Learning, in and around organizations, has many facets, which interact with one another. Increasingly, learning is what creates the quality that gives the organization commercial success and the individual the development suited for his or her well being. Learning is increasingly a criterion used by professionals in search of the organization they want to belong to. Learning is an aspect of client-friendliness (have you ever received assistance from someone who has no recollection of what you had said the previous day?).

You can say that learning is an aspect of life. We human beings learn as a part of how we conduct our lives; to put it more strongly, it is through learning that we are successful in what we do. Organizational learning can be seen as one of the ways in which organizations can mobilize the natural potential of individuals who are associated with the organization. But that is only part of the story. The other part is the challenge for organizations to ‘learn’ as an organization: to become more responsive, creative and flexible, and to become a more natural habitat to individuals and groups as they develop..

Perceiving is an important part of learning. All too often we allow conditioning, by organizations and social contexts, to limit how we perceive. Have you seen people in your organization who do not really see each other? Have you been in meetings with people who apparently do not listen? What would they have learned if they had been seeing and listening better?