Action Learning

Action Learning for Problem Solving*

Action Learning is used increasingly in the workplace to solve problems, to develop teams, and leaders, and to enhance organizational learning.  Its unique approach borrows insights from many fields, including: group dynamics, adult learning theory, sociology, psychology, management science, open systems and engineering (chaos theory), political science, appreciative inquiry, ethics, biology and life science and anthropology.

One of the remarkable features of Action Learning is that it models the view of the world represented by quantum physics, in contrast to the majority of approaches to problem solving, which model a view of the world represented by Newtonian Physics.

Logical, linear thinking is associated with and perhaps works best in a world described by Newtonian physics.  For nearly three centuries the world and the workplace have been modeled on Newtonian physics – the physics of cause and effect, of predictability and certainty, of distinct wholes and parts, of reality being what is seen.  Newtonian physics is a science of quantifiable determinism, of linear thinking and a controllable future – in sum, a world that does not change too fast or in unexpected ways.

In the Newtonian mind-set, people engage in complex planning for a world that they believe is predictable.   They continually search for better methods of objectively perceiving the world.  Thus, many problem solving approaches use techniques that are based in linear thinking.  That is to say, the path along which people travel is a logical progression, from one idea to another, from cause to effect, from effect to cause. 

Quantum physics, on the other hand, deals with the world at the subatomic level.  The quantum universe is an environment rich in relationships; it is a world of chaos, or process, and not just of objects and things.   With an understanding of quantum physics, organizations and teams realize that they cannot predict with certainty, that chaos is part and parcel or reality.

Quantum Physicist, Dr David Bohm in his book 'The Implicate Order,' states that “primary physical laws cannot be discovered by a science that attempts to break the world into its parts.”

Yet this is the exact methodology of contemporary Western science which still taught in most of our educational institutions today.

A perception of reality modeled on quantum physics requires us to change the way we think and the way we attempt to solve problems as well as the way we deal with order versus change, autonomy versus control, structure versus flexibility, planning versus flowing.

In addition to its sensitivity to changing environments, and the continual flow of new knowledge, to inquiry and reflection as powerful learning tools, Action Learning is grounded in the recognition that action completes learning.

The Components and Rules of Action Learning

Action Learning is a powerful problem solving tool that has the amazing capacity to simultaneously build successful leaders, teams and organizations.  It involves a small group working on real problems, taking action, and learning both as individuals and as teams.

Action has six components.

1. A Problem (project, challenge, opportunity, issue or task).  The problem should be urgent and significant and should be the responsibility of the team to resolve. 
2. An Action Learning group or team.  Ideally composed of 4-8 people who examine an organizational problem that has no easily identifiable solution. The group should be diverse in background and experience
3. A process of insightful questioning and reflective listening.  Action Learning tackles problems through a process of first asking questions to clarify the exact nature of the problem, reflecting and identifying possible solutions, and only then taking action.  Questions build group dialogue and cohesiveness, generate innovative and systems thinking, and enhance learning results.
4. An action taken on the problem.  There is no real meaningful or practical learning until action is taken and reflected on.  Action Learning requires that the group be able to take action on the problem it is addressing.  If the group makes recommendations only, it loses its energy, creativity and commitment.
5. A commitment to learning.  Solving an organizational problem provides immediate, short-term benefits to the company.  The greater, longer-term multiplier benefits, however, are the learnings gained by each group member and the group as a whole, as well as how those learnings are applied on a systems-wide basis throughout the organization.
6. An Action Learning Coach.  The Action Learning coach helps the team members reflect on both what they are learning and how they are solving problems.  The coach enables group members to reflect on how they listen, how they may have reframed the problem, how they give each other feedback, how they are planning and working, and what assumptions may be shaping their beliefs and actions.  The Action Leaning coach also helps the team focus on what they are achieving, what they are finding difficult, what processes they are employing, and the implications of these processes.

Action Learning is most effective when all six of these components are in operation.

The Two Ground Rules of Action

1. Statements may be made only in response to questions.  This rule helps group members make the transition from advocacy to inquiry.  Putting questions before statements opens the way to listening and reflecting and transforms the dynamics of the group.  It sets personal agenda aside and promotes dialogue, shortening the time required for problem solving and deepening the learning of the team members.
2. The Action Learning coach has the power to intervene.  The Action Learning coach focuses her attention on helping the group learn; she in not involved in problem solving.  When the action learning coach intervenes, the group stops to focus on how they are doing as a group, how well they are framing the problem, the quality of their questions, and the extent to which they are listening and reflecting.  The Action Learning coach also controls the ending of a session and provides time to help the group reflect on what it has learned and how it can apply its learning.

