Introduction

Organisational The concept of organisational learning and

learning: a critical
review
Catherine L. Wang
Pervaiz K. Ahmed
The authors
Catherine L. Wang and Pervaiz K. Ahmed are based at
the Business School, University of Wolverhampton,
Telford, Shropshire, UK.
Keywords
Organizational learning, Creativity, Innovation,
Learning organizations
Abstract
This paper reviews the conceptual framework of
organisational learning, and identifies five focuses of the
concept and practices within the existing literature,
namely, focus on collectivity of individual learning;
process or system; culture or metaphor; knowledge
management; and continuous improvement. In line with
current industrial contexts, this paper tentatively redefines
the concept of organisational learning, incorporating the
aspect of radical innovation and creativity. The aim of this
paper is to provide a clarified and updated understanding
of organisational learning.
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The Learning Organization
Volume 10 . Number 1 . 2003 . pp. 8-17
# MCB UP Limited . ISSN 0969-6474
DOI 10.1108/09696470310457469
8
learning organisation did not emerge until the
1980s, but its principles are rooted into many
perspectives of management (Garratt, 1999),
and its practices recognise a wide range of
factors, such as organisation strategy, culture,
structure, absorptive capacity, problem-
solving ability, employee participation, etc.
determining the learning results. The idea of
organisational learning is credited to the
creation of the ``action learning'' process
(Revans, 1982), which uses small groups,
rigorous collection of statistical data, and the
tapping of the group's positive emotional
energies (Garratt, 1999). This technique is
also reflected in Deming's quality control
system using quality circles, SPC (statistical
process control) and PDSA (plan-do-study-
action). A few works contributed positively to
open up the debate of organisational learning
and subsequently the popularity of the
concept. These include Argyris and Schon's
(1978) double-loop learning notion, Senge's
(1990) The Fifth Discipline and Pedler et al.'s
(1991) learning company model.
Today, the concept of organisational
learning has flourished and been defined in a
wide range of literature (Levitt and March,
1988; Senge, 1990; Cohen and Sproul, 1991;
Argyris and Schon, 1996). However, the
definitions bear some concurrent criticism.
First, the concept of organisational learning
and learning organisation is ``excessively
broad, encompassing merely all
organisational change . . . and from various
other maladies that arise from insufficient
agreement among those working in the area
on its key concepts and problems'' (Cohen
and Sproul, 1991, p. 1). Similar criticism has
been raised by many other authors such as
Daft and Huber (1987), Huber (1991),
Dodgson (1993), Garvin (1993), Hawkins
(1994), Miller (1996), and Popper and
Lipshitz (2000). Second, most of the
definitions appear to be complementary
rather than fundamentally original or
conceptually different (Matlay, 2000). The
influx of literature provides overwhelming,
but unclear information to both researchers
and practitioners. Finally, the prevailing
concept of organisational learning and
learning organisation bears a strong bias
towards the traditional scientific approach to
management, and stresses the importance of
 Organisational learning: a critical review
Catherine L. Wang and Pervaiz K. Ahmed
system thinking and continuous
improvement. A few researchers have
identified the limitations of the existing
framework in current industrial contexts
(Lorente et al., 1999; Kim and Mauborgne,
1999; Wang and Ahmed, 2001). There is a
need to review the existing literature to
explicate understanding of the organisational
learning concept and practices and essentially
upgrade the concept to conform to the
requirements of current industrial
developments.
Identifying five focuses of
organisational learning
The concept of learning is understood from
various perspectives, and mainly developed in
the psychological field over a long
evolutionary history. The application of
learning at the organisational level was
primarily conditioned as a collectivity of
individual learning, training and development.
The process of individual learning has a
significant impact on the concept and
practices of organisational learning. Learning
starts from individuals. A learning
organisation is founded on the learning
process of individuals in the organisation.
However, individual learning does not
necessarily lead to organisational learning
(Ikehara, 1999). It is the task of the learning
organisation to integrate individual learning
into organisational learning.
The concept of organisational learning has
quickly evolved to cover various aspects of
organisational management. Researchers and
practitioners intend to provide a holistic
description of the domain and create a
proliferation of definitions. Through an
extensive literature review, we identify five
focuses of the concept: focus on collectivity of
individual learning; focus on process or
system; focus on culture or metaphor; focus
on knowledge management and focus on
continuous improvement (see Table I).
