Management Topics Samples
Introduction
Theories and literature flourish leadership, training, efficiency, customer orientation; the record goes on and on. One of the mainly recent and widely accepted notions is that of the learning organization, characterized by a culture, pervasive throughout the firm, dedicated to improving workers, their productivity, and overall business performance via continuous lifelong learning. Yet it was not thought that the tenets of the learning organization represent the epitome of organizational development. Although learning is a prerequisite to development, it is not the desired outcome; simply increasing an organization's reservoir of knowledge does not necessarily produce better business results. Taking learning to its highest form to development enables employees to reach their full potential, while organizations focus on outcomes that produce better business results. Thus, the final phase of organizational transformation is that of the developmental organization.
The Blue Mountains Hotel School (BMHS) is a learning organization in Australia as the first residential hotel management school, and the best in the field of hospitality globally. Presently, the objective of BMHS is to be well known as a hotel school that has implemented a recycle/re-use program for guest supplies such as towels and linen
Organization and its evolution
There is an evolution that every organization can experience the transformation from a traditional to a developmental organization. Three identifiable types of organizations exist along this evolutionary plane: the traditional organization, the learning organization, and the developmental organization. What separates one type from another is the importance of human resources in achieving strategic business goals and objectives, the organization's capacity for renewal, and the firm's desire to improve competitive readiness. As with every evolutionary process, it may be difficult to determine exactly where one is at any given period. Often, only when the evolutionary phase has been completed does one know for sure that he or she has passed through it. Much has been written recently about the nature of the learning organization, particularly the importance of learning to the development. Beyond the learning organization lies the epitome of individual and organizational growth and performance. Learning itself does not guarantee employee or business growth and development. Developmental organizations extend themselves further along the evolutionary plane, engaging in activities that promote and reward long-term individual and organizational growth.
Learning Organization
The second phase of evolution is the learning organization. According to (Morgan:1986), the learning organization is an institution that learns powerfully and collectively, continually transforming itself to better manage and use knowledge for corporate success, empowering people within and outside the organization to learn as they work and to utilize technology to maximize learning and production. In recent years, several business leaders have begun to focus attention on organizational learning.
The management of BMHS must alter the environment to support and encourage learning, link learning to business operations communicate the importance of the learning organization, demonstrate their commitment to learning, transform the organizational culture to one of continuous learning and improvement, and establish organization-wide strategies for learning in order to make the transition from the traditional to the learning organization. In addition, eliminating organizational bureaucracy, encourage employee involvement and embrace continuous, adaptive improvement-oriented learning approaches throughout the organization is also important in changing organizational phase.
The management must focus on improving learning capacity as well as encouraging self-directed learning behavior for all employees. Learning organizations are as concerned about market share, productivity, and profitability as the traditional organization; they understand that learning is the key to acquiring greater business results. Nevertheless, the orientation of the learning organization is simply learning.
BMHS management incorporates several important dimensions and characteristics: • Learning is accomplished by organizational systems as a whole, almost as if the organization were a single brain. • Organizational members recognize the critical importance of ongoing organization-wide learning for the organization's current and future success. • Learning is a continuous, strategically used process, integrated with and running parallel to work. • There is a focus on creativity and generative learning. • System thinking is fundamental.
Andersonc and Fornell (1994) focus on the individual's role in learning organizations, maintaining that real, effective learning isn't individual, but social. They also explain that true learning is anything but a passive activity, and the most important stuff for people to learn in organizations is not the explicit stuff of rules, procedures, and so forth, but tacit (intuition, expertise, common sense, core competencies, and the like). They further assert that real learning takes place as part of the work itself, not in sterile training environments or in solitary.
In developing a program promoting the re-use program for guest supplies, the management can utilize Senge's (1990) five disciplines critical to the development of learning organizations. These disciplines are the defining characteristics of learning organizations that separate them from traditional organizations:
1. Personal mastery, which involves the acquisition of individual expertise and proficiency th1rough education, formal learning activities, and work experience.
2. Mental models describe one's fundamental worldview, which is reinforced by structures, experiences, cultures, and belief systems. Mental models guide and direct people as they make decisions, and are used to filter ideas and possibilities. Mental models are very difficult to change because they encompass one's values, beliefs, attitudes, and assumptions.
3. Shared vision is the collective perspectives of employees and evolves from their understanding of the organization's mission. Shared vision is, however, a cornerstone of learning organizations because leaders, managers, and employees embrace a common perception of learning in order for it become paramount within the firm. Shared vision also helps organizations allocate financial, physical, and human resources because they are being used to accomplish the same ends.
