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Learn or Die

Using Science to Build a Leading-Edge


Learning Organization
Edward D. Hess
Columbia UP © 2014
280 pages
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Rating Take-Aways

8
9 Applicability • Learning is essential in today’s business environment.
7 Innovation • Usually, people think quickly and automatically. That is “System 1 thinking.” To learn
8 Style better, slow down and think methodically. That is “System 2 thinking.”

• You can’t separate emotion and reason; emotions play a big part in thinking.
  • To learn and think well, use critical thinking tools, such as the “premortem,” the
Focus “insight process,” “unpacking assumptions” and the US Army’s “after-action review.”

• Creating a learning organization requires the right people, processes and environment.
Leadership & Management
Strategy • Hire people with learning mind-sets.
Sales & Marketing
• Learning organizations establish environments that nourish learning, experimentation
Finance and positive support. They pay attention to behaviors, not just results.
Human Resources
IT, Production & Logistics • Learning organization leaders support change, become role models and learn well
themselves. Pay attention to how you think and follow your logic’s full implications.
Career & Self-Development
Small Business • Learning organizations support employee engagement and use “critical thinking tools.”
Economics & Politics
Industries
• Learning organizations practice learning conversations, “humble inquiries” that
emphasize asking and listening, not telling.
Global Business
Concepts & Trends

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getabstract

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Relevance
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What You Will Learn
In this summary, you will learn:r1) Why learning matters, 2) What methods you can use to learn better, and 3) What
characterizes learning organizations and how you can establish one.
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Review
Professor Edward D. Hess offers a clear, methodical synthesis of current research. If you are familiar with the fields
of learning and thinking, or with learning organizations, you’ll recognize much of this intelligently compiled content.
However, you’ll still learn from reading Hess’s clear, methodical overview, which works as a manual for applying
today’s research to yourself and your firm. While focusing on core concepts and tools, Hess also offers usefully
honest accounts of his personal experiences and the transformations people go through to become better learners.
His case studies are fascinating. getAbstract recommends Hess’s work to teachers, managers, innovators and anyone
interested in learning organizations.
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Summary
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Creating a “High-Performance Learning Organization”
Excellence and innovation require constant learning as an individual and as part of
a learning organization. Peter M. Senge’s The Fifth Discipline popularized learning
organizations in 1990. Since then, “the science of learning” has made great strides. New
approaches draw on education, psychology and neuroscience to integrate studies of change
getabstract and performance. These methods can help your firm become a high-performance learning
“A learning journey
is a people journey. It organization (HPLO).
is both a continuous
‘search for the truth’
and an emotional Learning calls for evaluating the “relationships between stimuli and their effects.” For
journey.” example, you learn what happens when you take certain actions by observing the results.
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Then you build context through time and repetition. You link your observations together
by creating narratives and developing structured, categorizing systems. These systems
or processes eventually function automatically, like an operating system. Your internal
operating system works subconsciously, and shapes your perceptions and emotions.

To learn better, you need to understand your system, so you can change and improve it. In
Thinking Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman identified two kinds of thinking. “System 1” is
fast, easy thinking, as if on autopilot. “System 2” takes more work, is slower and features
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“Our operating system conscious focus. Recognizing when you default to System 1 and when you need System 2
runs automatically requires gaining skill at “metacognition” – thinking about how you think. This ability will
and unconsciously
and shapes our
enable you to escape the limits of your existing “mental models.”
perceptions, attention,
cognitive processing, Emotion and thought are not opposites. Emotions can interfere with thinking. Emotions
learning, emotions and
behaviors.” “code” events by tagging them for relevance. For instance, a “gut feeling” is a signal to pay
getabstract closer attention. You might feel an emotional push to speed up, think automatically and shut
out new ideas. You can’t silence the feeling, but you can be mindful of it. You think and learn
more easily when you feel “positive emotions.” Anxiety and other “negative emotions”
narrow your focus. Training in emotional intelligence (EI) helps you see, understand and
manage your emotions.

