Analysis of Leadership Challenges in a Learning Organization Essay

This essay delves into the multifaceted challenges faced by leaders within learning organizations. It begins by defining a learning organization and highlighting the importance of continuous transformation in a dynamic environment. The essay explores three key learning theories—behaviorism, cognitive information processing, and constructivism—and how they can be applied to address leadership challenges. It then identifies specific hurdles such as inspiring employees, managing change, and fostering employee development. The document emphasizes the significance of selecting appropriate learning theories to effectively manage these challenges, drawing on examples like Mark Zuckerberg and Malala Yousafzai to illustrate successful leadership approaches. The essay concludes by stressing the importance of adaptability and the integration of various learning theories to guide leadership practices.

Leadership challenges in a Learning Organization
Student Details
9/4/2019

LEADERSHIP CHALLENGES
Leadership Challenges in a Learning Organization
Learning is the process of skills or knowledge that is acquired by the individual over a period.
An individual study and being taught over the period of his whole life. Meanwhile the person
also experiences with many situations. The theories of learning all together can help the
individual in learning new things and making decision. An organization is called as a learning
organization when it facilitates it functions in such a way that its members, transactions as well
as operations have the potential to transform themselves continuously in this rapidly changing
environment (Alfonso J. Gil, et al., 2018). A famous researcher named Peter Senge as well as his
colleagues introduced this concept of learning organization. This essay concentrates on providing
basic information regarding the benefits of reflective leadership in a learning organization with
the help of various theories of learning. Learning theories can help an individual in leading the
learning organizations and they are mainly are of three types that are behaviorism, cognitive
Information Processing and constructivism. These theories and their principles can facilitate in
proper learning process by helping in selection of appropriate instruction providing tools,
strategies and techniques to lead many learning organization employees in an effective manner
(Alan Pritchard, 2017).
The first theory of learning that is behaviorism theory talks about the process of learning from
the point of view of behaviorists. Behaviorist is the situation where new behavior or learning is
acquired through the association between stimuli and the response of it. B.F Skinner develops the
behaviorism theory and he believed that the existence of knowledge is independent of human
beings. The learner is like a blank copy that needed to be filled over the period by outside stimuli
and its responses. As per the change in my behavior, the learning process is affected by the
behavioral theory, which facilitates my responses to the external stimuli that I have recently
encountered. I intercepted the knowledge with the help of the effective acquisition of stimuli and
reactions accordingly. This helped me in understanding the basic functions of my life. It further
can help in leading the employees of a learning organization, which can help in understanding
the things by making a link between external stimuli and their respective responses (Linda
Harasim, 2017).
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LEADERSHIP CHALLENGES
The other theory of learning is Cognitive Information Processing or cognitive learning theory.
Cognitive behavior is related with understanding the stimuli after analyzing it and interpreting
results accordingly after that responding to the situation. According to it, the leader as well as
employees of the learning organization grabs the knowledge. In my thinking process, I
understood the stimuli related to my academics, various established rules, theories, principles,
concepts, etc. according to my cognitive behavior. I intercepted the meaning of those and tried to
understand them according to my perception. As compared to behavioral theory of learning this
cognitive theory is more appropriate, as it provide us the way of understanding the things not just
as it is, they are present in the economy however analyzing its positive and negative points them
after making decisions accordingly (Jamie A.Gruman & Alan M.Saks, 2011). This can help the
leader of a learning organization in understanding and learning things for a longer time as
compared to others and making it understood by employees of the organization as well.
The third theory of learning is related to the process of self-construction, which is primarily
depends upon the experiences and internal knowledge of the individual. The name of the theory
is constructivism and, in this type, learning procedure depends upon the construction procedure
of individuals. This theory is known as construction theory as it helps the individuals in
construction of their level of knowledge by experiencing the things present all around them and
making their self-interpretation about those things (Kareem, Jacqueline, 2016). It is mainly based
on the lifetime experiences face by individuals, which give them the opportunity to learn
something new and innovative. In the learning organization perspective, the leader can learn the
things with the help of this theory. The theory helped me in understanding the things happening