4. Team learning allows people to experience things from a myriad of vantage points, enabling them to expand their horizons, deepen their understandings, amplify their perspectives, and develop a better sense of self. Team learning helps employees improve collaboration, communication, and cooperation, as well as view other organizational members as learning resources.
5. System thinking requires leaders, managers, and employees to think strategically about all aspects of organizational life, which include the organization's role in achieving its business goals and objectives, its mission and strategy, and its structure, culture, and managerial practices. Thus, examining the organizational system to determine connections, influences, pressures, and dysfunctions among the integrated parts of the organization proves helpful. Additionally, system thinking requires reflectivity on the part of leaders, managers, and employees for the purpose of improving understanding and action.
There were two types of developmental activities within the learning organization. These activities that are commonly found are called deuteron learning and action learning. (Morgan:1986) These actions or activities are conscious efforts by individuals to review and reflect upon their actions or those others. To see the difference, deuteron learning is as much a process of learning about learning while action learning involves working on real problems, focusing on the learning acquired and actually implementing solutions.
These developmental activities within the learning organizations focus on application and reflection. Application involves using learned information in new and concrete ways and applying the steps, rules, methods, concepts, principles, laws and theories on the job. The result of application on the job is personal mastery, which is defined as a high level of proficiency in one's area of expertise, skill or subject matter. Learning organizations encourage integration of new knowledge and skills on the job to enhance and improve an individual's proficiency. Another critical focus on developmental activities within learning organizations involves reflection. Reflection permits individuals to constantly search for new understanding of how and why they did what they did or believe what they believe.
Learning organizations focus on application and reflection to generate personal mastery and self-awareness. Moreover, learning is a prerequisite to the developmental activities of the learning organization. The organization evolves and begins in the learning organization when its people begin to utilize all components and respective outcomes from knowledge acquisition through and including self-awareness.
According to Senge, the learning organization is different from and superior to the management fashions that have preceded it. Taking the moral high ground, he argues that the learning organization is too important to be characterized as just another management fashion that will inevitably be forsaken for the next great management idea. Regardless of the foibles of fashion, the learning organization, in some form or other, will endure. One means by which he sets out to insure this is to attempt strategically to align the learning organization concept with the quality movement. For Senge, the learning organization is the logical successor to the Total Quality Management (TQM) movement initiated by Deming, one of Senge's key mentors. The concept can act as a unifying framework for galvanizing the quality movement, which, in Senge's mind, risks being fragmented into isolated initiatives and slogans and is hamstrung by the authoritarian, command-and-control hierarchy that still predominates in the United States. Senge makes the observation that Deming's management philosophy was essentially about creating learning organizations, even though he may not have used this term.
Strategic Management
The BMHS may use the balanced scorecard as a strategic management system that will allow various companies and organizations to clearly establish and follow their goals and business strategies and put them into action. This approach also has the capability to issue feedbacks around both the internal business processes and external outcomes, and this undoubtedly help the organization on its drive to continuously improve in terms of its strategic performance and results. When appropriately implemented, the balanced scorecard will be able to develop strategic planning into the brain of an organization.
The balanced scorecard approach is based on integral concepts of past management ideas such as Total Quality Management (TQM) and measurement-based management and feedback. The balanced scorecard integrates feedback within internal business process outputs, just like in TQM. The only difference is the existence of an additional feedback loop around the results of business strategies. This establishes the existence of a double-loop feedback process in the balanced scorecard. To establish such a process, the entire business processes must be part of a system with feedback loops. The feedback data needs to be thoroughly investigated by the company and organization managers in order to identify the causes of variation.
The balanced scorecard is strategic management process based on facts. It is a universal fact that business entities nowadays rely upon measurement and outputs of performance. Measurements must come from the business entity's marketing strategy and provide accurate and relevant data and information regarding critical processes and results. Critical data and information needed for performance analysis and improvement include service performance, operations, and financial. The careful investigation involves using this critical information to identify trends that might not be obvious without at first without undergoing thorough investigation. Relevant information and thorough investigation are able to support a variety of organizational purposes, such as planning, improvement of operations, as well as the comparison of company performance with those of major competitors.
A major factor involved in the improvement of company or organizational performance involves the establishment and utilization of performance measures or indicators. These measures or indicators are measurable characteristics of products and services that the company or organization typically utilizes in order to study and improve performance. The indicators that will be chosen should be able to represent the essential factors that are crucial to the improvement of operational and financial performance. Through the analysis of accurate information brought about by the tracking processes, the measures or indicators themselves can possibly be analyzed and improved to support such goals.
