Assisted Learning - Rolf Arnold

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Agyris and others at MIT and has been the subject of increasing discussion worldwide since the early 90s. As early as 1978, Agyris and Schön had drawn attention to the paradoxical interaction between individual learning and organizational learning and proposed major suggestions for the structuring of organizational learning processes: “Organizations are not merely collections of individuals, yet there is no organization without such collections. Similarly, organizational learning is not merely individual learning, yet organizations learn only through the experience and actions of individuals” (Agyris / Schön 1978, p. 9). From this definition one can deduce that it cannot be about a "replacement" of the individual through an organizational learning, but rather about a more precise clarification and synchronization of both levels of learning. The following definition provides further guidance on the determination of content and learning objectives of organizational learning:

      “Organizational learning occurs when members of the organization act as learning agents for the organization, responding to changes in the internal and external environments of the organization by detecting and correcting errors in organizational theory-in-use, and embedding the results of their inquiry into private images and shared maps of organization "(ibid., p. 29).

      While individual learning relates to the acquisition of inter-organizational professional expertise and the development of key qualifications, for organizational learning other contents are characteristic. Organizational learning focuses on theories used every day (“theory-in-use”) by members of the organization, i.e. on their shared visions and interpretations of the routines and strategies in everyday company situations. Consequently, in organizational learning, it is more about the transformation of more or less typical organizational explanatory and interpretive knowledge, than of specialized expertise or the promotion of individual key qualifications. If one examines the interaction of individual and organizational learning at the content level, it becomes clear that a moderation and participation-oriented style of leadership is needed, so that employees have the opportunity to participate in the development and transformation of operational reality interpretations. However, employees also need more than just technical skills for such participation. Moderate leadership and advanced skills are in fact, interrelated on the content level. The same also applies at the target level: the systemic development of an organizational competence on the part of employees is essential to ensure that they participate in the development of corporate cultures and the expansion of collective knowledge base of the company.

      b) The improvement and development of emotional competencies has been seen for some time now as an increasingly important requirement for successful action by individuals and organizations. Change management, for example, seen as the ability to deal with change and to overcome crises, requires basic emotional skills to cope with anxiety (fear of the new, etc.). The development of these skills essentially refers to the early human developmental experience of self-efficacy versus helplessness, i.e., being secure or threatened. Early imprinted patterns of anxiety and insecurity require learning processes that deeply touch the personality structure; these are easily changed just by training, crash courses, or by keeping to certain supposedly well-worded rules of “emotion management”.

      However, guiding principles can help structure appropriate emotional learning processes. In this context, the approach of “The Courage of Change” written by the American, Stephen R. Covey, is helpful. Covey describes among others the necessity to have clear priorities (“Put first things first”), to imagine the outcome of actions (“Begin with the end in mind”), to recognize the constructiveness and changeability of view and ways of assessment (“Paradigm as the map, not the territory”), and to pay attention to the emotional support basis and maintenance of relationships (“Emotional bank account”). These and other indications can be understood as pragmatic elements of a curriculum to improve the competencies of change (cf. Covey 2000).

      c) Such profound organizational or emotional learning processes cannot be achieved by interventions or by the relevant “doctrine”, rather they require a transformation of the early programmed patterns of emotion and interpretation. A description of the necessary maturity processes or better still, post-maturity processes as well as self-reflection processes, requires the enablement of transformative learning processes in the sense of second-order learning. A second-order learning is not limited to just acquiring new knowledge and developing new skills, rather its subject matter is the epistemology and the emotion pattern of the individual. One does not only learn new things, but rather in such transformative learning processes, there is a change in the habitual pattern of perception and emotion, whereby the latter should enjoy priority because there is so much evidence that we see the world as we “feel” it.

      The path of transformative learning is an intrinsic one. The second-order learning changes not just our knowledge and skills, but also our attitude towards ourselves and the world. We become more conscious of the habitual patterns -ultimately contingent - by which we perceive, or “take-as-true.” (An allusion to the German “wahrnehmen” – “to perceive” and “für wahr nehmen” – “to take-as-true.”) Whoever chooses the path of second-order learning will become more uncertain but, at the same time, stronger. He will free himself from the stable bonds of his habitual thinking, feeling and action and learn that the world is only portrayed to him based on his own inner states. This experience also silences reproach and allows a relaxed and ultimately, more fundamental human nature to surface.

      Case study:

      Eberhard, head of department of a medium size software distributor, found himself now and again, in his quite ostensibly successful career, in situations in which he believed it necessary to oppose superiors. It always took place in the same pattern: First, he loyally cooperated with his bosses, who then promoted him and confided (entrusted) more and more to him. But after some time he started to become discontent, which always found its expression in him feeling that he actually deserved more, and “in truth”, he was the one ensuring the whole success here. Again and again, situations arose in which he – as he put it – tried to cooperate with his superiors “at eye level”. Sometimes at public presentations of the company policy and success, he would “"forget” to mention the hierarchical assignment of responsibilities, so that to the outside, people increasingly got the impression that actually Eberhard was the company chief. Even internally, i.e. towards other employees, he demanded more and more a kind of vassal loyalty to his crusades, which found expression among others in the fact that he deliberately ignored management directives and agreed on other arrangements with project partners, financiers, he gave unauthorized press statements, etc. and thus repeatedly duped his superiors. Initially, these superiors attempted to clarify the resulting irritations repeatedly by means of dialog – driven by the desire to wisely continue using Eberhard systemically for the growth of the company, but this effort ultimately only led to a progression of his unauthorized acts.

      In the end, the responsible supervisors put a stop to it by transferring Eberhard to an area of responsibility where he had to carry out routine tasks according to clear guidelines. This “demotion” sparked a great sense of injustice in Eberhard. “After all, I have done for this company ...” was a standard clause in his conversations with others. Even phrases like “Why are they doing this to me?” came out over and over again. However, these questions also opened doors to an accompanying self-reflection on the issues deeply-rooted in his personality that were feeding his concerns. During a coaching process, these sentences were used to resuscitate biographical memories. The question “When did you use this sentence for the first time in your life?” played an eye-opening role. In this way, his attention was drawn away from the annoying events in the here and now and focused on a transformative learning process. It was actually all about the question “How long have you been like this?” a question, whose meaning and justification Eberhard vehemently resisted initially. His pronouncements, opinions, and statements were trapped in their own certainty, whereby it was clearly evident that this certainty mattered for his emotional state, which was decisive for him in organizing his area of responsibility the way he deemed it bearable. Only very gradually did we succeed in initiating a transformative learning process, during which Eberhard gradually became aware of his preferential manner of seeing himself-in-the-world versus feeling the actual world. In the process, he developed an alternative view of the situation and was able to recognize what feelings

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