Intranets and Org Learning LO10604

Yogesh Malhotra (MALHOTRA@vms.cis.pitt.edu)
Sun, 20 Oct 1996 18:15:17 -0400 (EDT)

Replying to LO10579 (Technology and Organizational Learning)

On 16 Oct 1996 Daphne Donaldson wrote:

>It would seem that the use of technology (e.g. Intranet or Internet
>systems) does not overcome some basic problems with promoting the kind of
>dialogue which will actually create an organizational learning
>environment.

Daphne, thanks for your kind words! The key issue seems to be 'how' rather
than 'what' of technology implementation for OL.

If technology was the panacea for organizational 'non-learning' we
wouldn't see examples of companies such as GM and IBM who couldn't align
their 'theory of business' (Drucker in HBR) with the changing external
reality. Nor would we see firms stuck in the 'Marketing Myopia' (Ted
Levitt) and creating 'buggy whips' for buggies that don't exist any more.
Referring to Skinner:

"The real problem is not whether machines think, but whether men [sic] do."

More such 'punchlines' on the capabilities of humans versus technology in
enabling organizational learning may be perused at the page titled 'On
Knowledge [and] Management':

http://www.pitt.edu/~malhotra/Peterold.htm

Sincerely,

Yogesh Malhotra
malhotra@vms.cis.pitt.edu
Editor/Publisher, A Business Researcher's Interests
URL: http://www.pitt.edu/~malhotra/interest.html

-- 

Yogesh Malhotra <MALHOTRA@vms.cis.pitt.edu>

Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>