Service Quality
Service quality is generally viewed as the output of the service delivery system, especially in the case of pure service systems (Fitzsimmons and Sullivan, 1982). Anderson and Fornell (1994) explained that service quality is linked to consumer satisfaction. Moreover, although there is no consensus in the research community about the direction of causality relating quality and satisfaction, the common assumption is that service quality leads to satisfied customers (Anderson and Fornell, 1994). Duffy and Kenchand (1998) elaborated this with an example that customers leaving a restaurant or hotel are asked if they were satisfied with the service they received. If they answer "no," we tend to assume service was poor. Direct service providers, such as waitresses, also note that at times the best service efforts are criticized because the customer's perceptions of the service are clouded by being in a bad mood or having a disagreement with someone just before arriving at the restaurant (Duffy and Kenchand, 1998). These service providers recognize that in practice the influence of service quality on customer satisfaction is affected by other factors, one of which is the customers themselves (Duffy and Kenchand, 1998).
In addition, service quality is defined as the difference between expectations of service and perceptions of service actually received. Service quality reflects both the manner and the location of the service delivery (Wakefield, 2001). Clients often make inferences about service quality based upon tangible and intangible cues observed during interactions with the firm (Wakefield, 2001). These are called the tangible and intangible service quality.
Wakefield (2001) explained that the tangible aspects of service quality comprise all that the client can see, touch, hear, and smell when the services are delivered. It includes not only the physical output of the service, but also the physical facilities, the equipment, and the appearance of personnel. Firms should consider facilities design and promote a positive employee image to current and prospective clients. Thus, tangibles basically involve physical facilities, equipment, and appearance of employees (Duffy and Kenchand, 1998).
On the other hand, the intangible aspects of service quality comprise the manner in which services are delivered (Wakefield, 2001). BMHS service performance describes all aspects of the delivery of services, such as reliability, responsiveness, assurance, and empathy (Wakefield, 2001):
Ø Reliability is basically the ability to perform the required service dependably and accurately (Duff and Kenchand, 1998). Reliability involves consistency and dependability. It means the service is performed right the first time, when promised. A sincere interest is shown in solving the client's or customer's problems. Reliability also includes accurate billing and record keeping (Wakefield, 2001).
Ø Responsiveness concerns the willingness of staff to provide prompt and attentive service. Clients or customers must feel that the management or the immediate employee trying to respond to the client's or customer's need knows, and can quickly respond to, their questions (Wakefield, 2001).
Ø Assurance encompasses the client's feelings of security, safety, and confidentiality. Personal information must be kept private to earn trust (Wakefield, 2001).
Ø Empathy means seeing things from the vantage point of the client. Practically speaking, the crews or the management is available to the client when needed, convenient hours are provided, specific client needs are understood, personal attention is given, and the crews or the manager has the client's best interests at heart (Wakefield, 2001).
Duff and Kenchand (1998) added that service quality refers to customers' appraisals of the service core, the provider, or the entire service organization. Moreover, perceived quality is a global judgment relating to the superiority of a product (Holbrook and Corfman, 1985) or a brand. However, Langevin (1998) explained that defining service quality as a measure of excellence in terms of perceptions is not sufficient. He maintains that "it is obvious that understanding customer expectations and meeting customer needs is the single most critical issue and determinant of service quality." Parasuraman, Berry and Zeithaml (1988) agree that expectations are important but add that it is actually the difference between perceptions of a service and expectations for that service which should be used as the measure of service quality. This line of reasoning follows the disconfirmation of expectation paradigm proposed by Oliver (1980). Furthermore, Parasuraman et al. (1988) developed the SERVQUAL instrument to measure perceived service in terms of the gaps between customer expectations and actual judgment of performance along five dimensions of service quality mentioned earlier (Tangibility, Reliability, Responsiveness, Assurance and Empathy). However, there are some authors who have noticed some weaknesses of the SERVQUAL method. Duff and Kechand (1998) stated that Criticisms of the SERVQUAL instrument have centered on its use of expectations and on its dimensions. They are outlined and countered in Parasuraman, Zeithaml, and Berry (1994). Brown et al (1993) stated it should be noted that even critics of SERVQUAL acknowledge the scale is currently the most popular measure of service quality.