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The Building Blocks of a High-Performance Learning Organization
High performance learning organizations have the right people, the right environment
getabstract and the right processes. To build a learning organization, hire people with a learning
“Learning basically is mind-set. That means they associate learning with enjoyment, increased efficacy and
the process by which
each one of us creates personal autonomy. Learners need the self-efficacy to tackle tough tasks, persevere through
meaningful stories challenges and recover from failure – rather than avoiding challenges and giving up easily.
about our world –
with the aim of making Such learners feel an “intrinsic motivation,” and want to learn for its own sake, not for
these stories ever more external rewards.
accurate so that we
can act ever more
effectively.” They do not think of their personal qualities or abilities as fixed. Instead, they believe in
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their ability to master new subjects with hard work and growth. They set out to master their
goals, not just perform them. Instead of thinking “I’m good at this,” they think, “I can learn
this.” Hire people who “love to learn,” and train and manage them to support this mind-set.
Treating employees as innately lazy and dishonest or giving them excess direction are both
ineffective. Assume people are honest and motivated and want to learn and contribute.

getabstract Shaping the Learning Environment


“An emotionally To make your company into an HPLO, create a learning environment with a systemic
positive environment
enables learning and approach to integrating learning at all levels. Include everyone in your firm as part
positive individual of a “journey of discovery.” This gives people “control over their learning.” Learning
emotions enable
personal learning.” organizations pay attention to employee processes and hold 360-degree reviews to observe
getabstract and reinforce desired behaviors.

Learning environments support “high employee engagement,” featuring supervisor


support, regular feedback, opportunities for growth, recognition of achievements and
an understanding of how each person’s work relates to the company’s mission. High
engagement and ongoing learning are major components of “consistently high-performing
businesses,” which also have leaders who function as “stewards,” “purposeful cultures” and
hiring practices that align with those cultures. Businesses with these elements have purposes
getabstract beyond making money. Their leaders are humble people who can face difficult facts. These
“A learning
organization needs companies promote from within, and their policies make sense to their employees, who can
employees who have the become even more a part of the company through stock plans.
right motivation for and
approach to learning –
a learning mind-set.” Learning environments also support learning conversations, or “System 2 conversations.”
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In such discussions, you communicate openly and honestly to serve truth and learning,
and not to defend the status quo or your ego. These conversations emphasize asking
and listening, not telling. These “humble inquiries” take place without an agenda. They
require participants to be mindfully present, recognize their shared humanity and be
willing to change. This can be difficult, because many people lack practice in disagreeing
constructively and feel pressure to get things done.

In circumstances that push you away from awareness, hold on to what you’re feeling.
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During these conversations, heed tone and body language as well as words. Periodically
“High employee paraphrase your understanding of what the speaker said and ask for confirmation that
engagement...is you understand. Summarize stopping points, “ask for clarification” when needed and pose
required to be a great
learning organization.” questions to gather more details. People in learning organizations apply “critical thinking
getabstract tools,” including commitment to critical thinking and to specific processes, rather than
specific positions. Emphasize the way you think. Follow the workings of your logic to its
full implications, rather than holding specific beliefs. To build on that foundational mind-
set, apply conceptual tools that help you slow down so you can “think more deliberately,”
test any assumptions and learn from your actions.

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“Recognition-Primed Decision”
Gary Klein, a pioneer in “naturalistic decision making,” offers critical thinking tools in
his recognition-primed decision (RPD) model. Klein observed people, like firefighters,
working in “high-velocity environments” that required them to make important decisions.
getabstract He found that people acting during these moments don’t consider multiple responses and
“Learning try to choose among them or embrace the first possible option. Instead, they identify a
organizations need
managers and leaders possible solution and run a mental simulation of what would happen if they tried it. They
with self-efficacy.” anticipate possible outcomes, heeding warnings generated by experience. If no warnings
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deter them, they try the action, paying attention as they do it. If something seems off, they
try an alternate path, testing the same way.

