Victoria J. Marsick, Marie Volpe
Description
Summary
The heart of Informal Learning on the Job is a number of descriptions of what informal learning looks like in different work settings. All of
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the studies reported in this issue are descriptive and qualitative in nature and are based on interviews and observation. They use stories to help illustrate how people experience informal learning at work. They also uncover some of the common differences that arise because informal learning is frequently left to the individual to design, direct and carry out.
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Description
"The case studies presented here were gathered within organizational settings. We have sought as much variety as possible in the type of organization highlighted and have focused primarily on individual learning rather than the informal learning that occurs within teams or by entire organizations.
As the flow of the chapters shows, Informal Learning on the Job looks at individual learning in successively broader social contexts, beginning with individuals learning alone and then progressing to individuals who work and learn in partnerships and finally individuals as members of teams. The last three studies-by Dechant, Zeigler, and Brooks-verge on organizational learning, or at least on the building of learning communities because they focus on manager. Managers can act as agents of organizational inquiry. Based on early work on organizational learning by Chris Argbyris and Donald Schoen (1978, 1996), we concur that organizations can learn when someone inquires into challenges on behalf of the organization. These individuals act on new knowledge to change the organization1s culture, structure, practices, mental models, or other artifacts. In so doing, they typically involve others they work with in a collective learning process. These last studies illustrate how individuals shepherd that process of organizational learning through their own knowledge creation."--from the Preface.
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