* For a more complete understanding of Action Learning, see, Marquardt, Michael J (2004). Optimizing the Power of Action Learning: Solving Problems and Building Leaders in Real Time. Palo Alto, Davies-Black Publishing, from which this description of Action Learning is taken.

Ethical Dilemmas for the 21st Century

“It is not wrong to surround yourself in luxury.” (Televised Buick Commercial, Washington DC Metropolitan Area, 10/20/02)

“In a self-proclaimed effort to elevate the status of Long Island’s Catholic Church, Bishop William Murphy moved into a 5000 square foot home in 2002 with nearly $1 million in new renovations and furnishings.”  Before renovations, the structure had been home to six nuns, two elderly, whom Bishop Murphy asked to find other accommodations.  (Washington Post, 10/20/02)

What are we to make of the world about us?  For most of human history, the bulk of normative messages, particularly those that instructed people about how to live, were issued by figures of authority.  Kings, priests, imams, village chiefs and others endowed with authority from their peers or from on high, instructed the masses about how to live rightly.  The authority figures were not infallible, but the words they issued were made weighty by the authority they held.

In the Information Age, links between authority and information have become severely strained.  Information now comes from a bewildering number and variety of sources whose authority cannot be verified.  Each person is free to examine information presented and to judge its value following the guides of experience and conscience.  But the great moral systems, those that form consciences, are not providing the clear guidance that characterized earlier eras. 

What is it that emboldened a copywriter to proclaim that it is not wrong to surround yourself in luxury?  Does s/he belong to an organized religion?  Did s/he stop, even for an instant, to make a mental reservation (“what I really mean is that it is ethically acceptable to surround yourself with the marvelous interior of a new Buick”)?  or to reach back to memories of family, church, school lessons in morality when crafting this message?

What is it that induced General Motors Corporation to find this commercial approach acceptable?  Was it an accurate reading of US culture in the early twenty-first century?  Does the corporation perceive the pursuit of luxury as a moral good?  Does it believe that any successful means of promoting sales of Buicks is good for the economy and therefore good for the nation?

In an environment where structural links between traditional authorities and information are fragile, where are we to get information we can trust?  Do we come to trust information that is repeated over and over again, as though the repetition establishes the authority of the source?  How do we learn to evaluate messages that fly into our space at breakneck speed, urging us to behave this way or that? 

Bishop Murphy invited nuns to leave a convent they had long called home, and renovated the convent at significant cost to make a home for him.  He did this apparently to improve the image of the Catholic Church on Long Island.  In whose eyes did the Church’s image need improvement?  Are there other ways that the Church needs improvement?  Was this the most critical?  How did the bishop determine that this was in the best interests of the Catholic Church on Long Island?  

As the structural links between information and authority have weakened, it has become difficult to trace the formation of a good conscience, and easy to justify all sorts of behavior.  The authoritative institutions (business schools and seminaries among them) that helped guide us in the past by turning out leaders who understood how the world worked are now struggling to clarify their missions in a world whose interconnections are overwhelming us all.

Perhaps the traditional authorities will be renewed much as St. Francis and his followers once renewed the Catholic Church.  Or perhaps the proliferation of information sources and the varying authority endowed them by the growing internet public will humble the traditional authorities, encouraging them to seek an authority in concert with subscribers, believers, colleagues and followers.

Meanwhile the current situation is discomforting.  It leaves unanswered the question that in earlier times would not have been asked:  Of the copywriter and the bishop, which is the other’s moral guide?

Generalist Managers

A principle of good management practice is to gather all available information before proceeding to determine a course of action.  The weight of the action determines how carefully information must be gathered and analyzed.  A person standing in front of the ice cream counter at Baskins and Robbins may quickly review his personal health profile, (allergies, dietary restrictions) check for freezer burn on the ice cream, observe the sanitary conditions of the store and its employees, and guided by this information, finally follow the whimsy of taste.

Weightier decisions follow the same process of gathering and analyzing information about interactions among systems.  Corporate and government strategic plans collect available information and evaluate it for its usefulness to organizational mission and objectives.  But the wealth of information and the inadequacy of structures for sharing, evaluating and cross referencing information hinder our ability to make good decisions.

As the pace of information dissemination has accelerated over the past fifty years, colleges and universities have turned out more specialized workers, as though each would become expert in a small area of applied knowledge.  But more than ever before, business and government need managers who are generalists, who can synthesize knowledge from a myriad of sources and who negotiate comfortably the complex environments in which they operate.

These generalist managers are the ones who will inspire employees and will guide business and government in an increasingly complex environment.  Organizations invest wisely in opportunities that broaden the horizons, challenge the values and enhance the critical thinking of their managers.

