Handbook of Organizational Learning and Knowledge Management, Second Edition

Abstract

This chapter reviews the literature on organizational learning through a social learning lens. We start with an individual learning perspective, before moving on to a social learning approach with a particular focus upon pragmatism. The literature review covers the following four issues: the content of learning, the process of learning, the relation between individual and organization, and the concept of organization. An important separator between individual and social learning perspectives is the different emphasis on learning as acquisition of skills and knowledge, versus learning as encompassing development of identities and socialization to organizational work and life. A pragmatist social learning perspective emphasizes both learning as acquisition through experience and inquiry, and learning as development of identities and socialization through individuals’ capacities to both adapt and change. Further, a pragmatist social learning perspective also provides tools for the analysis of learning as process by the notions of learning initiated by tensions and ruptures.