ORGANISATIONAL LEARNING: KEY FACTORS, PROCESSES, AND PERSONAL INSIGHTS

Organisation-wide learning enables business firms to upskill and reskill employees to facilitate learning from prior experience, which in turn helps them integrate positive practices into the operational process. Factors such as organisational culture, employee engagement, strategic alignment, learning content, technical infrastructure, benchmarking, quality rewards, and more affect the organisation-wide learning process (Lin and Huang, 2021).
Organisational culture
The organisational culture represents primary two factors namely leadership support and learning culture. Leadership support means the involvement of the company’s leaders in commitment and active involvement towards promoting and creating positive learning initiatives. Leadership plays a crucial role in building a positive environment where employees are encouraged and motivated towards continuous learning (Oh and Han, 2020). It not only helps employees in their self-improvement but also influences overall organisation success. The learning process requires various resources such as budget, time, and officials, which leaders are responsible for managing and arranging (Lin and Huang, 2021). Similarly, the learning culture is also important for organisational learning. Learning culture refers to the standards, values, and practices of continuous learning within an organization.
Learning culture allows the workforce to be curious, which motivates them to learn about new knowledge and makes them ask questions related to new practices and technology. It not only helps an organisation to improve its overall efficiency by increasing the effectiveness of its workforce but also builds a sense of empowerment among employees in terms of exploring and innovating (Halim et al. 2019). A positive learning culture also helps organisations to be adaptable towards new trends; as a result, it decreases resistance towards organisational changes. For example, the British dominating grocery retailer company Tesco follows this leadership approach and has built a positive learning culture, which allows the firm to increase its efficiency and business (Caputo et al. 2019). In my opinion, the leadership style not only helps employees to be comfortable within the organisation but also increases overall business efficiency.
Strategic Alignment
The strategic alignment refers to the tie, which ensures that the continuous learning initiatives and overall business objectives and priorities are connected. Linking business objectives and learning initiatives plays a crucial role in the development of overall business efficiency by employee development. Linked objectives and learning initiatives also come under the business strategy, which ensures overall business effectiveness. Learnings that are connected with business objectives enable the workforce for effective skills and knowledge, which contribute towards business success. I think strategic alignment is significantly important in terms of having an effective business structure, which not only ensures success but maintains a balance between employee and company progress. It enhances both the value of learning experiences for individuals and contributes directly to overall efficiency and innovation.
Employee engagement
Communication plays a crucial role in building employee engagement, which helps organisations simply share valuable information to make employees understand the benefits of learning. Effective communication builds a clear sense of clarity in the workforce, which enables employees to understand the purpose, benefits, and importance of the learning programs offered (Jha et al. 2019). It also helps build awareness within the organisation regarding the significance of continuous learning. Clear communication allows employees to understand the importance of learning in terms of their career development and overall business success. As per my understanding, an effective communication approach is significantly important for organisations to build an environment with clarity and awareness.
In addition, the employee’s engagement also can be positively influenced by recognition and providing incentives and rewards for their involvement in learning activities. The rewards program and recognition encourage employees to actively participate in the continuous learning process (Hendri, 2019). As a result, employees find interest in the learning process, which can help organisations to build an effective workforce. As an example, Elon Mask the co-founder of the prominent car brand Tesla has allowed its employees to contact him directly regarding any incident that caused injuries. It has built an effective communication channel between the higher management and employees, which not only encourages the workforce but also motivates them to actively engage with the learning process.
Technology Infrastructure
The technological infrastructure also plays an important role in enhancing the entire learning process by providing opportunities for managing and delivering learning content and tracking progress through the software application known as “Learning Management System or LMS”. The software offers a centralised control platform, which allows employees to get learning content (Giannakos et al. 2021). LMS also provides a user-friendly interface, which not only reduces difficulties in accessing learning content but also provides the option for tracking learning progress. The progress tracking facility not only helps the organisation in tracking employees’ learning progress but also provides ideas about the areas where further improvement is required. I think establishing an LMS application can allow employees to get more knowledge systematically and the tracking progress option can be beneficial for both company and employee.
Advanced LMS software also offers options for customisation in learning paths, which helps companies tailor specific courses for individuals based on required skills, knowledge and roles. The LMS technology is significantly helpful in terms of customising training courses and learning content (Weed-Schertzer, 2020). Therefore, for example, 90% of U.S.-based training companies were using LMS applications in the year 2022 (Statista, 2023). Furthermore, the Integration of other management systems such as HR systems and performance management tools can enhance the learning initiatives. It helps in ensuring that the data is consistent across systems and reduces the management burden on both learners and administrators. [Refer to Appendix]
Learning Content
The learning content is the most essential part of the entire learning initiative, which requires it to be relevant and specific to employees’ roles and easily accessible. As per my understanding, relevant learning content can provide direct benefits to employees by providing the proper knowledge and skills required for specific job roles (Antunes and Pinheiro, 2020). It enhances the practical values of the learning initiatives by increasing the effectiveness of the workforce. I think having easy accessibility to learning content for all employees increases the overall organisation’s efficiency. It requires providing materials and resources to every individual in the organisation regardless of their location, role, or background.
Furthermore, the learning initiates can also be enhanced by the utilisation of a multimodal learning approach, where various teaching formats such as text, videos and interactive simulations can provide an overview of the content (Antunes and Pinheiro, 2020). In my opinion, the use of multimodal can allow a diverse workforce to achieve knowledge and skills through various teaching formats based on their preferences whether visual, auditory or text.