Focus on collectivity of individual
learning
Early research demonstrates a strong
emphasis on the role of individual learning in
organisational learning. At the extreme end,
the organisational learning system is viewed as
one depending wholly on individual learning
as against practice of knowledge sharing for
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The Learning Organization
Volume 10 . Number 1 . 2003 . 8-17
all the organisational members (Shrivastava,
1983).
The main stream within this focus of
organisational learning considers individuals
as ``agents'' for organisations to learn (Argyris
and Schon, 1978, p. 16):
Organisational learning occurs when individuals
within an organisation experience a problematic
situation and inquire into it on the organisational
behalf. They experience a surprising mismatch
between expected and actual results of action
and respond to that mismatch through a process
of thought and further action that leads them to
modify their images of organisation or their
understandings of organisational phenomena
and to restructure their activities so as to bring
outcomes and expectations into line, thereby
changing organisational theory-in-use.
A learning organisation evolves as a result of
the learning and behaviour of its people
(Honey and Mumford, 1992; Burgoyne and
Pedler, 1994; Senge, 1990; Marquardt and
Reynolds, 1994). The ability of a workforce in
an organisation to learn faster than those in
other organisations constitutes the only
sustainable competitive advantage at the
disposal of a learning organisation (De Geus,
1998, p. 71). Organisational learning should
be where the individuals consciously interact
with others through the process of education
and as a result of experience (Kolb, 1984;
Honey and Mumford, 1992). Therefore, a
learning organisation should primarily focus
on valuing, managing and enhancing the
individual development of its employees
(Scarbrough et al., 1998, p. 2).
Under this viewpoint, organisational
learning is in a sense the collectivity of
individual learning within the organisation.
Collective learning occurs in addition to the
learning process at the individual level, and
may even occur independently of each
individual. However collective learning
cannot take place if all the employees in an
organisation are prevented from learning
(Romme and Dillen, 1997; Kim, 1993).
Therefore it is claimed that a learning
organisation can be defined or measured in
terms of the sum total of accumulated
individual and collective learning (Hyland
and Matlay, 1997).
It is worth noting that individual learning is
not necessarily positive or contributive to the
organisation, because employees may learn
something negative to the organisation, or
may learn to improve themselves, rather than
benefit the organisations (Field, 1997). On
 Organisational learning: a critical review The Learning Organization
Catherine L. Wang and Pervaiz K. Ahmed Volume 10 . Number 1 . 2003 . 8-17

Table I A summary of the organisational learning concept and practices

Focus
Individual learning
Process or system
Culture or metaphor
Knowledge management
Continuous improvement
The concept of organisational learning Practices
``Organisational learning occurs when individuals Staff training and
within an organisation experience a problematic development
situation and inquire into it on the organisational
behalf'' (Argyris and Schon, 1996, p. 16)
Organisational learning is the process whereby Enhancement of information
organisations understand and manage their processing and problem
experiences (Glynn et al., 1992) solving capability
``A learning organisation should be viewed as a Creation and maintenance of
metaphor rather than a distinct type of structure, learning culture:
whose employees learn conscious communal collaborative team working,
processes for continually generating, retaining and employee empowerment and
leveraging individual and collective learning to involvement, etc.
improve performance of the organisational system
in ways important to all stakeholders and by
monitoring and improving performance'' (Drew and
Smith, 1995)
Organisational learning is the changes in the state Facilitation of interaction and
of knowledge (Lyles, 1992, 1998). It involves strengthening of knowledge
knowledge acquisition, dissemination, refinement, base
creation and implementation: the ability to acquire
diverse information and to share common
understanding so that this knowledge can be
exploited (Fiol, 1994) and the ability to develop
insights, knowledge, and to associate among past
and future activities (Fiol and Lyles, 1985)
``A learning organisation should consciously and The adoption of TQM
intentionally devote to the facilitation of individual practices
learning in order to continuously transform the
entire organisation and its context'' (Pedler et al.,
1991)

the other hand, individuals' learning Focus on process or system

activities, in turn, are facilitated or inhibited
by an ecological system of factors that may be
called an ``organizational learning system''
(Argyris and Schon, 1978). Thus, the
learning-based interaction between individual
employees and the organisation that employs
them is emphasised (Morgan, 1986;
Hedberg, 1981). Matlay (2000) further notes
that the relationship between individual and
collective learning is a most important aspect
that distinguishes learning organisations from
one another.
