
Belet, D. (2012). Team academy. International journal of psychosociology and organizational behavior management, (46), 267-282.
Moretti, L. (2021). Science education, interdisciplinarity and learning territory: An action research on the Corsican island territory. Environmental Education. Regards-Recherches-Réflexions, 16(2).
Vulbeau, A. (2011). Specificities No. 3. Education throughout the city. Champ social Editions.
https://www.decitre.fr/ebooks/specificites-n-3-9782353718672_9782353718672_2.html
de Vulpian, A., & Dupoux-Couturier, I. (2019). Homo sapiens in the age of artificial intelligence: the humanist metamorphosis. Editions Eyrolles.
https://www.decitre.fr/ebooks/homo-sapiens-a-l-heure-de-l-intelligence-artificielle-9782212720228_9782212720228_11.html
Arnaud, B., & Cahn, S. (2019). The toolbox of collective intelligence. Dunod.
https://www.decitre.fr/ebooks/la-boite-a-outils-de-l-intelligence-collective-2e-ed-9782100819201_9782100819201_9.html
Cristol, D., & Joly, C. (2021). Management and collective intelligence, 80 methods and exercises: Practices for learning together. ESF Sciences Humaines.
https://www.decitre.fr/ebooks/management-et-intelligence-collective-80-methodes-et-exercices-9782710144090_9782710144090_1.html
Sol France channel https://youtube.com/channel/UCKetSlwRJO0_Fx2ezH9hl8A
The Collective Researcher - Sol france https://4cristol.over-blog.com/2020/10/le-chercheur-collectif-de-sol-france.html
Sol France Center. Sol France presents its method for helping organizations become learning
https://www.centre-inffo.fr/innovation-formation/articles/sol-france-presente-sa-methode-pour-aider-les-organisations-a-devenir-apprenantes
Ota62. Learning organizations by Jacques Chaize president of Sol France https://ota62.site.ac-lille.fr/courses/les-organisations-apprenantes/cours/les-organisations-apprenantes-par-jacques-chaize-president-de-sol-france/
Forma radio Sol France. Éric Mellet https://formaradio.fr/sol-france-lassociation-des-entreprises-apprenantes/
Béatrice Dewandre. Sol France Human Element Day https://www.beatricedewandre.com/agenda/2022/11/29/journee-element-humain-solfrance
Hbr France how to become a learning organization? https://www.hbrfrance.fr/chroniques-experts/2020/07/30667-comment-devenir-une-organisation-apprenante/
Mooc learning organization https://www.saintrapt.com/mooc-les-organisations-apprenantes/
Hr today once upon a time there were learning organizations https://www.hrtoday.ch/fr/article/il-etait-une-fois-les-organisations-apprenantes-
Echoes. The learning organization seduces bosses Https://www.lesechos.fr/1998/05/lentreprise-apprenante-seduit-les-patrons-1047406
Linternome the learning stories http://www.linternome.fr/2013/09/learning-stories-histoires-apprenantes/
SOL France https://www.solfrance.org/
Senge, P. M. (2006). The fifth discipline. Leveraging Learning Organizations
https://www.decitre.fr/ebooks/la-cinquieme-discipline-9782212312904_9782212312904_11.html
David Bohm - Dialogue - Pathways to Collective Intelligence
https://www.decitre.fr/livres/le-dialogue-9782416000195.html
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