Action Learning as a Transformational and Sustainable Way of Working and Learning

Action Learning as a Transformational and Sustainable Way of Working and Learning

Extract from "Action Learning: A Practitioner's Guide" Ian McGill & Liz Beaty, Kogan Page, 1992

So far in this chapter we have concentrated, in the main, on the empowerment of the individual. However, we cannot separate the individual from the social - the group, the organization, the community. Social change and development without individual transformation is ultimately totalitarian. Individual change without social change is difficult for the individual to maintain. Action learning is a form of co-operative and collaborative enquiry that links individuals to the group (the action learning set), to a range of groups outside the set and to organizations and the community. Morgan and Ramirez (1984) link action learning with individual and social transformation in an essentially democratic way:

Action learning stresses that it is necessary to appreciate that human beings and their wider society are in one another in the most basic sense, and that effective social transformations must involve both. Action learning recognizes that effective change must start with the individual, but reverberate in its effects throughout a social system.

Action learning sets provide the milieu for personal transformation within a small group - social unit - an action learning set. If sets reflect in a small group, the whole of a social system, then action learning can spread its nature and effects throughout the social system as a whole.

Another related but unusual way of looking at action learning is the idea that it is a sustainable, 'green' or ecological form of learning and action. One of our sets recently included Shirley All Khan who was undertaking a major national project on 'The Greening of Polytechnics', using her action learning set at the University of Hertfordshire (formerly Hatfield Polytechnic) to support the progress of her project. Shirley found the action learning approach very relevant to the theme other project and had this to say about action learning:

Shirley Ali Khan: Action learning is 'green'

My perception of action learning is that it is a process which enables individuals to make connections - connections within themselves; connections between themselves and their groups; connections between themselves and their homes and working communities; connections between themselves and the world.

Because the connections are personal, learning is always personally relevant as opposed to didactic learning which is often personally irrelevant. Relevant learning is quality learning.

An understanding of the Interconnectedness and interrelatedness of all things is associated with the holistic way of viewing the world. The holistic view is an ecological view which leads to an understanding of people as a part of (as opposed to apart from) the environment. This view encourages the re-evaluation of the environment, since with it comes the realization that to abuse the environment is to abuse oneself. New personal values mean new personal responsibilities, including environmental responsibility.

Making connections is only part of the process - the understanding and knowledge part of learning - the subject being life. This life literacy includes environmental literacy. The number of connections made determines the level of life literacy and, in turn, the level of environmental literacy achieved.

The other parts of the process can be summarized in terms of developing life skills/competency and the translation of life and literacy and competency into action. In other words the process goes beyond holistic viewing to enabling people to be whole. Being whole would include being environmentally responsible. Wholeness can be both freeing and frightening.

We can consider action learning as an evolving ecosystem. Mature ecosystems in nature are massively decentralized and based upon the principle of unity-in-diversity - the rain forests are a classic example. Immature ecosystems are massively centralized and compartmentalized and based upon the principle of unity-in-uniformity. Bureaucratic organizations are examples of immature ecosystems (Southgate, 1985). Action learning is a decentralized form of group consisting of persons across an organization or between organizations or a community. Action learning promotes unity-in-diversity because it is more likely to reflect the diversity of its 'community'. Instead of being variety-reducing in seeking solutions to problems, sets 'seek to create a situation that is variety-increasing'.

Bureaucratic and hierarchical organizations tend to be alienating and energy-reducing. An example would be an organization in which what vision there is will be manifested from above in a hierarchical form to be imbibed by a docile work force who are supposed to harness their energies to that vision. Action learning sets are energy-creating and uniting. Organizations that engage in action learning mature and lose their dependency on traditional ways of organizing. Action learning is one of the processes that enable people to develop ownership for and invest energy in what they are doing.