However, if a distinction between the
organization and the individual is not made
explicit, a model of organisational learning
will either obscure the actual learning process
by ignoring the role of the individual (and
anthropomorphizing organisations) or
become a simplistic extension of individual
learning by glossing over organisational
complexities (Kim, 1993, pp. 42-3).
10
Another stream of organisational learning
research focuses on organisations themselves
and refers to an organisation as a ``learning
system'' (Revans, 1982). Organisational
learning is the process whereby organisations
understand and manage their experiences
(Glynn et al., 1992).
Different perspectives are stressed within
the learning process: leadership (Revans,
1982; Popper and Lipshitz, 2000); five
disciplines: personal mastery, mental models,
shared vision, team learning and systems
thinking (Senge, 1990); and 4I processes:
intuiting and interpreting at the individual
level; interpreting and integrating at the group
level; and integrating and institutionalising at
the organisational level (Crossan et al., 1994,
p. 6).
The system view of organisational learning
has been taken mainly from the information
processing perspective (Cyert and March,
 Organisational learning: a critical review
Catherine L. Wang and Pervaiz K. Ahmed
1963). Organisations are referred to as
information processing systems, acquiring,
interpreting, distributing, and storing
information within the organisation, and
therefore four components of the
organisational learning process are proposed:
knowledge acquisition, information
distribution, information interpretation and
organisational memory (Huber, 1991).
There are two sub-streams within the
system view: organisations as a closed system
or an open system. Under the view of
organisations as a closed system,
organisational learning is restricted within an
organisation itself. The viewpoint of
organisations as an open system takes into
account the situational factors and includes
inter-organisational learning as an important
part of the whole organisational learning
system. Knowledge is acquired widely, both
within and outside of the organisation. The
open system viewpoint reflects the
contingency approach to organisational
management and some practices from the
new organisational paradigms. In a learning
organisation, the highest stage incorporates
three aspects of learning: adapting to their
environment; learning from their people; and
contributing to the learning of the wider
community or context of which they are a part
(Pedler et al., 1991). However, there is lack of
emphasis on flexibility, innovativeness and
creativity within the system view, and these
factors become increasingly important for an
organisation to succeed.
Focus on culture or metaphor
Within the organisational learning literature,
there is a strong emphasis on the cultural
perspective of the learning organisation.
Culture serves as a sense-making mechanism
that guides and shapes the values, behaviours
and attitudes of employees (O'Reilly and
Chatman, 1996), and it is through values that
behaviour flows and is guided (Simon, 1976).
An organisation's culture imposes ``coherent,
order, and meaning'' and enables the
institutionalisation of an appropriate sense-
making structure to facilitate interpretation of
unfamiliar events (Weick, 1985, p. 384).
Drew and Smith (1995) comment that a
learning organisation should be viewed as a
metaphor rather than a distinct type of
structure, whose employees learn conscious
communal processes for continually
generating, retaining and leveraging
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Volume 10 . Number 1 . 2003 . 8-17
individual and collective learning to improve
performance of the organisational system in
ways important to all stakeholders and by
monitoring and improving performance.
Traditional hierarchical cultures are anti-
learning and anti-training, and undermine the
ability of organisations to match and survive
increasing competition in the global
marketplace (Jones, 1996). In the new
economy, knowledge is not reserved for
people in managerial or professional
positions. Every worker needs to be a
knowledge worker. However, having a
company where the majority of employees are
knowledge workers is not sufficient to
guarantee success against strong competition.
The culture has to be right to enable their full
contribution. Organisations need to change to
a collaborative team culture in order to escape
the no-training and waste-training traps
(Jones, 1996) and focus on the process and
involvement of people within the organisation
(Mintzberg, 1994). Every member of the
organisation must be able to positively
contribute. The same has been stressed by
Jones (1996) that, ``in addition to the full
utilization of the technical skills and
knowledge of employees, a team approach is
essential for the effective acquisition of new
knowledge and skills. Team skills are
inextricably linked to effective learning. It is
the learning and motivation which a team
approach enables that forms the mainspring
of quality, innovation, service, etc.''. Torbert
(1991) names it ``the liberating culture'',
which is a means of overcoming barriers that
limit organisational learning.
The linkage between culture and
organisational performance has been
tentatively defined by researchers (Denison,
1990; Gordon and DiTomaso, 1992).
