Proceedings of the 12th European Conference on Knowledge ...

Inocencia Mª Martínez-León and Isabel Olmedo-Cifuentes
There is increasing concern that OL is a process. Argyris and Schön (1978) suggested that OL is a
process <strong>of</strong> detecting and correcting errors, while Fiol and Lyles (1985) also pointed out that OL is “<strong>the</strong>
process <strong>of</strong> improving actions through better knowledge and understanding”. Huber (1991) defines
learning as a process which changes <strong>the</strong> scope <strong>of</strong> potential behaviour. Additionally, Duncan and
Weiss (1979) assert that “organizational learning is a process leading to an outcome: knowledge or
skill”.
Hence, OL is a process concerned with transforming information into knowledge and knowledge into
action (e.g., Argyris and Schön, 1978; Fiol and Lyles, 1985; Huber, 1991; Crossan et al., 1999), which
implies acquiring information, knowledge, understanding, know-how, techniques, and practices that
lead to changes in its routines (Argyris and Schön, 1996). Consequently, organizational learning is “a
process aimed at helping organizations to develop and to use knowledge to change and improve
<strong>the</strong>mselves continuously” (Cummings and Worley, 1997) and, thus, to <strong>the</strong>ir members’ capabilities.
These definitions emphasize OL is a process, not an end state, which main outcome is <strong>the</strong>
knowledge. OL is a key variable in <strong>the</strong> enhancement <strong>of</strong> organizational performance (Fiol and Lyles,
1985; Stata, 1989; Dodgson, 1993; Garvin, 1993; Nevis et al., 1995; Jiménez and Cegarra, 2007). OL
is consequently a source <strong>of</strong> competitive advantage (Spender and Grant, 1996; Matusik and Hill, 1998;
Nonaka et al., 2000).
3. Organizational learning phases
Previously, OL has been defined as a process. Different perspectives have studied <strong>the</strong> OLP, such as
cognitive and behavioural (Kim, 1993; Crossan et al., 1999) or social cognition (Huber, 1991).
The cognitive perspective focuses primarily on providing an efficient process to OL, independent <strong>of</strong>
<strong>the</strong> context. However, <strong>the</strong> competitive and global context should be considered in <strong>the</strong> OLP. Both
reasons are important, and are jointly considered in <strong>the</strong> social cognition view: Huber’s (1991) model.
Huber suggests that OL is a process, whereby organisations aim to incorporate and disseminate
valuable experience and knowledge across its communities <strong>of</strong> practice over time, updating and
replacing “organizational memory” (Huber, 1991). He constitutes a more grounded approach for
understanding <strong>the</strong> learning process via examines aspects <strong>of</strong> human information-processing; what it
influences, and what it is influenced by, within <strong>the</strong> complex social interactions <strong>of</strong> groups (social
cognitive process). In this sense, Huber (1991) asserts that organizations learn about “<strong>the</strong>
environment”, “<strong>the</strong> competition”, or “production processes”. Therefore, Huber defines “learning” as a
process that enables an entity to increase its range <strong>of</strong> potential behaviour through its processing <strong>of</strong>
information.
Most studies <strong>of</strong> OL see it as a combination <strong>of</strong> four-stage processes: information acquisition,
information distribution, information interpretation and organizational memory. O<strong>the</strong>rs consider
knowledge acquisition (Huber, 1991). Organizations acquire information to transform into knowledge,
using a learning process. Information is patterned data and knowledge is capability to act. For that
reason, <strong>the</strong> knowledge acquisition proposed by Huber (1991) is replaced by information acquisition.
Therefore, <strong>the</strong> four different phases identified in this research are:
Information acquisition refers to <strong>the</strong> processes by which information is obtained from various
sources (internal and external), and <strong>the</strong> generated information flow from supplier to user.
External information acquisition means collecting information from sources outside <strong>the</strong> company
(external experts, consultants, customers, competitors, economic assessments, financial
statements, social reports, etc.). If <strong>the</strong> provider <strong>of</strong> quality information is an employee, organization
even explicitly rewarding him/her. External acquisition can also take place on ei<strong>the</strong>r an upcoming
purchase decision (pre-purchase search) or on a regular basis regardless <strong>of</strong> sporadic purchase
needs (on-going search). The most important benefits come from gaining access to knowledge
and experiences developed in o<strong>the</strong>r firms.
Internal information acquisition involves treating employees as an important information source,
encouraging workers to take part in formal and informal networks <strong>of</strong> people or grasping
knowledge from o<strong>the</strong>r organizational units within <strong>the</strong> same company.
Information distribution is a social process by which information from different sources is spread
among <strong>the</strong> organization’s members (individual and functional units, through formal and informal
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