To Integrate Employees Individual Knowledge Processes With The Organisations Learning Process: Construction Of 'The Affect Based Learning Matrix'

This paper tries to front a commonly expressed criticism towards research in organisational learning: "organisational learning does not provide 'useful' knowledge for practitioners." Activities related to organisational learning are many times accused for being performed and managed on a managerial level and thereby too theoretical and abstract. To not understand how the individual process and acquire knowledge has a negative effect upon organisations since all organisations are becoming more knowledge intensive across the service, industrial and governmental sectors. A more personalised view of knowledge is required, and we suggest instead to deliberately emanating from the individual and his or her behavioural conditions in order to influence and affect the organisation. With this perspective, individuals' actions are paid attention to earlier in the learning process. 'The Affect Based Learning Matrix' has been constructed in order to promote processes for continuous learning within organisations when taking employees automatic thoughts and emotional aspects into consideration. This is assumed to improve the organisational learning process since vague wordings and unspoken negative emotions make people passive in finding new solutions. Seven in-depth interviews have been made with people deeply involved in or responsible for learning and knowledge management activities in order to receive feedback upon the idea of introducing a cognitive approach into the organisational learning field.