Making Organizational Learning Work: Lessons from a High Reliability Organization

This paper reports findings from an ongoing study to understand the dynamics of operational reliability. Previously, the study identified weaknesses in organizational settings that inhibited learning opportunities, specifically the ability to learn from failure (Sullivan et al., 2008). Effective organizational learning strategies are critical in promoting operational reliability, specifically recovering from operational failures or preventing them altogether (Sullivan, 2007). There is considerable debate over the effectiveness of organizational learning and there is evidence that shows that it can, and in some cases must, work. The U.S. Navy demonstrates exceptional learning capabilities, learning from failure and even learning without failure. Further, the Navy’s knowledge management practices have proven effective over time as generations of military personnel, civil servants, and contractors learn from the experiences of their predecessors (Sullivan, 2007). DOI: 10.4018/jbir.2012070105 International Journal of Business Intelligence Research, 3(3), 54-61, July-September 2012 55 Copyright © 2012, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited. management systems to identify meaningful information that needs to be retained and capturing it for future use. Thus, organizational memory is said to be the physical IT infrastructure that facilitates the storing, searching, and retrieving of factual information (Jennex, 2005, 2008; Jennex & Olfman, 2002). While there are critics of the notion that organizational learning contributes to operational reliability (Baumard & Starbuck, 2005; Mellahi, 2005; Husted & Michailova, 2002; Busby, 1999; Starbuck, 1993; Milliken et al., 1992), this study provides evidence that organizations can learn from past experiences and that those with highly evolved cultures of reliability can mitigate imagined failure scenarios by developing strategies in advance, essentially learning without failure (Jennex, 2008; Sullivan, 2007). When organizations learn from failure, they become more competent. Conversely, operating environments that demonstrate a propensity for repeated failures show signs of an inability to learn from past mistakes (Sullivan, 2007) raising the question why do some organizations fail to learn from failure when others do not? In the following sections we provide the background to an ethnographic study which was conducted over a six month period with an organization working in a high reliability environment. The data gathered from this study was analyzed using the Sullivan-Beach Model for High Reliability Organizations (HROs) (Sullivan & Beach, 2009). The principles behind the model are briefly explained and the remedial action taken as a consequence of the analysis is described. Insights into why organizations fail to learn when others do not, are also presented.