Culture, as an independent and internal
variable (Smircich, 1983), has become a
critical tool for strategists to design
organisations. Culture enables an
organisation to best utilise its knowledge and
experience for establishing and achieving
desired goals and learning about wisdom as
the process of discerning judgments and
action based on knowledge (Bierly et al.,
2000). This type of learning is associated with
the ``third-order learning'' or triple-loop
learning by Bateson (1972), Berman (1981),
McWhinney (1992), and ``the spirit-action
connection'' by Rothberg (1993). However,
within the existing literature, there is general
 Organisational learning: a critical review
Catherine L. Wang and Pervaiz K. Ahmed
restriction to validate the association between
adoption of a learning culture and
improvement of organisational performance.
There is a need of larger-scale empirical
research to understand the linkage and
relationship.
Focus on knowledge management
Organisational learning and knowledge
management are two parallel-developed
concepts in the new economy and often refer
to each other in their definitions and
practices.
Organisational learning is referred to as the
changes in the state of knowledge (Lyles,
1992, 1988), and involves knowledge
acquisition, dissemination, refinement,
creation and implementation: the ability to
acquire diverse information and to share
common understanding so that this
knowledge can be exploited (Fiol, 1994,
p. 404), and the ability to develop insights,
knowledge, and to associate among past and
future activities (Fiol and Lyles, 1985, p. 811).
Bierly et al. (2000, p. 597) define ``learning is
the process of linking, expanding, and
improving data, information, knowledge and
wisdom''. Organisational knowledge is stored
partly into individuals in the form of
experience, skills and personal capability, and
partly into the organisation, in the form of
documents, records, rules, regulations and
standards, etc. (Weick and Roberts, 1993).
Part of knowledge between an organisation
and individuals is complementary and part of
it incongruent to each other's belief systems.
Organisational memory maintains the
organisational knowledge base, acts as the
foundation of knowledge accumulation and
creation, and reflects the absorptive capability
of organisations. Therefore, to create a
learning environment between individuals
and the organisation to facilitate interaction
and strengthening of each other's knowledge
base becomes the main task for management
(Adler et al., 1999).
Only recently has organisational learning
been essentially linked to knowledge creation.
The understanding of the impact of
organisational learning on knowledge
management can be taken from the
``ontological dimension'' of Nonaka and
Takeuchi's knowledge creation model, which
is the process of knowledge transfer among
individual, group, organisational and inter-
organisational levels (Nonaka and Takeuchi,
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Volume 10 . Number 1 . 2003 . 8-17
1995, p. 27). It is increasingly important that
the learning process moves on to a higher
level of triple-loop learning, which, combined
with organisational unlearning, leads to
knowledge creation.
Focus on continuous improvement and
incremental innovation
Current literature on organisational learning
has a bias on continuous improvement
(Pedler et al., 1991; Buckler, 1996;
Scarbrough et al., 1998). The learning
organisation is a state which is continuously
being striven for (Hodgkinson, 2000) and is
more an aspiration for a continuous process
rather than a single product (Garratt, 1999).
A learning organisation is viewed as one
where ``people continuously expand their
capacity to create the results they truly desire,
where new and expansive patterns of thinking
are nurtured, where collective aspiration is set
free, and where people are continually
learning how to learn together'' (Senge, 1990,
p. 3). A similar definition is given by Pedler
et al. (1991): a learning organisation should
consciously and intentionally devote to the
facilitation of individual learning in order to
continuously transform the entire
organisation and its contexts (Pedler et al.,
1991; Morris, 1996; Scarbrough et al., 1998).
In this sense, the adoption of total quality
management (TQM) is a milestone towards a
learning organisation.
TQM's main tenets are the pursuit of
continuous improvement. Practised both as a
philosophy and a set of techniques, TQM
enables organisations to focus on meeting and
satisfying customer needs by improving
processes, understanding the internal
customer concept, involving each individual
employee, implementing organisational wide
training and development and concentrating
on improvements in cost, quality and
customer satisfaction (Evans and Lindsay,
1999; Luthans, 1998; Flood, 1993). It has
been thus argued that TQM and learning
organisations are mutually dependent (Ford,
1991). Organisational learning is an intended
outcome of TQM, and there is a correlation
between process improvement and
organisational learning (Barrow, 1993).
Continuous improvement is aimed to achieve
incremental innovation, therefore, a learning
organisation dedicates to incremental
innovation through effective learning
mechanisms.
