Published Online:June 2025
Product Name:The IUP Journal of Effective Executive
Product Type:Article
Product Code:IJEE010625
DOI:10.71329/EffectiveExecutive/2025.28.2.5-33
Author Name:Colin Coulson-Thomas
Availability:YES
Subject/Domain:Management
Download Format:PDF
Pages:5-33
The concept of the learning organization has appealed but proved difficult to realize and sustain. Eventual outcomes and impacts have often fallen short of early expectations and promise. What is learned can be ignored, misused and quickly become out-of-date. Entities struggle with contemporary challenges, global risks and existential threats. There are issues and questions for directors and boards to consider. Lessons from the past are not learned. Misinformation and disinformation abound. AI models that feed on them can mislead and in time implode. Evidence and warning signs are ignored. Responses to existential threats are inadequate. Climate change denial and authoritarian strategies reduce our survival prospects.
Peter Senge’s vision of a learning organization thirty-five years ago was very different from the hierarchical organizations of the time (Senge, 1990 & 2006). It has been described as a radical movement away from traditional command and control to a more liberating structure based on faith and trust (Bradbery, 2007). The reference to faith and trust may hint that seemingly appealing, profound and holistic silver bullet or single factor solutions can be harder to achieve than articulate