NCJ Number
143251
Journal
Houston Police Department Leadership Journal (October-December 1992) Pages: 1-20
Date Published
1992
Length
20 pages
Annotation
Any company that aspires to be competitive in this decade faces the dilemma that success in the market place depends on learning, but the best-educated and most high-powered people in any given corporation do not know how to learn and do not realize a problem even exists.
Abstract
Companies often fail to solve the learning dilemma because they define learning too narrowly as "problem solving" and they assume that learning is largely a matter of motivation. However, effective learning is a reflection of how people think; therefore, the learning dilemma can be overcome when managers and employees make the ways in which they reason about their behavior a focus of organizational learning and continuous improvement programs. People at all levels of professional development must not only master the techniques of their particular occupation but must also learn to work effectively in teams, form productive relationships with clients, and critically reflect on and change their own organizational practices. Defensive reasoning is prevalent among executives who have rarely experienced failure and end up not knowing how to deal with it. Learning how to reason productively is the key to continuous and effective improvement.