Empowering Staff, Empowering Yourself

Managers will find themselves, from time to time, in situations where they are ill-prepared, out of the loop, less informed or less articulate than their subordinates, or where subordinates appear to have deeper insights into the issues at hand.  In this Electronic Age, as information travels at breakneck speed to everyone’s desktop, the manager is less able to link her authority to knowledge that only she possesses.

If the manager’s self image is linked to the old paradigm wherein his authority was interdependent with knowledge that he possessed exclusive of his subordinates, then he will be tempted to exclude knowledge from his subordinates, or avoid opportunities for them to share knowledge they have acquired independently.  Worst of all, he may adopt their knowledge without attribution.  We all know managers who have taken a wonderful idea from a subordinate and portrayed it as their own in meetings with the boss. 

None of these ploys will work. Today’ successful managers must be confident decision makers, to be sure.  But most of their interaction with subordinates will be involved in coordinating their staff’s creativity and their contributions to meeting organizational objectives and mission.  In today’s interconnected world it is more likely than ever that a non-manager will produce the most brilliant piece of a strategic plan, or will have the most insightful suggestion about how to deal with an important account.

If managers find their behavior consistent with the older paradigm, what can they do to become successful in the Electronic Age, where managers are more aptly compared to symphony conductors than to generals?  Training can help, especially in a setting where other managers are addressing the same issues.  Increasingly, coaching is available to assist managers to discern and adapt their styles in real time and real issue settings.

More that anything else, managers must learn to live with vulnerability, especially the vulnerability that comes with being not the best informed, not the most knowledgeable and not the wisest.  Here is a very simple first step that a manager can take to become more comfortable with such vulnerability.

Bring a real, but not momentous issue to your subordinates in a staff meeting.  Tell your staff that you are struggling to get your arms around this issue, and that you just don’t seem to be able to resolve it.  Lay it out in some detail, even sharing options that you see but can’t seem to choose among.  Wonder aloud whether anyone has any suggestions.  As staff offer suggestions, listen carefully, ask questions to clarify, take the suggestions seriously and find a way to praise each one.  Do not rush to resolve the issue during that meeting.  Rather spend time showing appreciation for the thoughtful suggestions that have surfaced.

If you find, as you should, that your staff  feel appreciated and empowered by this behavior, you will be emboldened to bring more and more important issues before them.  As you do, they will endow you with even more power.  This is the paradox of sharing one’s vulnerability.  The manager who hides vulnerabilities becomes less powerful in the eyes of his/her subordinates.  S/he who invites subordinates to participate in matters of substance becomes more powerful in their eyes.

Powerful Leaders

When training non-supervisory employees I look for occasions to ask them about their experiences with manager-supervisors.  Usually I do this as we are focusing on communications within organizations.  Typically I will ask them about their experiences with managers and how they perceive the behavior of managers as supervisors.  The purpose of this questioning is to foster discussions about effective management styles among employees who represent the next wave of manager-supervisors. 

Many times I have asked trainees if they have ever known a manager who took good ideas from staff and represented them as his/her own before senior managers.  Most have known such managers.  Trainees typically report that the effect of this behavior is to jeopardize trust, stifle open communication and reduce morale among those whom such managers supervise.

Since many organizations do not invest in effective supervisory training programs for new managers, or in development programs that challenge and assist managers to get the most out of their employees, many managers are left to their own devices.  They may copy the behavior of other managers without having a reliable mechanism of evaluating that behavior.  All around them, in a culture dominated by individualism, in a media awash in messages of instant gratification and in popular success myths that feature competition, domination and takeovers, messages of control, micromanagement and mistrust abound.

It would seem that there are few manager-supervisors who understand the paradox of power.  Unlike water or air, power is not a limited resource.  One need not reduce the power of another in order to become more powerful.  On the contrary, the more power one confers on others, the more powerful one becomes.

When employees are credited for their good ideas and suggestions, they are empowered to be even more creative.  When a manager-supervisor struggles with an issue and asks his subordinates for help, they become empowered.  When a manager-supervisor empowers her employees, morale soars and the employees perceive the manager as even more powerful.  After all, she is now presiding over a group of people who have become more powerful than before.

Manager-supervisors would do well to recognize signs of empowerment: laughter in the workplace, eagerness to communicate, high productivity and work beyond hours.  Conversely, they should recognize the signs of lack of empowerment: a subdued workplace, low morale, dull staff meetings, and an empty office at 5:01pm.  In the first instance, powerful, confident employees abound and the manager’s growing power is barely noticeable; in the second instance, the manager’s power may be absolute, but it is also meager as employees do only what they are told to do.

While some manager-supervisors are naturals at empowering their staff, many have to examine and possibly alter their sense of the way the world works in order to empower their staff.  Organizations would do well to invest in the kind of training and coaching that helps managers to increase the overall power of the organization.

Peter Loan, Brown and Loan Associates