Organizational Learning Processes and Outcomes: Major Findings and Future Research Directions

Abstract

We trace the evolution of research on organizational learning. As organizations acquire experience, their performance typically improves at a decreasing rate. Although this learning-curve pattern is found in many industries, organizations vary in the rate at which they learn. In order to understand this variation, we separate organizational learning into four processes: search, knowledge creation, knowledge retention, and knowledge transfer. Within each process, we present research on how dimensions of experience and of the organizational context affect learning processes and outcomes. Our goals are to describe major findings and to identify opportunities for future research. The article concludes with a discussion of research directions that are likely to be productive in the future. These directions include investigating how new technological and organizational developments are likely to affect organizational learning. This paper was accepted by David Simchi-Levi, finance.

Separated by a Common Language: How the Nature of Code Differences Shapes Communication Success and Code Convergence

“…How code differences are bridged by learning through interaction is a particular form of organizational learning (Argote 2013, Argote et al 2020. Our results also contribute to this literature by highlighting the importance of unlearning-and the different challenges posed to unlearning by qualitatively different initial conditions.…”

The origins of time compression diseconomies

“…First, we examine the empirical literature involving the construct of speed and how it influences firm performance. Second, we build on the extensive literature on learning curves that has meticulously documented learning‐by‐doing across a wide range of activities (see Argote, 2012, and Argote, Lee, & Park, 2020 for recent reviews), which we utilize to explain why time compression negatively influences the rate of capability development. We review these bodies of literature briefly.…”

“…The learning‐curve literature suggests that firms develop capabilities in the process of learning by doing (Argote et al, 2020). Thus, these scholars have theorized how firm capabilities, typically measured as operational outcomes such as cost or quality, change with cumulative volume of production (Wright, 1936; Yelle, 1979).…”

Orchestrated learning: creating a company-specific production system (XPS)

“…Second, we propose that creating an XPS involves striking a balance between, on the one hand, searching out and generating new experience, and, on the other hand, consolidating experimental knowledge into a coherent approach to be further disseminated across the units (Argote et al, 2020). In the case of Elkem, there was an alternation between local experiments and central efforts to revise the XPS content.…”