All Life Is Problem Solving

Every once in awhile the issue of the relationship between Organizational Learning (OL) and KM comes up as an issue. It happened a couple of weeks ago in the actkm group. Here’s my take on the issue.

First, a lot of what one thinks about the relationship depends on how one views OL and KM. So let’s get to some definitions. For me, OL refers to the organizational processes through which individuals, groups, teams, communities, and the organization itself learn. And, by now, you know that I think KM refers to activity (policy, programs, projects, etc.) intended to enhance knowledge processing where knowledge processing includes: 1) problem seeking, recognition, and formulation, 2) knowledge production (including information acquisition, individual and group learning, knowledge claim formulation, and knowledge claim evaluation), and 3) knowledge integration (knowledge and information broadcasting, searching/retrieving, teaching, and sharing.

OL is addressed at various places in the conceptual framework I’ve used in this blog. At the level of decisions and actions integrating into operational, knowledge, and knowledge management processes, agents engage in single-loop learning through the familiar pattern of the Decision Execution Cycle (DEC), which involves monitoring the changing specific conditions about the agent’s situation and self, and therefore acquiring knowledge about such changes using pre-existing knowledge and capabilities.

Double-loop learning occurs when previous knowledge and new situational knowledge are not enough; when the decision maker recognizes that an epistemic gap (a problem) exists that must be closed (solved) with new knowledge. At that point, the agent begins problem solving (knowledge production) to learn (produce) new generalizing and/or situational knowledge that could not be produced using pre-existing knowledge or the routine procedures of monitoring, and that closes the epistemic gap (solves the problem) and supports the Decision Execution Cycle. Of course, knowledge processing generally require numerous DECs. But the DECs constituting knowledge processes are different from operational DECs in that the motivation underlying them entails the motivation to learn, whereas the motivation underlying operational DECs is directed toward goals other than closing epistemic gaps.

Knowledge processing is nested at every level of the organization one finds problems. In fact, it is through knowledge processes that organizational agents produce (learn) new generalizing and specific problem-relevant knowledge, biological, mental, and cultural. So the relationship of OL processes to knowledge processes is that they are one and the same in the area of double-loop organizational learning. But in the area of single-loop learning, OL corresponds to operational, knowledge processing and Knowledge Management DECs in which new knowledge about specific situations unrelated to epistemic gaps is generated.

So, when we take a process view of OL, we see it as identical with organizational knowledge processing and single-loop learning in DECs. But, since KM is activity intended to enhance knowledge processing, its relationship to OL is that it is the form of management that enhances its Double-loop Learning/knowledge processing aspect. Further, when we take a prescriptive or normative point of view on OL, associated with the idea of the Learning Organization (LO), we see the LO as approximating an organization characterized by high quality KM. So, the relationship of OL and KM is close enough to be termed intimate. The terminology may vary somewhat, but the concerns of both fields are, or at least should be, largely the same. A more complete and developed version of the view I’ve given here incorporating more detailed specifications of knowledge processing and KM, as well as complexity considerations, co-authored with Mark McElroy, is available here.