Essay

The first step, and certainly one of the most critical steps in establishing powerful and successful action learning programs in an organization, is to gain the support of top management. The leaders in the organization will become invaluable in launching action learning throughout the organization and assuring the action learning groups that their efforts, strategies, and learnings will be championed and promoted by the organization.

To gain this support, the leaders themselves must first be convinced that action learning will successfully and quickly solve the complex and urgent problems of the organization. They must be willing to acknowledge that some of their existing challenges and problems have been intractable and not well resolved by the existing approaches, such as task groups, training, and outside consultants. These leaders should therefore be open to trying a new approach that will generate quantum improvements for their business and prepare their workers for the challenging and competitive environment surrounding them.

It is very important that top management has a solid understanding of action learning processes and principles. Otherwise, they may not select the appropriate problems, people, or resources for action learning. Or they may withdraw support at the first sign of difficulty or resistance. It is valuable to highlight the fact that action learning enables the organization to have more time in the long term by resolving present problems that are obstructing success in the short term.

If top management becomes convinced that action learning will develop and improve the organizational capacity to provide better products, services, and profits, they will be willing to assign their most critical and urgent problems to the action learning groups and to commit themselves to implementing the solutions and strategies developed by the group. Ideally, they will allow, encourage, and enable the group itself to carry out the solutions it has identified.

• Is top management committed to action learning?

• Do managers understand the benefits and expectations?

• What information or endorsements would enhance their support?

• Will they support the action learning groups with time and resources?

• Are they aware of and supportive of cultural changes created by action learning?

• Is there agreement on overall objectives for the program?

• Do they want leadership development as part of the action learning programs? Team building? Organizational culture change?

• Are there champions for the action learning sets?

• Have the program and its objectives been discussed with potential participants and their managers?

• Do managers and participants understand the time factor involved?

• How will the recommendations and actions of the action learning groups be handled?

Top management should be aware of the fact that if proposed solutions from the group are rejected or ignored, the energy and efforts of members will quickly dissipate, and much of the power and potential growth of action learning will be impaired. Managers must also understand that if the action learning process is to build leaders and teams, they must allow time and provide appropriate resources (e.g., an action learning coach). Time for learning and development needs to be an integral part of the company's action learning programs. An important question, even at this early stage, is whether the organization will be using internal or external action learning coaches.

A tremendous boost to action learning is to have top management commit to assigning senior managers to action learning groups or to become members of groups themselves. They can also reinforce action learning by allowing groups to use company time to work on organizational problems. Such actions clearly demonstrate their commitment to the program. It is important that leaders maintain management support even when some projects do not achieve immediate success.

Some action learning proponents have found that a more effective approach is to bring an external source—either a leader from another company who is a strong proponent or an experienced action learning coach—into the organization to introduce the principles and benefits of action learning. Often leaders are uncomfortable trying a new system or tool unless they know that other companies have had success with it. Thus, it is valuable to provide examples of companies who have used action learning with wonderful results.

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