Critical Individual Factors for Enhanced Organisational Learning

Organisational learning is a key source of success for a number of companies within the context of corporate governance and business management. As a strategic tool, the concept plays a critical role in ensuring achievement of proactive workforce that uphold innovation and embrace change. In this regard, this type of learning characterises new intuitions in humans and thus, a process guided by change and experience. The human brain has three principal parts; cerebrum, stem, and cerebellum. It is made up of a dense network of fiber pathways consisting of billions of neurons, through which learning occurs. When the brain learns, communication between neurons at synapses takes place. Ideally, brain functioning in organisational learning plays an important function as managing human resources. As such, practicing, exploring knowledge and learning are among the steps that improve brain functioning. Notably, the factors that shape brain functioning and learning include a commitment to professional development, top management support, and involvement and learning culture. Therefore, it is important to look into such factors while engaging in activities that promote organisational learning.

              Essentially, it is fundamental for Hawkeye Research Corporation to understand the existing individual adult learning needs including developing professional competence, experience and acquiring skills among others. To optimise adult learning, AGES (Attention-Generation-Emotion-Spacing) model should be applied. Generally, given the nature of challenges that the modern companies face, there is a need to foster adequate and effective organisational learning. Enhancing effective and adequate organisational learning in this regard require the management of Hawkeye Research Corporation to employ constructive training to its workforce through training sessions and conferences, industrial tours, building individual development plans as well as paying for their educational pursuits. Based on issues relating to organisational learning and its importance, the corporation should invest in specific programmes to make its employees enhance their learning, improve productivity, promote employee creativity and ensure learning efforts are channeled through a specific workplace.

Overview

             In the recent years, knowledge is a fundamental source of success for different organisations within the context of business management. As a strategic tool, organisational learning plays a key role in the field of modern management that aid in fostering competitive advantage and stable organisational success. Notable, the objective of leaning is not only to enhance individual skills and knowledge but also to build flexible and dynamic learning organisations as well as for growth and development. According to Saadat & Saadat (2016), every person is born with learning abilities, which make an individual ready to adapt to growth and changes in the environment. Learning leads to new concepts and intuitions in humans and given that people are affected by their actions while also striving to identify and correct mistakes, it is a critical process guided by change and experience. Given the role of learning in promoting organisational goals and establishing knowledge management, this report explores different aspects relating to the issue including brain learning activities, improving brain learning functioning, improving adult learning as well as enhancing learning at the workplace. Additionally, the report gives recommendations on what Hawkeye should do to foster its learning and training for greater capability and success.

What the Brain Does When It Learns

             As CEO of Hawkeye Research Corporation, it is important to note that cognitive neuroscience continues to grow rapidly characterising new discoveries and as such, there is a need to understand what the human brain does when it learns through training and development. Understanding the basic structure of the brain is a fundamental aspect of determining what happens when an individual’s brain learns. The brain characterises a dense network of fiber pathways that consist of billions of neurons. It consists of three principal parts; cerebrum, stem, and cerebellum with the cerebrum being the most critical in learning given that it is the region where memory and reasoning occur.  Learning thus occurs through neurons, synapses transmitting sensory data through neural pathways and tentatively stowed in the memory (Zull, 2006). In this regard, the short-term memory is the receiving center for a series of sensory information that individuals counter in their daily lives. Once processed, individual brain neural pathways carry such memories to the structural core for comparison with existing memories after which the data is stored in the long-term memory. The memory characterises an enormous repository of individual life experiences.

               Such basic structure of the brain and the process of acquiring and storing information have important implication for learning especially how people acquire knowledge, store it in their memory and retrieve when it needed.  When an individual learns new aspects of knowledge, frequency as well as recency of what he/she learned is what strengthens his/her memory and recall and as such, maximising memory retention (Carpenter et al., 2012). The more the person practices and applies something new, the easier it would be for their brains to transmit the experiences for later application. Besides, when the brain learns, there is communication between neurons at synapses. One neuron releases chemicals that either suppress or activate another neuron leading to transmission of information to the brain (Zull, 2006). As a result, the brain learns by the changes in the strength of synapses determining the importance of the volume for connections.