Customer satisfaction refers to either a discrete, time-limited event or the entire time the service is experienced (Duff and Kechand, 1998). Service-encounter satisfaction is how much a customer likes or dislikes an actual service encounter (Duff and Kechand, 1998). Overall service satisfaction is the customer's feeling of satisfaction/dissatisfaction based on all the customer's experiences with the service organization (Duff and Kechand, 1998). Bitner and Hubbert (1994) found the two satisfaction constructs differed from each other and from service quality.
Furthermore, Duff and Kenchand (1998) also referred to well-being, also known as life satisfaction which refers to the positive/negative affective dimension of contentment with one's life. It can be measured in terms of health, social, and psychological factors (Duff and Kechand, 1998). According to Larson (1978), much research has been done on individual life satisfaction factors, particularly on the elderly. A multidimensional measure has been applied to a research by Conde and Salamon (1982). The eight factors in their Life Satisfaction in the Elderly Scale (LSES) are: pleasure in daily activities - satisfaction with unspecified daily activities; meaningfulness of life - attitude toward life as a result of feeling useful or having purpose; goals - goodness-of-fit between desired and achieved goals; mood - degree of happiness or optimism, nonspecific to a particular environmental or social situation; self-concept - degree of personal self-regard and positive self-appraisal; perceived health - self-assessment of overall physical well-being; financial security - satisfaction with present and recent financial situation; and social contact - level of satisfaction with the number and quality of usual social contacts.
Managing Service
Services are more difficult to deal with than products because: first, services are intangible (Manoochehri :1993) . They are activities rather than physical objects and generally cannot be measured, tested, or verified before they are consumed; second, services are heterogeneous, especially those with a high labor content. The consistency of the service can vary depending on the performer, the customer, and the environment; finally, production and consumption of services often occurs simultaneously, making them inseparable. This is especially true where the service involves high labor content and there is a great deal of interaction between the customer and the service provider.
In order to improve the quality of service of an hotel business especially the BMHS. The first thing was the approach that the company should understand the customer's needs and expectations. Here, he stressed that defining customer needs is more complex in services than manufacturing because of the involvement of customers in the production process. Manoochehri (1993) advised that customer involvement provides an opportunity for service companies to get direct and immediate feedback on quality. He further stated that employees must be trained and directed to listen carefully to customers to find out what they are thinking. While listening is essential, he argued that it isn't enough. Customers are often unable or unwilling to articulate their expectations and may not always know exactly what they need or want. Furthermore, employees must be encouraged to solicit customers' feedback. Then, they must be willing to ask open-ended questions, and listen not only to what the customer is saying, but also to what the customer is implying.
Manoochehri (1993) also suggested that another way to "listen" to customers is through marketing research, not just service quality research. Then finally, a third area to look at is external communications. Effective external communications that educate customers about services and help establish reasonable expectations are worthwhile. Exaggerated claims to customers that establish expectations you cannot meet are usually disastrous Manoochehri (1993)).
Second among the suggestions is defining and communicating company goals and standards and to enable employees to succeed, it is helpful to establish and communicate service standards such as these (Manoochehri:1993) . Researchers have indicated that service role ambiguity can result if service standards don't exist, if they are too general or too numerous, if they are poorly communicated or if they are not tied to measurement and reward systems. Evidently defined service standards allow for more effective training programs, more accurate measurements of employee performance, and more effective rewards and incentives. Air Asia utilizes this approach very well as they expose and communicate their established standards using the Internet. The Internet can be a powerful tool in the application of this approach because it can reach anyone in the world.
Third, Manoochehri (1993) suggested that the management of a company should improve its human resource practices. Here, he stressed that the intangible nature of services often makes it difficult for customers to judge service quality in precise terms. Since the quality of service depends heavily on the quality of employees, employees in services have an expanded and important role to play (Manoochehri, 1993). He viewed it as critical - that service organizations place a strong emphasis on human resource management (HRM) practices. In particular, services should make sure they have effective practices for hiring, training, motivating, and compensating their employees. Moreover, he also suggests here that organizations should realize that the traditional job design characterized by short cycle, simple and narrow task assignment is not appropriate for today's competitive environment.
