Why organizations don’t learn

Why Organizations Don’t Learn
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Abstract
Many leaders believe that for them to be competitive, their businesses should learn and improve continuously. However, this is not a simple task because even well-known companies find it difficult to practice what they say to the public. A good example of such businesses that have failed to live by what they say is like Toyota. Their tendency to learn is hindered by bias toward success. Bias toward success comes from the obsession with success and failing to appreciate that failure is also a chance for learning and progressing. This bias raises other four challenges which are fear of fail, rigid mindset, overdependence on past performance and association bias. There is a bias toward action which makes leaders think that the only way to solve an issue is by undertaking tasks first instead of strategizing or taking the time to review what was not done correctly. They prefer acting even if the action is not going to be productive. They also think that planning is a waste of time. There is also inclination toward fitting in where employees believe that they should conform to the organization which makes them fail to use their strengths. Finally, there is a bias toward experts.
 
Many managers hold on to the fact that for their businesses to remain at the top, they should learn and make improvements daily. However, even those companies known for their commitment towards getting informed continuously do not always live by what they say.

Toyota is a good example of a well-known enterprise that has failed due to their persistence in continuous learning. There exist four examples of central tendencies among companies which interfere with the learning. These include a bias toward success, bias toward action, bias toward fitting and bias toward experts (Gino & Staats, 2015, 112).
Bias toward success
The majority of leaders across businesses believe that failure precedes learning. However, their behavior portrays the exact opposite since most of the time; they are obsessed with success. This tendency of bias toward success leads to other four challenges towards learning.
• Employees are scared not meeting desirable objectives. This causes distress, displeasure, embarrassment, and even depression. This, therefore, causes organization members to try to the best of their ability to avoid making errors, and when they do happen, they give them a lukewarm attention. These fears of failure make a business fail to create time or set aside some money for experimentation purposes (Gino & Staats, 2015, 112).
• Fixed mindset. A lot of people approach their lives with two basic mindsets. These are fixed and growth mindsets. According to people who do not have an open mind, brilliance and talents are entirely inborn, and you either possess them or not. They try by all means to look intelligent, and they continuously view losing as an avoidable situation. Therefore, such people have a reduced tendency to learn because their main aim is doing well other than learning from their errors (Gino & Staats, 2015, 112).
• Basing majorly on previous achievements. During recruitment and advancement of ranks, most managers put a lot of focus on academic results. This is a risky measure because someone may have a good paper performance yet they are poor performers on the ground. Someone’s potential to learn is based on curiosity, insight, engagement and determination but not on how that person had presented earlier. A person with learning potential will perform better than another person without learning potential (Gino & Staats, 2015, 112).
• The attribution bias. Many people associate their success with effort, brightness, and skills but not luck. On the other hand, they associate their failure with bad luck. This is a scenario which limits learning. Unless people appreciate the fact that being unsuccessful is a result of what they do, the errors they make will not help them improve. (Gino & Staats, 2015, 112).
As a leader, you can use the following strategies to realize abilities and prevail over partiality towards authorship.
• Learn to accommodate failure. As a good leader, you must stress on the fact that mistakes are learning opportunities but not cause for shame. The leader should also behave in such a way as to emphasize the message. They should embrace and teach growth mindset. A leader with a growth mindset detects improvements in their staffs’ performance because they are not bound to their original perception. More so, such a person realizes opportunities that can aid improvement of oneself, be able to tackle challenges or insist when they are faced with obstacles.
• A leader should also consider potential when employing or when doing promotions. This will help the manager to deal with the problem of incorrect first impression and also the natural bias to hire people like them. This as well assists the employer as a leader to attempt new ideas and look for assistance in developing competencies. Focusing on potential more than on the first impression will bring out those candidates who would have been disadvantaged for job opportunities and promotions (Gino & Staats, 2015, 113).
• Finally, as a leader, you should consider using an information analysis methodology to knowing the cause of triumph or loss. This is because the majority of leaders know that it is important to reveal the actual cause of success using data, but they do not insist on collecting and analyzing data to reveal the exact cause of failure.
Bias toward action
Almost all leaders react to a problem by taking action. When a problem arises, people try to put in more effort and even place more stress on themselves. They are more satisfied with what they engage in regardless of the results. Many people consider themselves constructive when undertaking duties than when strategizing them, more so when they are stressed. They see the formulation of strategies as a waste of time. This type of biasness is dangerous to improvement and learning for two reasons. The first reason is exhaustion. Many tired employees are reluctant to study new ideas or practice what they already know. The second reason is due to lack of reflection. This is because being busy always denies employees a period of reflection on what they executed correctly and what they did badly. To avoid bias toward action and improve on learning the following strategies should be adopted (Gino & Staats, 2015, 144).
• Create breaks in the middle of the timeline. Guarantee that employee have enough time to refresh and meditate during the working hours. These breaks are good for relaxing talks and for learning and exchanging ideas. Therefore, as an employer, you should encourage your employees to take breaks and start by setting an example.
• Create some time to think. It is crucial to spare some time each day to write down our goals or reflect on the day’s progress (Gino & Staats, 2015, 144).
• Encourage meditation after doing. Through meditation, we are in a position to comprehending the strategies we are planning and their possibility of having a positive outcome.
Bias toward compatibility
When many people join jobs, they desire to blend in, but this is a habit which results to the following;
• Thinking that they have to be compatible. By doing this, a person limits what they can provide for the organization and only take what the organization has to offer.
• Reduced opportunity to practice one’s capabilities hence employees cannot act freely and maximize their strengths (Gino & Staats, 2015, 116).
Bias toward experts
Many leaders trust experts to give them excellent strategies to keep their businesses progressing. This bias creates two major problems. First, there is a rare view and understanding of expertise. Many organizations define the term expert by the use of titles held and experience. This can make a leader fail to comprehend the capability threats that are associated with prolonged periods of practice on the task. (Gino & Staats, 2015, 117).
Secondly, there is insufficient frontline involvement among the experts. These employees are more involved in interacting with customers. However, due to employer’s poor perception, these employees are not consulted, but only the experts are asked. To avoid this overdependence on experts, organizations should motivate employees to possess those challenges that have a direct impact on them, provide them with a variety of activities that help them gain knowledge and inspire them to take advantage of their gathered knowledge. (Gino & Staats, 2015, 117).
Reference
Gino, F. & Staats, B. (2015). Why Organizations Don’t Learn. Our Traditional Obsessions-Success, Taking Action, Fitting In, And Relyng On Experts- Undermine Continuous Improvement, 112-118.