Deep learning strategies have three elements

Becoming a learning organization requires much more than merely adding programs for learning new mental models or systems thinking to a team’s agenda.

People naturally want to know where to intervene in order to influence this deep learning cycle. Many approaches are possible, but coherent strategies have three elements: (1) guiding ideas; (2) theory, tools, and methods; and (3) innovations in organizational infrastructure.^[1]

Senge continues:

Guiding ideas constitute the governing concepts and principles that define why an organization exists, what we seek to accomplish, and how we intend to operate. It is the domain of purpose, vision, and values.

Theory, tools, and methods refers to explicit ideas about how things work (for example, a systems map of the procurement process or a simulation model of why “fire fighting” characterizes new product launches), and the practical means by which people apply those theories, solve problems, negotiate differences, and monitor progress. Tools are crucial to any deep learning process. Buckminster Fuller used to say that “you cannot change how someone thinks,” but you can give them a tool “the use of which leads them to think differently.”

Organizational infrastructures such as formal roles and management structures, like their physical counterparts, shape how energy and resources flow. Many of the important innovations described in this chapter take the form of new learning infrastructures, implemented in concert with clear guiding ideas and appropriate tools and methods.

#cognition #strategic-cartography #organizations

See also:

• Learning organizations create their own future
• Adaptability is the capacity of actors to manage the resilience of a system
• Mental models influence how we think and act
• Systems thinking is a discipline for seeing inter-relationships