Storytelling from experience to reflection: ERSML cycle of organizational learning

Abstract

Learning process development, both in individual and organizational levels, does not occur only in education institutions, but from older people’s experience, sharing their knowledge through the reflection stemming from Storytelling in an informal way. Faced with this context, we have analysed the contribution of Storytelling to the reflection process as a way of Organizational Learning, resulting in the proposal of a framework named ERSML Cycle of Organizational Learning (Experience, Reflection, Sense, Meaning and Learning). The results have pointed that in storytelling practices listeners are motivated to reflect through the told and recalled experiences. The ERSML Cycle represents the Reflexive and Experiential Organizational Learning, in which the interaction between the individual and the collective is generated by stories, urging reflection and resulting in learning.

Keywords:

• Organizational learning
• experience
• reflection
• formal and informal learning
• storytelling

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).