The “premortem” is another critical thinking tool, a thought process that considers hindsight
before committing to an action. When you are about to do something, sit down and imagine
that you have already done it, “and that it failed miserably.” Identify why. This helps you
arrive at a balanced, realistic view. It exposes your biases and helps you find and fix possible
negatives. Klein also uses the “insight process” – consciously slowing down to evaluate and
getabstract improve your thinking. Rather than racing to act, deliberately seek data that contradict your
“The CEO and other
leaders and managers position or that you may have omitted. Ask if there’s “something new, unusual or out of the
must role model ordinary” to integrate. What happens when you reframe your questions or the problem at
learning behaviors and
attitudes and actually hand? List all the information that can disprove your perspective. Check your inner signals:
teach, facilitate and What is your gut telling you?
enable learning.”
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This specific, methodical approach connects to the need for “unpacking assumptions.”
To think critically, knowing what you believe isn’t enough; you need to identify the
assumptions at the foundation of your beliefs. State a belief. Step back and ask what
assumptions it rests upon and what steps in your reasoning justify these assumptions. Does
sufficient data support them? Do you need more or better data? The US Army provides a
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Learning leaders “have widely applicable tool: the “after-action review.” After a campaign, meet with your team to
to accept the magnitude review what happened. What was the result? What worked and what didn’t? Why? What
of our ignorance [and]
view everything we can you learn from your choices?
think we know as
conditional and subject
to change based on new
Lessons from Three Learning Organizations
evidence...We have to Learning organizations are positive and engaged; they share several core principles. Their
define our self-worth leaders act as role models for personal learning and never assume that people are dumb
not by what we know
but rather by striving to or unmotivated, but rather that they want to learn and perform. These leaders are open to
be the best learner we personal change. They support a culture of critical thinking and learning conversations.
can be.”
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These leaders command the three “meta self-management skills” needed for true learning.
The first is metacognition, which is “managing how” you think and knowing when to move
from System 1 to System 2. The second is “metacommunication,” being cognizant of the
messages you are conveying, and “metaemotions,” managing and helping others manage
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“fears of failure, punishment and not being liked.”
“If you’re a leader,
manager or a teammate
and you want to change
The United Parcel Service (UPS) shows how a company and its leaders can evolve into a
your organization, learning organization and apply learning principles on a large scale. UPS is a global delivery
the best advice I can service with methodical principles for self-improvement. It became a learning organization
give you is to change
yourself first.” through a series of business-specific steps, such as hiring experts to study its products’
getabstract efficacy, and committing to its people and values. The UPS culture seeks improvement,
measures everything, allows employees to move among internal positions and regularly
promotes people from drivers to managers.

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The Intuit software corporation offers a more challenging example of a learning
organization. Its first market edge came from its software’s ease of use. As the market
matured, this edge wasn’t enough. Intuit had to change how its people developed
new products. It adopted “design thinking,” which it applied through its “Design for
Delight” (D4D) program, establishing shared methods and shared goals, like creating
getabstract products to “delight” people. Intuit committed to “customer-driven innovation” and to
“Bonds of trust can be spreading design thinking companywide. The firm selected 10 staffers to coach others, and
built that enhance the
willingness to learn trained its people in the D4D program in a three-stage process.
and the effectiveness
of learning. In order to
change, people have to Intuit seeks “deep customer empathy” to understand completely what customers want.
overcome their fears.” As staff members generate product ideas, Intuit goes “broad before going narrow”
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– considering several options before selecting one to pursue. Intuit uses “rapid
experimentation” to test ideas. A team identifies “the idea,” which articulates the customer
need, the problem and the possible solution. The team follows up with a “leap of faith” in
which members identify which customer behavior has to recur for the proposed solution to
work. Intuit experiments to determine how many customers will behave as it predicts. The
design team sets a “minimum numerical success criteria” for judging the experiment. Intuit
teams study their results to see if they’ve proven a hypothesis. They look for anomalous
responses and identify execution barriers.
getabstract
“I expect that many Ray Dalio, founder of the Bridgewater hedge fund, set out to make the company “a learning
of you believe you machine.” Dalio worked odd jobs as a kid, including being a golf caddy. He listened to
are good learners.
This book may raise golfers and decided that investing in stocks was an easy way to make money. He also learned
questions about that.” how quickly he could lose money. This led him to a worldview that endures. In college,
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Dalio studied meditation; its mindfulness is intrinsic to Bridgewater’s approach.

Dalio started his investment business in 1973. He analyzed his reasons for each trade,
tracking the results and investigating what worked and why. He built these understandings
for decades, developing them into the “algorithms that drove Bridgewater’s global
investment platform.” Bridgewater’s core practices include seeking “root causes” for all
results and making “lots of small bets” without risking everything on large investments.
That’s how Bridgewater developed its Pure Alpha Fund, possibly “the most successful
hedge fund in history.”
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“Learning requires Its “search for truth” sets Bridgewater apart. Dalio tracks historic patterns and shares them
people and with his staff. He articulates the firm’s investing practices and states “principles” that
organizations to
change.” guide its actions and its employees’ interaction. It emphasizes “radical transparency”: open
getabstract processes and honest interactions. Bridgewater records all meetings, and anyone in the
company can watch these recordings. Employees discuss their greatest weaknesses – this
is public record within the company – and anyone in the firm can speak openly to anyone
else about these weaknesses, their processes or recent decisions. The result is a culture in
which people make mistakes, but do not feel threatened by them, and everyone strives for
rationality and learning. Individual responsibility and objective analysis of all actions and
positions are paramount values.
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About the Author
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Edward D. Hess, the Batten executive-in-residence at the University of Virginia Darden Graduate School of
Business, also wrote Smart Growth and 10 other books.

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