The Learning Organization: An Undelivered Promise

Abstract

The article presents a case study on the development of a learning organization that did not last very long. I suggest that the reason for this result was the way in which learning in the learning organization was understood and enacted. The emphasis was placed on changing individual employees while the organization itself-its managerial structures and work practices-remained fairly constant. The emphasis on individual learning as opposed to organizational changes in the pursuit of developing a learning organization may be an effect of the general and abstract terms in which learning is described in the prescriptive literature on learning organizations. The case is evaluated against John Dewey's learning theory, which would consider employees' active involvement as the turning point around which a learning organization may develop.