Work Group Learning: Understanding, Improving and Assessing How Groups Learn in Organizations

Increasingly groups are being called on to make important decisions in organizations. Individuals need to learn to be group members-that is, move from a collective of individuals to a cohesive unit in which members are focused on the same goals and agree on how to achieve them. Groups need to learn how to structure themselves, communicate with other groups, conduct work processes, make decisions, and put these decisions into action. As the organizational context shifts, groups must be fluid enough to shift with them-restructuring, adapting decisions, and updating plans. Groups and their members need to learn continuously or they will find themselves standing still in a continuously changing environment.