Fourth, BMHS should handle dissatisfied costumers effectively (Manoochehri, 1993). In this suggestion, he stated that the first step in handling service problems is to understand the cost of ignoring them. He continued that industry experts agree that it costs five times more to replace a customer than it does to retain one and it has been estimated that companies can increase profits by almost 100% by retaining an additional 5% of their customers. These figures are not surprising when you consider that satisfied customers tend to produce more profit each year they do business with a company, and that customers that are dissatisfied usually express their feelings to about ten other people (Manoochehri, 1993). Then, the next step, he explained, is to make it easy for the customer to complain. Manoochehri (1993) stressed that this is especially important when a company consider that only 4% of dissatisfied customers ever inform the latter of the former's complaints. Manoochehri (1993) continued stating that the employees who deal directly with customers probably hear complaints first. Furthermore, not only should these employees be willing to listen to customers' complaints, they should encourage them. It has been suggested that listening, showing empathy, and demonstrating a genuine understanding of the problem provides the customer with "psychological" restitution. In addition, as mentioned previously, Manoochehri (1993) stated that listening to customers' complaints will give the company valuable information on its service deficiencies and allow it to further refine its service standards.
Last but not the least, Manoochehri (1993) suggested building a culture of quality. Here, he stressed the importance of top management. According to Manoochehri (1993), top management commitment to quality improvement, as a corporate way of life is a prerequisite to success. Top management is defined here as not only the president and CEO, but also all managers who have the authority to establish and enforce policies and guidelines within the organization. He stressed that these managers are responsible for establishing the philosophy, policies, and goals that will direct the organization. Furthermore, these managers also have ultimate control over the systems that account for 85% of the potential for quality improvement.
A second strategy for building a culture of quality is the concept of continuous improvement. Manoochehri (1993) stressed that one area in particular need of continuous improvement is information management. Effective information management is critical for the successful implementation of these quality improvement suggestions that Manoochehri (1993) provided:
Ø A company should understand its customers' needs and expectations, either through personal contact or marketing research.
Ø Define and communicate goals and performance standards.
Ø Distribute decision making through employee involvement.
Ø And build a culture of quality.
Manoochehri (1993) concluded that the productivity and profitability of the service sector in America is stagnant at best. Meanwhile, international competition is increasing in many industries including banking, "airlines", innkeeping, data processing, programming, and entertainment. He stated that Japan, and other foreign countries are using the quality and productivity improvement expertise developed in manufacturing to enhance their services. Moreover, the same thing can be said in Malaysia where hospitality is a priority.
Another way to improve the quality of service of a company is through Total Quality Management. TQM is a company-wide perspective that strives for customer satisfaction by seeking zero defects in products and services (Bethke et al, 1994). In this strategy in management, the role of the Human Resource Management (HRM) has been stressed. Bethke et al (1994) explained that making quality improvements was once thought to be the sole responsibility of specialists (quality engineers, product designers, and process engineers). At the present time, developing quality across the entire firm can be an important function of the human resource management (HRM) department. Bethke et al (1994) stated that a failure on HRM's part to recognize this opportunity and act on it may result in the loss of TQM implementation responsibilities to other departments with less expertise in training and development. Furthermore, the ultimate consequence of this loss is an ineffective piecemealing of the TQM strategy. Thus, HRM should act as the pivotal change agent necessary for the successful implementation of TQM.
According to Bethke et al (1994), implementing a total quality management system has become the preferred approach for improving quality and productivity in organizations. TQM, which has been adopted by leading industrial companies, is a participative system empowering all employees to take responsibility for improving quality within the organization (Bethke et al, 1994). Instead of using traditional bureaucratic rule enforcement, TQM calls for a change in the corporate culture, where the new work climate has the following characteristics: an open, problem-solving atmosphere; participatory design making; trust among all employees (staff, line, workers, managers); A sense of ownership and responsibility for goal achievement and problems solving; and, self-motivation and self-control by all employees (Bethke et al, 1994). The TQM approach involves more than simply meeting traditional rejection rate standards. The end result of TQM is the efficient and effective use of all organizational processes in providing consistent quality at a competitive price. In cultivating the TQM philosophy, strategy implementation must involve a focused effort on the part of every employee within the organization. It cannot be applied successfully on a piecemeal basis (Bethke et al, 1994). The HRM can be the initiator of the principles of TQM. This means that HRM has two specific tasks: "Serving our customers, and making a significant contribution to running the business" (Bethke et al, 1994). This emphasis on customer oriented service means that the HR department must see other departments in the firm as their customer groups for whom making continuing improvements in service becomes a way of life (Bethke et al, 1994). Basically, TQM can be applied in HRM through: focusing on customers' needs; focusing on problem prevention, not correction; making continuous improvements: seeking to meet customers' requirements on time, the first time, every time; Train employees in ways to improve quality; and apply the team approach to problem solving (Bethke et al, 1994).