all around us, by experiencing them in particularly and getting to know new things and the way
of handling them effectively and efficiently. The experience of this theory can help a leader in
managing the learning organization in effective manner (Gareth Edwards, et al., 2015).
In the process of learning and leadership, there are many challenges that can be faced by a
leader. The leadership in learning organization by leader can be challenging for the leader, as it is
difficult for the leaders to develop the managerial effectiveness of the learning organization. This
challenge facilitates the process of resistance to change and development forms the employees as
well as management of the organization (Linda Harasim, 2017). There is another challenge that
is of inspiring others. It is difficult for any leader to inspire others and motivate them to work
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hard. The challenge of development of employee for their future as well as organizational future
is another challenge that is faced by the leader in leading the learning organization. In leading the
learning organization, the leader, must deal with a set of diverse employees, which possess
different needs. These needs of the employees needed to be taken care by the leader in order to
facilitate the learning process in an effective and efficient manner (Mieke Koeslag-Kreunen, et
al., 2018).
The challenges faced by leader while leading the employees of learning organization are many,
only main and few of them are described here. These challenges can be taken care by the leader
if they deal with them as a challenge not a problem. In order to deal with those challenges the
leader can adopt one or more leadership learning theories, which are already discussed in above
paragraphs (Wiliam D., 2016). The theory of behaviorism can help in managing the challenge of
inspiring the employees by providing a link between stimuli and responses. Based on that the
employees can know details about results they will be getting after fulfilling their mentioned
task. The theory of cognitive or cognitive behavior can be applied on the challenge related to
guiding the through change to employees. This is done by the perceptions of leader as well as
employees based on their extent of understanding and learning the things and generating the
knowledge regarding it (Serrat, Olivier, 2017). The theory of constructivism can be useful in
making the development process of the employees of a learning organization easy and
productive. In this way, the leader with the help of appropriate theories of learning can manage
the challenges in effective manner.
It is always claimed that leadership is the extended part of learning. It is so because in order to
make the employees aware about various operations, products and services of the organization
they needed to be led in an effective manner (Shih Yung Chou & Charles Ramser, 2019). The
theories of learning are not enough for leading very complex assets of the learning organization.
The leader must not completely relay on the theories and concepts of learning (Shu-Hsien Liao,
et al., 2017). There are discovered just to guide the leader in the process; however, it is up to
leader to choose various effective ways to lead its employees. Every organization and its
employees need to face challenges in their course of work life, as challenges make them to strive
for more and work harder than before to be successful and profitable in nature. There are many
examples of leaders which opted advance learning programs to lead their team or the employees
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LEADERSHIP CHALLENGES
of the organization in which they are working in an effective and efficient manner, which helped
the followers to learn new things and get motivation of achieving more. For e.g. the leadership of
Millennial like Mark Zuckerberg the founder of Facebook is considered the very effective. It can
be seen from the profitability as well as place of the company among its competitors. It became
possible with the help of learning and leading technique used by Mark (Larry F. Moore & P.
Devereaux Jennings, 2017). The techniques were not only based on theories of learning but also
facilitate the involvement of technology in it. It helped the employees of the organization in
learning the things in more advance and effective manner, which in turn affects the profits of the
company in a positive manner.
There is another example of leadership thorough learning process that is the protest drive leaded
by Malala Yousafzai. She popularly known as Malala and is a Pakistani activist who took a stand
for the girl education and took a leadership drive in the country. Many followed her and
participated in her drive. the drive was there to make everyone aware about the importance of
education for a girl and for everyone as well. She followed the constructivism theory of
leadership, which in turn help her in constructing her views due to her experiences. She even got
Noble Prize Laureate. In leading an organization in order to facilitate the learning process in it
effectively and effectively, it is the responsibility of the leader to adopt one or more than one
theories of learning in the process. This can help in providing the appropriate direction to the
efforts of the leader and his or her leadership practice. The theories of learning in together can
help an individual in understanding the process of learning in more productive and efficient way
with respect to the way of leading in a learning organization.
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