By: Tal Ben-Shahar

In a recent interview, Peter Senge, the man who brought the notion of the "Learning Organization" into public awareness, reflected on the ten years since the publication of The Fifth Discipline, an influential book that has shaped the way academics and practitioners think about organizational behavior. Looking at his own work, Senge laments the fact that most companies that were introduced to the learning organization model did not change, and merely continued on the path they had been on before the intervention.

This failure to attain meaningful organizational change is not peculiar to learning organization initiatives. Senge, noting that most strategic initiatives and corporate reorganizations are only marginally effective, concludes that "The traditional model of change—change that is led from the top—has a less-than-impressive track record." Unfortunately, the alternative model for organizational change—change that is driven from the bottom, or from the middle—has not yielded much better results, and initiatives that lack commitment from the top rarely if ever succeed.

As a management consultant, who has embraced and taught Senge’s work and many other strategic initiatives, I was deeply disturbed when reading Senge’s grim assessment. And yet, it is difficult to disagree with his evaluation of the general state of our field. We can look at the score card of TQM and reengineering, or we can look closer, at our own score card as consultants. I know of no consultant who has not, at some point, expressed frustration because true change seemed elusive. And while it is always possible to find post hoc reasons for failure, and we do derive important lessons for future work, the batting record of our industry is still poor. When our top players hit twenty to thirty home runs in ten years—Senge’s self proclaimed statistics—we are not yet ready for the big league. As consultants, we will find it harder and harder to justify, to ourselves and in the future to the market, that we are in a profession worthy of an audience, and a paycheck.

The failure of most intervention programs is rarely due to dearth of ideas. We have enough books and theories that tell us what it takes to be a great leader, and what distinguishes successful organizations from lesser ones. We know that delegation and the devolution of decision rights is important in the fast changing world; we understand the importance of having a vision for the organization—an inspiring mission statement, deeply held core values, and hairy and audacious goals; we know that to remain competitive in our fast changing world, individuals—and organizations—must learn and grow continuously. Individuals and organizations who pay heed to, and assimilate these ideas benefit a great deal. The fact remains, though, that most people and most companies do not benefit, and the outcome is that an increasing number of people—many of whom have tried every latest fad—are losing faith in the field of organizational development. Already now, most consultants face the formidable wall erected by a history of intervention failures, where the employees no longer believe a new consultant who comes in and cries "change." The self-fulfilling nature of such expectations from employees dooms most interventions to failure from the outset.

Right now, our problem as consultants is not with the notion of a learning organization or TQM or Reengineering, but with our way of implementing a new idea in an organization. Change is difficult; an organization, like an organism, generates anti-bodies and responds negatively to a foreign element that is trying to enter the system. The challenge is to get an organization to assimilate a new idea—a foreign element worthy of adoption—and make it its own.

What the consultant must help create is a self-contained community of learning in which the people who are primarily responsible for the teaching are not brought from the outside, but are the managers themselves. The responsibility of the consultant in such an intervention program comprises two stages. First, it is to teach the content of the intervention program to the managers. The consultant teaches the manager about the conditions that are necessary for successful teamwork, or the merits of delegation, or the importance of creating, and adhering to, an organizational vision. The second, and equally important stage is when the consultant—or someone working with the consultant—teaches managers how to teach. In the "Train the Trainer" program, managers are taught how to deliver a lecture or conduct a workshop—learning both how to put the content together, and how to present it effectively. Some managers might feel more comfortable lecturing, whereas others might resonate more to leading a discussion groups. The consultant helps managers to identify their unique and natural presentation style, and then using that style, to come up with ways of communicating the message effectively.

Usually, consultants coming into an organization, are charged with the primary responsibility of being the teachers; the intervention mostly comprises the first step of spreading the content throughout the organization. Consultants conduct workshops for the managers in some off-sight location, and if the organization has the resources, they provide similar training for the rest of the employees. There is usually a buzz following such training, but the buzz does not last and is not translated into permanent change. The second stage in the intervention program—getting managers to become teachers—requires much more time and effort that management is not always prepared to invest; but this stage is essential if the organization is serious about change.

There are at least four benefits to this two stage model of intervention: enhanced learning, deeper assimilation of material, a rise in the quantity and a drop in the cost of training, and enhanced satisfaction and motivation throughout the organization.