Benchmarking
In organisation-wide learning, benchmarking refers to the process of comparing the process of development and learning, performance, and practices against industry standards and other organisations. It assists business firms in determining their drawbacks and strengths in terms of learning and development (Martínez-Costa et al. 2019). The identification of suitable “Key Performance Indicators or KPIs” is an effective step for benchmarking in organisational learning. KPIs are the measurable indicators of performance and learning in an organisation. It provides appropriate targets for the teams along with several milestones to measure progress and insights, which aids people in making better decisions (Baltrunaite and Sekliuckiene, 2020). Majority of the business firms utilise KPIs to analyse their learning process, which involves a skill acquisition process, knowledge retention, rates of training completion, and expenses of the training process.
For example, Google is renowned for its focus on continuous learning culture by investing heavily in employee training and development initiatives. It has assisted the firm in staying relevant in the changing market trends and developing skills and experience, which are essential for gaining a competitive advantage. In my opinion, benchmarking is highly effective in organisation-wide learning as it provides an overall picture of learning progress and compares required skills with industry standards. I have used KPIs to measure proficiency in various skills for self-assessment and to identify my competencies aligned with the industry standards.
Quality rewards
Quality rewards have a substantial impact on organisational learning, which fosters a culture of excellence and continuous improvement. Quality rewards are usually given to renowned and prestigious business organisations, which demonstrates their commitment to quality and positive performance in aspects of all their operations (Alnuaimi et al. 2021). Quality rewards provide the organisation with external validation to highlight the organisation’s commitment to excellence. It generally motivates workers by acknowledging their effort and achievement, which creates a sense of accomplishment. For example, Toyota has pursued the prestigious “Deming Prize”, which is a Japanese award for business excellence and quality. As per my understanding, quality rewards motivate employees to enhance their efforts to facilitate collaborative work to achieve an organisational objective, which in turn provides them with a sense of pride and achievement.
Self-assessment
Self-assessment offers an introspective and structured approach to assessing the individual strengths and weaknesses along with determining the learning opportunities. Self-assessment directly contributes to the development of a culture of continuous learning in case an organisation encourages teams and individual employees toward the process of self-assessment (Turi et al. 2019). Self-assessment generally includes the facilitation of reflective practices, which helps the employees and the teams learn from their prior experience. I have often used self-assessment to analyse my level of knowledge and expertise regarding a specific subject and topic. I have also been able to assess my experience regarding a certain event to understand my drawbacks and mistakes, which I have been able to improve by identifying effective action plans. As a result, I think self-assessment is an integral factor, which facilitates organisational learning.
Mystery shopping
Mystery shopping is a process, which is generally used in quality assessment and organisational learning to evaluate consumer experience and service delivery examining the overall performance of a firm. It involves recruiting individuals known as secret or mystery shoppers to act as normal consumers and avail of the services provided by the organisation. It helps the organisation gain an unbiased and objective evaluation of service processes (Jian et al. 2023). The feedback provided by the mystery shoppers is often used to identify a gap in service processes, which are negatively affecting the experience of the consumers. In my opinion, a mystery shopper helps in identifying both weaknesses and advantages of an organisation in organisational operations including consumer service, work processes, and employee performance. The identification of service gaps helps the business firm in taking appropriate measures and fostering a culture of continuous learning.
Feedback Loops
Feedback loops help the business firm improve its existing processes by establishing a channel for information exchange, which facilitates organisation-wide learning. It induces a flow of insights from the various stakeholders resulting in informed decision-making and higher adaptability to the changing market trends and demands (Caputo et al. 2019). In many instances, feedback has helped me in improving my performance. I generally analysed the feedback of my professors and teachers to assess my shortcomings and to improve my efforts. Similarly, inputs from consumers and other stakeholders can the business firms recognise their weaknesses. For example, Amazon uses a feedback loop to gather insights from consumers to enhance their product development and improvements in operational and service processes.
Suggestion system
The suggestion system offers a structured platform to share insights and ideas with the employees along with a scope to participate in the continuous improvement process (Budhiraja et al. 2019). For instance, 3M, an American multinational firm, has facilitated the “15% rule”, which enables employees to contribute a certain portion of their time toward personal projects. During group projects, we have often been provided with time to suggest creative and unique ideas to improve our performances. I think it works similarly to the suggestion system as it gives us a scope to highlight insights and perspectives, which leads to improved learning. Similarly, the business firm utilises suggestion systems to encourage employees to share their perspectives with organisations to facilitate a culture of learning and shared intelligence.
Reward learning and team learning
Providing rewards helps motivate the employees to actively engage in learning initiatives. Organisations often incentivise the learning achievement of employees to facilitate engagement and learning culture in the organisation (Tsai et al. 2019). On the other hand, team learning creates a collaborative environment, where employees are collectively engaged in the learning process. In my experience, I have engaged in a team learning process, which has assisted me in sharing experiences with my team members and enhanced my communication abilities.
Learning from all stakeholders
Learning from the stakeholders includes gathering feedback, insights, and perspectives from various groups and individuals who are associated with organisations. It can be referred to as an inclusive strategy, which assists in understanding the opportunities and challenges of the firm by determining the learning needs (Lin and Huang, 2021). I have gathered feedback from various people to recognise my drawbacks, which has assisted me in developing learning processes to improve my skills.