Replying to LO27483 --
On November 1, David Mather wrote,
> I am conducting a project on developing an audit tool for a learning
> organisation. There appears to be a lot about the characteristics and what
> a learning organisation is, but very little about how to assess a L.O. Can
> you assist?
David, you've raised from another angle a question that has appeared here
repeatedly: how to assess an LO, in this case using the tools of
auditing.
As one who has been an LO practitioner for a number of years, and also has
professional training as a quality auditor, I'd have to say that your
quest will be difficult. Auditing, as I understand it, depends for its
success almost entirely on the prior existence of an agreed standard
against which compliance can be compared. In the classic formulation of
the auditor's report, "condition expected" references a standard like ISO
or ANSI, and "condition found" describes a discrepancy. But so far as I'm
aware (and this is the community that would know), there is nothing even
approaching an agreed standard for organizational learning, or the
characteristics of a learning organization, against which to audit.
Frankly, since many of us are agreed that there may not actually even "be"
such a thing as a learning organization, such a standard (if it existed)
would almost certainly not reveal much about an LO. So much as I find
auditing a useful tool in some realms of organizational life, I'd not be
much interested in trying to apply it to learning.
What do others think?
Regards,
Malcolm Burson
Director of Special Projects and Quality Manager
Maine Department of Environmental Protection
mburson@mint.net
-- Malcolm Burson <mburson@mint.net>Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <Richard@Karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>
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