BMHS must also determine the behavior of their customers or clients. A detailed comparison of the two constructs was provided by Patterson and Johnson (1993). They summed up the differences and similarities as follows:
Ø Satisfaction contains both affective and cognitive components and represents a consumer's evaluation of a specific transaction and consumption experience. This soon decays into an overall attitude about the service. Perceived service quality represents a more global judgment across multiple service encounters, similar to a general attitude towards the firm. However, more recent research supports the notion that both constructs can operate on both levels (Bitner and Hubbert, 1994; Rust and Oliver, 1994).
Ø The satisfaction model includes a crucial intervening variable -disconfirmation, which is a distinct cognitive construct and is conceptualized to have an independent, additive effect on satisfaction. The service quality model, according to Patterson and Johnson, omits the disconfirmation construct. However Cronin and Taylor (1992) believe disconfirmation mediates perceptions of service quality.
Ø Consumer attributions and equity perceptions are also antecedents of satisfaction, but have not been integrated into the service quality model.
Bolton and Drew (1994) also found other antecedents of satisfaction, for example mood or affect, usage frequency, situation, and perceived control.
Ø As well as having an indirect effect on satisfaction via disconfirmation, perceived performance has a direct effect on satisfaction, particularly in high involvement services. However evidence of a direct effect has been found in perceived service quality as well (Cronin and Taylor, 1992; Bolton and Drew, 1991).
Ø Satisfaction is based on experience with the service, whereas perceived service quality is not necessarily experience based.
Ø The pre-purchase standard in satisfaction research (expectations) is typically operationalised as predicted performance, although different standards may apply in certain situations. In contrast, service quality research generally uses equitable, deserved, or 'should receive' expectations. However, as we saw in the previous section, predictive expectations would also seem to play a part in service quality perceptions (Boulding et al, 1993).
After the effort of comparing satisfaction and perceived service quality, Patterson and Johnson (1993) went on to propose an integrated model of the two constructs. In their model there is a route from service perceptions though disconfirmation and satisfaction to perceived quality . Patterson and Johnson's integrated model of service quality and satisfaction states that a person's perception starts at his attitude, expectations and performance, and continues to the discontinuation and the satisfaction or dissatisfaction of that particular person, where then eventually lead to service quality or poor service conclusion. According to the Patterson and Johnson (1993) model, transaction specific satisfaction is an antecedent of overall perceived service quality. This is the view taken by Parasuraman et al (1988:16) "...incidents of satisfaction over time result in perceptions of service quality".
Conclusion
A learning organization is continually developing its abilities in order to flourish and survive. Learning organizations are about creative as well as adaptive learning; they have an evolving shared vision; they use systems thinking; and they spend time challenging their mental models (Senge 1994). These are organizations, which facilitate the learning of all their members, who constantly reframe their view of the world and continuously adapt and transform themselves. Here are ideas drawn from cell biology, evolutionary biology and new understandings about brain functioning and living systems.
An organization can be conceived of as a brain in that it has its own cognitive system as well as its own behavior patterns. The notion of the organization as a brain fits well with ideas of organizational learning and the concept of the learning organization. The concept of organizations learning from their actions as a strategic notion is a very powerful one which resonates with ideas developing from complexity and the underpinning concepts of the learning organization. Strategic learning suggests that an organization is constantly aware of its own actions, reflecting upon them and learning how to do things differently. This is a significant shift away from the more deliberate strategic approaches which tended to focus on central direction and hierarchy towards the more emergent ones which create the space for collective action and supportive behaviors. These more emergent approaches suggest that organizations are complicated, complex, interactive systems that are not so easily directed and controlled. They go a significant way towards recognizing that they are not machines but are made up of complex, living systems. The learning organization, however, contains not only single-loop or maintenance learning but also Morgan's (1986) 'double-loop' learning whereby people are able to question their own assumptions, where they learn to learn and to self- organize. People develop the skills of reflection and inquiry and are encouraged to develop new mental models of the world, to become creative as well as adaptive.
The essential tenet on which many interpretations of the learning organization is based is that through learning an organization is able to adapt, develop, transform and change to meet the needs of itself, its people and society. Here learning is the key to transformation. This is very much a holistic approach to strategy and to learning, which sees learning linking individuals and groups in an organizational web that responds, reacts and transforms in an ongoing process. This means focusing less on specific events and more on the ongoing and underlying patterns and movements for change.
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