              Based on the analysis of what the brain does when it learns, it is evident that an organisation leader must have adequate understanding about the brain and makes it perform at its best. Such leaders are better equipped to promote mental and emotional wellbeing and as such, improve productivity in their organisations (Scarlett, 2016). It is advisable that every organisation needs to teach its managers, employees, and leaders about the nature of the human brain and the important knowledge to acquire. Organisations vary in different aspects and establishing critical individual factors for enhanced organisational learning is extremely valuable. The factors include commitment to professional development, top management support and involvement and learning culture. These factors shape brain functioning and systems of learning in a given company.

Improving Brain Functioning for Learning

               Brain functioning in organisational learning is as important as managing the needs of human resources, the most important assets of a company. While individuals’ brains change with age, their mental functions change along with it and as such, the need for improving brain functioning for learning to foster skill improvement and overcome possible problems that may relate to individual mental declines. To give individuals a full brain workout, the organisation needs to make them engage both hemispheres of their cerebellum and cerebrum through practicing, exploring, as well as learning new concepts in the three dimensions of the real world.

             The first step to improving brain functioning is practicing, which involves getting to understand existing organisational concepts, culture, new ideas and strides toward acquiring knowledge (Wlodkowski & Ginsberg, 2017). The step also characterises activities that foster brainpower such as exercising and engagement. The second step is exploring to gain knowledge through openness to experience, social connections and creativity among others. The last step is learning which involves the ability to capture and manage knowledge.

              To foster adequate activities that Improve brain functioning for learning among employees, Hawkeye Research Corporation should provide a learning culture by setting knowledge sharing standards and expectations, encourage participation and make information easy to discover. In this regard, the organisation must establish specific learning goals and communicate the goals. Improving participation calls for fostering a culture that recognises individual learning, identifying experts for teaching, mentoring, coaching, and rewarding those who learn more.

Optimising Individual Adult Learning

             There is a relation between application of learning techniques and cognitive motivation. In most cases, adult learners are interested in developing their professional competence, which would, in turn, update their skills and knowledge based on existing learning opportunities and methods (Simona, 2015). Organisational learning facilitators provide various strategies that expedite the behavior of leaners to extend the knowledge acquired on a particular issue and foster skills practice. For Hawkeye Research Corporation to optimise individual adult learning, it is essential to understand and apply elements of effective adult learning. Ideally, adult learning highlights the fact that adults have fundamentally different learning techniques. As the executive of a research organisation, there is a need to understand the existing differences in adult learning and figure out the best techniques to employ to meet the learning needs of this category of people or employees.

               Adult learners have different challenges, demands and expectations and the key to accommodate such needs is to understand human psychology and brain science. The application of AGES model by Lila Davachi highlighting four essential components ((Attention, Spacing, Generation and Emotion) for optimal individual adult learning is an important step towards meeting such needs (Gutierrez, 2015). The model gives four steps Attention-Generation-Emotion-Spacing toward effective adult learning. The first step involves gaining the attention of the learner with little distraction. While it may be physically possible to multitask during organisational learning, it is important to manage the attention of learners focusing on single tasks (Gutierrez, 2015). Once the attention of the learner for a particular task is gained, the next step would be to generate an idea in the working memory. Unlike young individuals, adults tend to capitalise on what they know and as such, build on it.  Therefore, to achieve adequate idea generation, self-directed learning technique should be applied for adult learners. The method allows adult learners to control what they learn as well as how they learn. The technique provides a foundation for transformative learning and as such, the corporation should consider applying it. Emotion and memory interlink and as the third element of adult learning, it helps in creating memory while spacing involves fostering the continuous practice of materials, information or task learned.

Enhancing Workplace Learning

             Organisational learning is an aspect that has shown many scholars give divergent views and theories due to its importance in fostering organisational success. Given that the challenges that characterise the contemporary world call for an organisation to operate on the foundation of the power of learning as well as continuous managerial updates, organisations must foster adequate learning to synchronise themselves to survive in the competitive world, respond to environmental changes, and evolutions. To survive stiff competition, organisations must ensure their employees learn sooner, better and faster than those of their competitors (Saadat & Saadat, 2016). Besides, in the current business environment, conventional structures do not have the needed inflection and ability to align the environmental changes to foster growth and survival. As a result, learning helps companies to equip their employees with adequate skills and capabilities to change organisational structure and abilities to counter growing global changes (Saadat & Saadat, 2016).

