In Session 7, "Organizational Change and Learning (2): Organizational Learning Theory," we will examine the challenges and possibilities of "organizational learning theory" in management studies, focusing on the concept of "communities of practice" (Wenger, 1998; Wenger, et al., 2002).
As explained in "Session 6: Organizational Change and Learning (1): Knowledge Creation Theory," interest in "information" and "knowledge" as a source of corporate competitiveness has been growing since the 1990s, and today, "knowledge creation" has become a key concept in the field of organizational change. The study has been called the "theory of One of the results of this research is the clarification of the managerial significance of "tacit knowledge," which has not received much attention in conventional management studies, and its potential for organizational utilization. However, the "theory of knowledge creation" does not clearly explain how to support the creation and acquisition of "tacit knowledge," for which education and training methods based on the existence of "formal knowledge" are not expected to be very effective. No answer has been obtained.
To answer this question, we need to ask: "How does the learning process in a business organization differ from the learning process in a school? The following are some of the issues that need to be clarified. In management science, research on these topics has been conducted in a field called "organizational learning theory".
According to Eastherby-Smith and Araujo (1999), "organizational learning theory" existed before the 1990s, but it was mostly studied at the theoretical level (see, for example, Kuwata and Tao, 1998: Chapter 14) and was not of much interest to practitioners. It was not until P. Senge (1995) proposed the concept of "The Learning Organization" that this field began to attract attention. He called the organization a "learning organization" in which members of the organization work together to promote creative problem solving, and developed the "organizational learning theory" in a form that is easy for practitioners to visualize, citing specific corporate examples.
Since then, research on "organizational learning theory" in the 1990s has been conducted in two directions (Eastherby-Smith and Araujo, 1999). The first direction was based on technical views and aimed at developing "management tools" to support the realization of a "learning organization" and methods to measure the degree to which organizational learning is realized. In this approach, it has been recognized that the process of organizational learning is a systematic process and that the "learning organization" can be realized with technical support. (Issue Book (1) falls into this category.)
On the other hand, some studies are based on the recognition that the learning process in business organizations is not a systematic process. From a social views, this research seeks to clarify the influence of culture, behavioral norms, political dynamics, and other factors on organizational learning. The social viewpoint is based on the recognition that the learning process in a business organization is not a systemic process. The "theory of organizational learning" is based on the approach from the social views. (This is the case with the assigned book (2).
How have the two approaches in "organizational learning theory" been evaluated since the 1990s? The major achievement is that the concept of "learning" has penetrated into business administration. Learning," an activity traditionally studied only in human resource development theory, is now recognized as one of the key concepts in management strategy and organizational behavior theory.
However, it is also true that both approaches have reached a kind of dead end in terms of concrete methods to realize a "learning organization. While many "tools" have been developed from a technical viewpoint that can be used at the practical level, the response to social factors such as organizational culture, behavioral norms, and political dynamics has remained insufficient. The number of companies that have been affected by the crisis has been increasing. On the other hand, with regard to approaches from social views, although the mechanisms of social influences on organizational learning have been elucidated, the development of practical methods to help realize "learning organizations" has remained at an insufficient level.
Under these circumstances, the concept of "Communities of Practice" has recently attracted attention as a new approach in organizational learning theory. In Session 7, Organizational Change and Learning (2): Organizational Learning Theory, we will focus on this concept of "Communities of Practice. The concept of "Communities of Practice" proposed by E. Wenger (1998), a cognitive science researcher, has attracted attention as overcoming the problems of both technical views and social views, but its evaluation has been It has not been established. At this point, the evaluation should be described as an "expectation" level. Therefore, we will critically examine this concept and explore its possibilities and problems. This is the aim of this study.