Learning by design - organizational learning - The Mandate for Learning

Chief Executive, The, July-August, 1995

New information becomes even more valuable, and learning becomes even more effective, when employees share it and understand its implications. Many big companies have pioneered techniques, such as cross-functional teams, to transfer learning from one group or unit to another. GE devotes part of its Corporate Executive Committee - a regular gathering of senior operating executives and the CEO - to a discussion of best practices in its various units, with the expectation that this will precipitate the transfer of learning companywide. Other corporations use process maps, quality function diagrams, or other written techniques to capture and transfer learning. Not only do these written records become valuable resources for training future employees, they also create an institutional memory - particularly important in a world of high turnover, downsizing, and frequent career moves, where the cost of lost knowledge is extraordinarily high.

Some companies use job rotation, a popular and effective tool for personal development, as a technique to transfer learning. Before it opened its assembly plant in Georgetown, KY, for example, Toyota cycled key management and engineering personnel through several stints at NUMMI, its California-based joint venture with General Motors. These employees, called "trainers," spent three months at NUMMI to develop an understanding of American production methods and workers. Then they went home for three months to debrief and reflect on the experience. They repeated this cycle two or three more times before setting up shop in Kentucky. National Bicycle Industrial Co. takes skilled craftsmen from traditional job classifications and rotates them through other trades to improve their motivation, augment their skills, and increase their versatility.

And then there's learning from the past. During the 1970s, for example, while Boeing was developing its 737 and 747 aircraft, the company faced serious cost overruns and quality problems. To understand what had happened and to make sure it didn't happen again, top management began a three-year, high-level, analytical review it called "Project Homework." The study generated hundreds of recommendations and an inch-thick volume of lessons about how to launch new models. Several key Project Homework personnel went on to lead the launch of the 757 and 767 models, by far the most successful and error-free aircraft development program the company ever undertook.

Learning and Behavior

The proof that learning has taken place comes in the purposeful, coordinated action it inspires. Take the evolution of GE's "Work-Out" initiative, for example. Work-Out began in 1989 as little more than a series of off-site town meetings that allowed rank-and-file employees to discuss their work with their bosses. Originally, these off-site get-togethers aimed to eliminate outmoded practices and procedures. Later, they moved inside and became a continuing forum, an accepted procedure for identifying problems, considering new courses of action, building a consensus for change, and charting new directions. Eventually participants included not only GE employees but also key suppliers and customers, attacking fundamental business processes. For many GE units, the learning that's taken place at Work-Out has fostered enormous gains in productivity, savings, and market share.