 Organisational learning: a critical review
Catherine L. Wang and Pervaiz K. Ahmed
Focus on creativity and innovation
It is not necessary to make a prolonged
discussion about the fast changes of the
current business world, which is evidently
featured by hyper-dynamics, uncertainty and
chaos. Organisations have to face a constant
challenge: intensified competition6increased
customer power6shortened product life
cycle. Organisations relying simply on the
traditional competence in cost and differential
strategy find it increasingly difficult to sustain
competitive advantage. A strategy of
continuous improvement is not necessarily
beneficial to organisations which operate in
hyper-dyanmic markets such as the high-risk
investment sector like pharmaceuticals and
the high-tech sector like microprocessors, etc.
(Lorente et al., 1999). In fact, many
researchers have noted that a focus on merely
continuous improvement lacks vigour in the
new world, since many companies are likely to
confront competitors' innovations that
undermine their area of competence (Kambil
et al., 2000). Continuous improvement
provides a comfortable logic to gradual
evolution and an intellectual ``safe harbour''
for risk optimisation, but presents very limited
forms of creative insights (Mascitelli, 2000).
In turbulent organisational environments,
``competitive advantage is anchored in the
company's ability to innovate its way
temporarily out of relentless market
pressures'' (Ghosal et al., 1999).
Traditional strategies are competition-
based: strategies are oriented toward building
advantages over the competition (Kim and
Mauborgne, 1999). Guided by this principle,
organisational learning conforms to system
thinking and stresses the capacity of problem-
solving or information-processing, which
leads to incremental improvement. This
stereotype contains a certain degree of
deficiency in terms of flexibility,
proactiveness, innovativeness and energetics
required to succeed in new business
environments. Organisations need to stand on
a more revolutionary viewpoint and make
breakthroughs and quantum leaps, which
require fundamental changes in organisations.
Organisational learning will have to expand its
function to facilitate the change in order to
enable the organisation to gain a leadership
position (Kim and Mauborgne, 1999;
Mascitelli, 2000; Kambil et al., 2000; Wang
and Ahmed, 2001). Based on this
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Volume 10 . Number 1 . 2003 . 8-17
assumption, organisational learning needs to
adopt a sixth focus of innovation and
creativity, and possess the following features
(see Table II):
. Triple-loop learning: it is essential that
organisations move onto this higher level
of triple-loop learning, which constantly
questions existing products, processes and
systems by strategically asking where the
organisation should stand in the future
marketplace, rather than merely single and
double-loop learning which simply asks
what is wrong, how to correct and prevent
from errors (Wang and Ahmed, 2001).
. Organisational unlearning: people do not
tend to abandon current beliefs and
methods as long as they seem to produce
reasonable results (Kuhn, 1962), and
until incontrovertible evidence, usually in
the form of failures, convinces them to
accept new paradigms (Petroski, 1992,
pp. 180-1). The insistence in existing
beliefs and methods inhibits learning;
therefore, organisational learning is often
accompanied with a certain degree of
organisational unlearning. In fact,
organisations have to learn to discard
things done previously. They have to plan
to abandon rather than try to prolong the
life cycle of a successful product, system,
or policy (Drucker, 1993). In a sense,
organisational learning is more about
organisational unlearning in order to
create quantum leaps.
. Knowledge creation: organisational
learning is not restricted to knowledge
accumulation, dissemination, retention
and refinement. Knowledge creation is
the core competency for organisations to
move to a higher platform of competitive
success. Innovation capacity is referred to
as a continuous process of knowledge
creation (Biemans, 1992; Nonaka and
Takeuchi, 1995; Davenport and Prusak,
1998). However, there is more evidence
that, to achieve sustainability,
organisations need to facilitate knowledge
creation through radical changes, which
requires triple-loop learning accompanied
by organisational ambition, wisdom and
courage (Bierly et al., 2000).
. Creative thinking: ``Creativity is the seed
of all innovation, and the psychological
perceptions of innovation (the
implementation of people's ideas) within
an organisation are likely to impact the
 Organisational learning: a critical review
Catherine L. Wang and Pervaiz K. Ahmed
Table II A shift of the organisational learning focus
Existing focus
Single-loop and double-loop learning
Knowledge accumulation, dissemination, retention,
refinement and creation through incremental
changes
System thinking
Competition-based strategy
Continuous improvement in organisational
performance
motivation to generate new ideas''
(Amabile et al., 1996). Breakthrough
innovations involve unexpected leaps of
creativity and insight, rather than simply
follow predictable trajectories (Mascitelli,
2000). Organisational learning needs to
incorporate a higher degree of creativity
to achieve quantum leaps.
