Community Colleges Can Learn Too

Hypothetically think about how you would respond to the following statement:

          Community colleges are excellent examples of learning organizations. To hazard even further, community colleges are ideal environments for cultivating the best practices for learning organizations.

 Yes?   No?    Perhaps…  Maybe? 

If your daily schedule is anything like mine, you understand it takes concerted and practiced effort to extend and disseminate organizational knowledge. For an explanation of learning organization from David Garvin and Amy Edmondson, view the below video.

Consider the question: What can your institution change or implement which increases the avenues and possibilities for organizational learning? I am sure that each of us can identify areas that are indeed appropriate examples for following best practices of learning organizations. On the other hand, each of us can also most likely identify areas for improvement and conditions which hamper our institutions from achieving a learned, best practice model.

Let us look at one possible example. At my institution, a formal registration committee meets regularly and discusses registration goals, procedures, and potential improvements. What happens after the meeting adjourns? Phones ring. Students approach us for help with records and transcripts. There are more meetings for us to attend. The urgent gets our attention. It takes extraordinary effort for each of those individuals involved in the meeting to digest all the information, create plans, implement ideas, and measure results. 

In the course of daily activities, a learning organization places importance into advancing organizational knowledge and securing ongoing transfer of this knowledge while focusing on and advancing forward the goals of the organization. 

Sounds like a mouthful. Consider for a moment how your organization might enhance knowledge transfer.

Even though we all face growing demands on our time and efforts, our institutions through individual learning, can utilize best practices for learning organizations and create real change and improvements. Keep in mind that learning occurs in three settings: formal, non-formal, and informal.  Employees attend formal training by earning advanced degrees. They also may attend non-formal training such as professional development opportunities. However; most knowledge is gained informally.

The book Learning in Adulthood states that approximately 70% of workplace learning takes place in the informal setting. Most learning happens as a course of ones day-to-day activities. Since informal learning occurs as part of individual activity, it is private or restricted in immediate dissemination. A large amount of learning and knowledge is held in tight individual pockets.

One way of getting at these pockets of information are by using After Action Reports. AARs, as discussed by Garvin in his video titled Building a More Effective “Learning Organization,” document actions taken and lessons learned and suggest changes or modifications in approach to an activity after an event has occurred. These reports have a semi-formal format and possibly could be used after college meetings or events as a means of documenting lessons learned and knowledge gained.

Community college administrators, faculty, and staff form a system of individuals. Organizations do not truly learn without documenting knowledge gained and placing this knowledge into action. Organizational learning must be systemic in scope, supported and encouraged as a matter of course, and repeated during everyday activities.

I am very interested in your comments on organizational learning and your ideas for implementing best practices.

For more information on learning organizations see:

http://www.infed.org/biblio/learning-organization.htm from the encyclopedia of informal education.

- Or -

http://hbr.org/2008/03/is-yours-a-learning-organization/ar/1 from Harvard Business Review.

- Or -

http://www.forbes.com/sites/joshbersin/2012/01/18/5-keys-to-building-a-learning-organization from Forbes.