              One of the best ways that an organisation can thrive and succeed in its mandate by meeting organisational goals and objectives is through becoming a learning organisation. Learning organisations are those that nurture new patterns of thinking; allow people to learn together and freedom to create desired results. For an organisation like Hawkeye Research Corporation to become a learning corporation, every employee must contribute to its success, as enhancing learning at work is important for both the organisation and employees.  There are a number of ways that can be employed to improve workplace learning.

              To improve the performance of workplace learning, the organisation needs to impart proper training to its employees by making adequate arrangement for them to attend training sessions and conferences, which are appropriate learning platforms. Brainstorming sessions also foster better workplace learning, giving employees an opportunity to think of specific issues (Marsick & Watkins, 2015). Such sessions add value to employees as they think, talk and work on new ideas as well as improve communication skills through discussions. Another way to enhance workplace learning is through a selection of a few employees and taking them on an industrial tour to learn how other organisational groups and teams solve problems. The cross-sharing of information helps increase the collective experience of employees.  Besides, the organisation can also enhance workplace learning by paying for educational pursuits of its employees as well as build individual development plans that help in understanding the entire organisation systems through cross-departmental training given that fffectiveness of workplace learning directly influence employee motivation (Noe, Tews & McConnell Dachner, 2010).

Conclusion and Recommendations

              Based on this report, it is evident that knowledge organisational learning as a strategic tool plays a key role in the field of modern management such as fostering competitive advantage and stable organisational success. Therefore, promoting organisation leaning call for an understanding of the functionality of the brain, the concept of adult learning and the relevant tools that enhance workplace learning as outlined herein. For Hawkeye to facilitate organisational learning for greater success and capability, the following recommendations need to be considered.

             The corporation should invest in specific programmes for employees to enhance employee learning and improve its productivity. Such programmes should include coaching and mentoring, a result oriented, solution focused and systematic process that foster effective organisational learning. The application of this programme will make it possible for the organisation to facilitate work performance and personal growth of its employees. In particular, mentoring programmes would promote socialisation functions, psycho-social development, and career development. On the other hand, coaching would promote building skills that increase.

             The organisation should also promote creativity as well as make efforts to ascertain the perceptions of individuals about creativity as well as the obstacles and factors that influence it. Incorporating this kind of knowledge into training programmes promote effective learning in an organisation. Besides, the organisation should ensure that any effort toward promoting learning is tailored to a specific workers as nothing works in every circumstance. Based on the research by Noe, Tews & McConnell Dachner (2010) organisations should limit the use of conventional instructional model and as such, propose workforce learning from the perspective of a psychological engagement. Further research needs to be carried out to look into issues that would help in having a fulsome understanding of other factors that facilitate proactive learning at work better.

References

Carpenter, S. K., Cepeda, N. J., Rohrer, D., Kang, S. H., & Pashler, H. (2012). Using spacing to enhance diverse forms of learning: Review of recent research and implications for instruction. Educational Psychology Review, 24(3), 369-378.

Gutierrez, K. (2015). 4 Elements to Effective Adult Learning. Retrieved from https://www.shiftelearning.com/blog/effective-adult-learning-neuroscience

Marsick, V., & Watkins, K. (2015). Informal and Incidental Learning in the Workplace (Routledge Revivals). Routledge.

Noe, R. A., Tews, M. J., & McConnell Dachner, A. (2010). Learner engagement: A new perspective for enhancing our understanding of learner motivation and workplace learning. Academy of Management Annals, 4(1), 279-315.

Saadat, V., & Saadat, Z. (2016). Organisational learning as a key role of organisational success. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 230, 219-225.

Scarlett, H. (2016). Why every organisation needs to become more brain-savvy. Development and Learning in Organisations: An International Journal, 30(5), 11-13.

Simona, G. (2015). Optimisation of training strategies–a study on learners’ motivation and satisfaction. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 180, 808-813.

Wlodkowski, R. J., & Ginsberg, M. B. (2017). Enhancing adult motivation to learn: A comprehensive guide for teaching all adults. John Wiley & Sons.

Zull, J. E. (2006). Key aspects of how the brain learns. New directions for adult and continuing education, 2006(110), 3-9.

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