Master of Business Administration
Master of Business Research
Unit: | Organisational Learning and Change |
Unit Code: | BUS 510 |
Type of Assessment: | Assessment 1 – Personal Journals |
Unit Learning Outcomes addressed: | Learning outcomes – (a), (c), (d), (e) and (f) a) Critically analyse and critique the major theories of organisational learning. c) Critically review and evaluate the reasons for different approaches to change, and demonstrate an ability to apply this understanding to volatile or novel organisational contexts. d) Critically analyse and critique common perspectives on the role of, and relationship between, individuals, teams and leaders in the change processes. e) Integrate biblical frameworks into a contemporary understanding of organisational learning and change. f) Integrate the concepts of organisational learning, strategic and innovative change management with leadership theory and practice |
Criteria for Assessment: | · Criterion 1 - Extent to which the question is answered – (4/10) · Criterion 2 - Extent of critical analysis – (4/10) · Criterion 3 – Structure – (2/10) |
Assessment Task: | Personal journal (300 -/+ 10% words for each personal reflection) The purpose of this assessment is to enhance the understanding and application of organisational learning and concepts in the organisational context. Each student is to develop a personal journal to reflect and record their learning/ thoughts/ application of the readings from Senge’s book, ‘The Fifth Discipline”. Students should choose and read any two chapters from the book and write a personal reflection of 300 words on each chapter covering the following: · why the reading was thought provoking, · how the concept/lesson from the reading applied or can be applied to a current or past organizational situation in the student’s experience. · Integration of biblical and ethical principles. Students should NOT summarize the chapter that has been read. The purpose of the journal is to help students develop their roles in change management and organisational learning building on their organisational experiences. |
Total Mark & Weighting: | 20 marks (20%) For each personal journal – 10 marks (10%) |
BUS 510 Organisational Learning and Change
Assessment 1 – Personal Journals
Personal Journal of Chapter 1:
The first chapter of ‘The Fifth Discipline: The Art & Practice of The Learning Organization’ by Peter M. Senge discusses the way our actions are closely knitted with our reality, necessitating us to control and change it in a desirable direction. Change is inevitable whether it is the personal lives of individuals or the course of proceedings of various organisations. The particular chapter plays a significant role in breaking free the illusion that the whole world is created of disparate and unconnected forces to give rise to the development of learning organisations, where people can continuously combine their efforts to strive and achieve shared goals and objectives. The particular chapter, as a result, is thought-provoking to chalk out the big picture through constantly expanding capacity using new and expansive patterns of thinking.
I work as a trainee in a telecom organisation, which exceptionally depends on seizing opportunities of new technologies and innovation to promote differentiation and overcome competitive pressure in the existing market. With its preference towards building and developing learning organisations, the author essentially suggests the need for discarding conventional ideas and traditional leadership tactics to emphasise on planning and achieving sustainable competitive advantage. With the appointment of ‘learners’, instead of employees, the particular idea obtained from the chapter can be used to develop a more ‘learningful’ organisation in order to operate in a growingly interconnected business world, which is becoming more complex and dynamic.
The particular excerpts from the chapter successfully address the integration of biblical principles such as wisdom and trust with ethical principles, including shared value and mutual respect. The author discloses some of the key disciplines of developing a learning organisation, such as the influx of systems thinking and shaping mental models in line with concepts like shared vision and team learning.
Personal Reflection of Chapter 2:
The second chapter of the particular book focuses on learning disability, which may serve as the principal reason for the failure and extermination of organisations. The author comes up with multiple evidence of organisational failure to accentuate the need for recognising the underlying reasons for such failure. Most of the organisational failure happened despite the availability of abundant evidence. As leaders and managers tend to pay little attention to important evidence while failing to recognise the impending threat, their implications, they increasingly fail to come up with suitable responses to cause obliteration of organisational operations. As each one of us has the propensity to blame the failure on another person, the particular chapter provides a piece of important theoretical evidence that provokes thoughts to tame the enemy residing within us.
As an employee of a telecom organisation, aspiring to achieve great career heights, I am responsible for developing increased acknowledgement of personal strengths and weaknesses affecting my contribution to the entire team effort. Readings from this particular chapter help to determine the importance of adopting and introducing longstanding policies that assist organisational individuals and members to recognise their learning disabilities, which are deeply rooted in individuals for a long time. In order to stand forward and battle the issues of learning disabilities and dilemmas, contemporary organisations must develop a management team, comprising of tech-savvy, experienced and capable managers at different functional areas in line with their expertise.
The ethical principles of teamwork and mutual respect integrate with biblical principles of knowledge, wisdom, righteousness and truthfulness to help mitigate disagreements in several functional or cross-functional areas of the organisation. As business environment continuously becomes global and competitive, the principle of togetherness, in this case, greatly helps an organisation to sort out complex issues of cross-functional operations, which act as major obstacles for achieving sustainable success.