Leading schools as learning organizations

The educational leadership field has accumulated findings, from a wide range of international, empirically-based studies, highlighting the positive impact that leadership has on organisational learning and outcomes. There is an extensive research base that demonstrates how leadership is a key contributor to organisational learning and system improvement (e.g. Leithwood, Harris, and Hopkins 2008; Fullan 2010; Harris and Jones 2015; Leithwood et al. 2017; Robinson 2018). Under the right conditions, the evidence suggests that leaders can transform organisational performance through creating powerful professional learning communities (Fullan 2010; Harris, Jones and Huffman 2017; Meyers and Hambrick Hitt 2017).

Early evidence about the relationship between leadership and organisational learning can be traced back to the school effectiveness and improvement research fields (Teddlie and Reynolds 2000; Reynolds et al. 2014; Chapman et al. 2015). This extensive evidence base reinforces the importance of leadership in securing and sustaining organisational learning (Muijs et al. 2014; Chapman et al. 2015; Muijs and Reynolds 2017). It also ‘strongly emphasises the importance of school leaders supporting ‘individual, group and organisational learning with inquiry, problem solving and experimentation as key drivers of change and innovation’ (Kools and Stoll 2016, 1).

An early review of the literature (Hallinger and Heck 1998, 5) concluded that while the influence of leadership on school performance was indirect and relatively small, it was also statistically significant, thus supporting the general belief ‘that principals contribute to school effectiveness and improvement’. A subsequent review similarly highlighted the centrality of leadership in securing positive organisational transformation and learner outcomes. It concluded that ‘leadership is second only to classroom instruction among all school-related factors that contribute to what students learn at school’ (Leithwood, Harris, and Hopkins 2008, 5). Hence in pusuing the school as a learning organisation, school leaders play a critical role.

In the global policy arena, leadership remains a central policy priority largely because of the positive relationship between leadership and organisational change (Harris and Jones 2015). Recently, the idea of the school as ‘a learning organisation’ has been revisited and rejuvenated in policy debates about improving school and system performance (Kools and Stoll 2016). Yet, as Kools and Stoll (2016) acknowledge the idea of a ‘learning organisation’ is far from new. The idea stems back to the early 1980s, when it became a way of describing the internal processes that contributed to organisational success (Argyris 1982).

In the 1990s, the idea was at the height of its popularity, stimulated by Senge’s ( 1990) book ‘The Fifth Discipline’. Countless publications, workshops, and websites followed, and the idea of the school as a learning organisation became mainstream. Since the original conception of the ‘learning organisation’ there have been a range of ideas, within the field of education, that traverse the same intellectual territory (e.g. professional learning communities, the learning school, the learning organisation, the learning community) resulting in some conceptual overlap and it has been argued, some conceptual confusion.

In the business world, a learning organisation has been described as:

an organization skilled at creating, acquiring, and transferring knowledge, and at modifying its behavior to reflect new knowledge and insights¹

For school leaders there are several questions to initially consider about the school as a learning organisation. Firstly, what exactly does it mean for a school to become a learning organisation and how exactly is this fulfilled? While the literature offers some guidance, rubrics and latterly, some dimensions, the terminology around the idea of a learning organisation tends towards the aspirational rather than functional. Less is said in the literature about the actual process and mechanics of forming and sustaining a learning organisation. So how does a school become a learning organisation in practice? What are the clear steps, what are the necessary conditions and what the central evaluative processes? A clear theory of action and some workable, practical guidance would seem, at minimum, to be an important requirement for school leaders and staff to embark upon this organisational journey. Also, if a school considers itself to be a learning organisation already, where does it go next, what direction for school improvement does it then take? The literature is more preoccupied with establishing learning organisations and says far less about how to sustain them or extend them.

Secondly, those in pursuit of the ideals and features of a learning organisation will need a clear implementation strategy to ensure that any changes are deeply embedded and have a positive impact. In their recent work, Viennet and Pont (2017, 6) propose that any effective implementation that results in sustainability and positive outcomes requires: ‘concrete measures that bring all the determinants together in a coherent manner at the school level’. There is a deliberate emphasis on coherence, in terms of planning and delivery, which suggests that the establishment and continuation of the school as a learning organisation should be based upon an integrated developmental model.

The idea of the school as a ‘learning organisation’ is certainly attractive and its revival is proving to be influential, in policy terms (Kools and Stoll 2016; Seashore Louis and Lee 2016). Premised on the fact that the school is seeking long term change and improvement, there is both potential and power in the idea of the school as a learning organisation. It is based upon a flawless logic that presumes that teachers and school leaders want their school as a learning organisation. It would be largely inconceivable to propose the opposite. Most writers on the subject extoll the virtues and positive benefits of being a learning organisation but creating the conditions for this to happen, in practice, is far from automatic or straightforward. Creating a school as a learning organisation requires a significant cultural shift, a change of mind-sets and a school-wide commitment to self-reflection and evaluation.

Ideas are rarely as powerful as the actions that emanate from them. The school as a learning organisation is a potent concept that has informed and continues to inform school improvement practices within and across schools, in many different countries. Considerable time, effort, and resource, however, will need to be allocated, to turn any school into an authentic and sustainable learning organisation. Consolidated, coherent, and collaborative efforts among staff, at all levels, will be essential to secure and sustain the cultural shifts that characterise an active, genuine learning organisation or learning community (Fullan 2018).

In short, aspiring to be a learning organisation is different from becoming a learning organisation. The latter is not an easy option. Subscribing, in a genuine way, to the idea of a learning organisation means that disruptive change will inevitably follow. Learning without change is not only contradictory but also futile if significant organisational improvement is the real end-game. Consequently, without the collective commitment, collaborative action, associated risk-taking and deep changes required for the school to be an authentic learning organisation, this influential and potentially transformational concept is in danger of being negated. If the school as a learning organisation is to be more than just the latest label, then leaders at all levels in schools will need this to be their shared ambition, their core purpose, and their collective focus for school improvement.

Notes

1 https://hbr.org/1993/07/building-a-learning-organization