We all know that the best way to learn something is to teach it. On average, we retain around 5% of the material in a lecture, 50% of the material when we actively participate in a discussion, and around 90% of the material when we present it. Managers usually forget most of the material that they have learned and rarely look into their extensive notes and summaries and the long reading list that the consultant had left behind. These are filed away neatly, and permanently. Getting the top people in the organization to teach not only forces them to consult the material more often, but the act of teaching in and of itself helps to maximize their understanding and retention of the material.

When we teach, we not only learn the material, we also assimilate it. Studies in social psychology on "self-perception theory" demonstrate that when we see ourselves do something, or hear ourselves say something, our belief in what we are doing or saying is strengthened. A manager who teaches the company’s core values, will, over time, internalize the importance of adhering to these values. He will become more conscious and conscientious, and is more likely to comply with the values that he himself promotes. We find it difficult to tolerate a discrepancy between what we profess to others on a regular basis and what we do in practice. For example, it is much easier for a manager to say that he agrees with a consultant that delegation is important—and then refrain from delegating himself—than it is to teach the merits of delegation and remain blind to his own dictatorial style. Moreover, there is nothing like a public commitment to keep us honest—we do not like to be perceived as inconsistent and, worse, as hypocritical.

When introducing a new initiative into a large organization, it usually takes months, even years, to train all the employees, a time lag which might jeopardize the initiative. The speed of training is restricted by the availability of consultants, and by the high costs of external training. The outcome of a change effort might be determined by the lowest common denominator, and therefore success is exceedingly difficult when only part of the organization is on board, when some of the employees are still not sure what the change is about.

For the employees to truly understand and assimilate the material, continuous training is necessary. A one time training session on TQM is insufficient if we want to create a quality conscience organization. When there are more trainers in the organization, however, it is possible to get employees to go through the same training more than once. Better yet, employees can begin to teach the material to one another, especially to those who have not yet gone through the training. The idea that an employee of the company becomes a teacher must start from the top—senior management must be the first to demonstrate a commitment to teaching—but should by no means be restricted to the tip of the pyramid.

Training is expensive, and it is not feasible, nor necessary, to introduce massive training programs through external consultants. When managers become trainers, they can teach other employees who can teach others, and so on. Training spreads exponentially—each student is a potential teacher—rather than linearly, as in the model of the consultant as the sole trainer. When each and every employee—from all ranks of the organization—is both a student and a teacher, we have a true learning organization.

Not all organizations can afford in-house consultants, and often, once the consultant, who is brought in for a finite period of time, leaves, the momentum that was created by the initiation of a new program dies. Old habits die hard, and if the change agent is not present and persistent, then the organization will usually regress back to the old, familiar ways of doing things. However, having the manager as the primary change agent—as opposed to the consultant—ensures continuity of the process after the consultant leaves.

Over time, as employees become familiar with their job scope, boredom creeps in. There is a deep sense of satisfaction when we teach and when we learn, and by encouraging employees to become perennial teachers and students, we excite them about, and help them become more engaged with, their work. A commitment to teaching and learning releases levels of energy that are often absent in the mundane day to day operation of an organization. Both trainers and trainees will, in the long run, come to appreciate the opportunity to teach and to learn—the opportunity to grow continuously.

Encouraging the leader to be the teacher is not a novel idea; great leaders do not need to be told that they should also be teachers. Jack Welch, in running General Electric, spent much of his time going around and preaching his philosophy. Percy Bernevik, Asea Brown Boveri’s legendary CEO, said that "A leader must first be a teacher." Anita Roddick travels the world and teaches the Body Shop way to her employees. Organizational behaviorists also recognize, though usually indirectly, the importance of the leader as a teacher. Edgar Scheine in his work on "Process Consultation" perceives the consultant as a facilitator who helps the manager come up with ideas for change and then take responsibility for implementation. Martin Greenleaf in his work on "The Leader as Servant" suggests that the leader turns the organizational pyramid upside down and becomes the servant of the employees, the supporter of the organization—the teacher. Senge’s notion of a learning organization is about creating a workplace in which employees continue to learn after the consultant has left.

Confucius, one of the first organizational behaviorists, admonishes us not to give a man a fish, but to teach him how to fish. Many of us as consultants bring up Confucius’ wisdom when discussing the merits of delegation with managers. It is time we apply this wisdom to our own work. When we assume the responsibility of teaching, we feed the organization for a day; when we teach managers how to teach, we feed an organization for a lifetime.