. Competence-oriented: traditional
competition-based strategies drive
organisations to build up competitive
advantage by doing better and cheaper
than competitors. Because their strategic
thinking regresses toward the
competition, companies, in spite of
tremendous efforts, often achieve no
more than incremental improvement
(Kim and Mauborgne, 1999).
Organisational learning needs to focus on
building competence, both organisation-
based and marketplace-based, to
undermine competitors' innovation
(Kambil et al., 2000). The organisational
objective should be set to make current
competition irrelevant and open up a new
market opportunity.
. Linked to organisational sustainability:
organisational learning is related to
organisational outcomes (Bedeian, 1990,
1987), and connected to continuous
improvement (Pedler et al., 1991; Morris,
1996; Scarbrough et al., 1998). However,
in response to current turbulent markets,
value innovation through the creative
quality process will be the only sustainable
competitive advantage in the future
(Wang and Ahmed, 2001). Organisational
learning should facilitate the creative
quality process to deliver value innovation
in the marketplace, in order to achieve
organisational sustainability, rather than
temporary profitability and incremental
changes within the current competitive
framework.
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Volume 10 . Number 1 . 2003 . 8-17
New focus
Triple-loop learning and unlearning
Knowledge creation through radical changes
Creative thinking
Competence-based strategy
Organisational sustainability through creative quality and
value innovation
In view of the aforementioned, we feel it
necessary to update the concept of
organisational learning and learning
organisation to conform to current business
environments.
In hyperdynamic business contexts, organisation
learning is the process by which the organisation
constantly questions existing product, process
and system, identifies strategic position, applies
various modes of learning, to achieve sustained
competitive advantage.
A learning organisation should dedicate to
improving the learning context and strategically
strengthen organisation competency to facilitate
knowledge creation and innovation, and deliver
marketplace-based competency.
Continuous improvement is still important to
a learning organisation, because it is the
foundation of a learning organisation, and the
basis of organisational capacity. To move onto
this higher level of organisational learning,
organisations need a strong backup based on
single and double-loop learning, which
involves continual improvement in
management techniques. Similarly,
knowledge creation is based on the existing
knowledge base and absorptive capability of
the organisation, which is enhanced through
continuous improvement. Therefore,
incremental changes are in fact more
important than ever to a learning organisation.
However, encountering current business
environments, a learning organisation has to
strive to achieve breakthroughs in terms of
both organisational competency and
competitive edge in the marketplace.
Organisations will have to focus on creativity
and innovativeness to make quantum leaps in
order to become a market leader.
Conclusions
The concept of organisational learning has
borrowed and developed from the individual
 Organisational learning: a critical review
Catherine L. Wang and Pervaiz K. Ahmed
learning process, which is commonly believed
to be very sophisticated and involves all
aspects of the human nature and the
interaction with the environment.
Understanding the individual learning
process is a good starting point to understand
organisational learning, but not the whole
picture of it. Organisations are in a more
complicated context than an individual to the
environment. For example, organisational
learning is not simply a collectivity of
individual learning processes, but engages
interaction between individuals in the
organisation, and interaction between
organisations as an entity, and interaction
between the organisation and its contexts.
The vast area of interest in the organisational
learning field has created diversified
understanding of the concept of
organisational learning. To explicit the
understanding, we identify five focuses of the
concept and the associated practices.
Although these focuses of organisational
learning are evident, in one perspective or
another they overlap each other and do not
fundamentally exclude one from another.
Successful implementation of organisational
learning requires an effective blend of focuses
according to the organisation's specific
situations. In addition, we feel the concept is
still evolving to include aspects that will
facilitate organisations to create and maintain
competitive advantage in current business
contexts. The focus of organisational learning
needs to incorporate the perspective of
creativity and radical innovation, as a strategic
orientation to sustained competitive
advantage, on top of five other perspectives of
organisational learning.
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Further reading
Schein, E.H. (1999), ``Empowerment, coercive persuasion
and organisational learning: do they connect?'', The
Learning Organization, Vol. 6 No. 4, pp. 163-72.