Learning organisations OECD/France workshop on Human resources, education and innovation, 7-8 December 2009 Nathalie Greenan Centre dEtudes de lEmploi.

Learning organisations

OECD/France workshop onHuman resources, education and innovation, 7-8

December 2009

Nathalie Greenan Centre d’Etudes de l’Emploi and TEPP-CNRS

Edward LorenzUniversity of Nice-CNRS

What is a learning organisation? A quantitative assessment at the

European level based on the EWCS→The spread of learning organisations→The trend in work complexity

Policy issues

Outline

An organisation able to adapt and compete at low cost through learning

Common definitional ground→ multi-level concept: individual-team-organisation→ role of learning cultures: beliefs, norms and values supportive of employee learning→ specific HRM policies supportive of learning culture

What is a learning organisation? (1)

Tradeoffs in organisational design → stimulate dynamic properties / provide stability in the organisational structure → standardisation/routine versus mutual adjustement/innovation

Scientific and technical skills deal with an employee participation contraint to

innovation in order to avoid conflicts between vested interest in the organisation → characteristics of the innovative idea → socio-demographic characteristics of the workforce → soft skills → group processes → customer focus → transparency and fairness

What is a learning organisation? (2)

The spread of learning organisations in the EU-15 (1)

Percent of employees by cluster reporting each variable

VariablesDiscretionary

learningLean

productionTaylorism Traditional

organisationAverage

Learning new things in work 93.9 81.7 42.0 29.7 71.4

Problem solving activities 95.4 98.0 5.7 68.7 79.3

Complexity of tasks 79.8 64.7 23.8 19.2 56.7

Discretion in fixing work methods 89.1 51.8 17.7 46.5 61.7

Discretion in setting work rate 87.5 52.2 27.3 52.7 63.6

Horizontal constraints on work rate 43.6 80.3 66.1 27.8 53.1

Hierarchical constraints on work rate 19.6 64.4 66.5 26.7 38.9

Norm-based constraints on work rate 21.2 75.5 56.3 14.7 38.7

Automatic constraints on work rate 5.4 59.8 56.9 7.2 26.7

Team work 64.3 84.2 70.1 33.4 64.2

Job rotation 44.0 70.5 53.2 27.5 48.9

Quality norms 78.1 94.0 81.1 36.1 74.4

Responsibility for quality control 86.4 88.7 46.7 38.9 72.6

Monotony of tasks 19.5 65.8 65.6 43.9 42.4

Repetitiveness of tasks 12.8 41.9 37.1 19.2 24.9

Source: EWCS 2000

The spread of learning organisations in the EU-15 (2)

Percent of employees by country in each organisational class

Discretionary learning

Lean production

Taylorist organisation

Traditional organisation

Total

EU-15 39.1 28.2 13.6 19.1 100.0 Scandinavian countries

Denmark 60.0 21.9 6.8 11.3 100.0 Finland 47.8 27.6 12.5 12.1 100.0 Sweden 52.6 18.5 7.1 21.7 100.0

British I sles I reland 24.0 37.8 20.7 17.6 100.0 UK 34.8 40.6 10.9 13.7 100.0

Western Europe Austria 47.5 21.5 13.1 18.0 100.0 Belgium 38.9 25.1 13.9 22.1 100.0 Germany 44.3 19.6 14.3 21.9 100.0 France 38.0 33.3 11.1 17.7 100.0 Luxembourg 42.8 25.4 11.9 20.0 100.0 Netherlands 64.0 17.2 5.3 13.5 100.0

Mediterranean countries Greece 18.7 25.6 28.0 27.7 100.0 I taly 30.0 23.6 20.9 25.4 100.0 Spain 20.1 38.8 18.5 22.5 100.0 Portugal 26.1 28.1 23.0 22.8 100.0

Source: EWCS 2000

Learning organisations and innovation mode(1)

Countries with a high proportion of learning forms of work organistion have more lead innovators: higher in-house creative capacity

Countries where lean and taylorist forms of work organisation dominate have more non-innovators and technology adopters: more reliance on outside suppliers of new technology

Learning organisations and innovation mode (2)

BEDK

DE

EL

ES

FR

IT

LU

NL

AT

PT

FI

SE

UK

10

15

20

25

30

% le

ad in

nova

tors

20 30 40 50 60% discretionary learning

LEAD Fitted values

R-squared = .39

% Lead innovators by % discretionary learning

BEDK

DE

EL

ES

FR

IT

LU

NL

AT

PT

FI

SE

UK

10

15

20

25

30

% le

ad in

nova

tors

20 25 30 35 40% lean organisation

LEAD Fitted values

R-squared = .36

% Lead innovators by % lean organisation

Learning organisations, HRM and organisational culture

Model 1 Model 2 Model 3 Model 4Discretionary

Learning Lean Taylorist Simple

Further training .27*** .04 -.25*** -.44***Payment systemPiece rate -.28*** .42*** .21*** -.50***Pay based on group performance -.29*** .31*** -.09 -.09Pay based on enterprise performance .29*** -.01 -.42*** -.20*Consultation and assessmentFrank discussions with employer over performance .06 .11** -.00 -.18***Consultation over changes in working conditions .15*** .25*** -.21*** -.27***Regular formal performance assessment -.17*** .42*** .11* -.46***AssistanceAssistance from employer .09* -.01 .00 -.03External assistance .03 .15*** -.39*** -.11Learning culture measuresApply one’s own ideas in work .64*** .12** -.99*** -.36***Intellectually demanding job .25*** .49*** -.53*** -.55***Opportunities to learn and grow at work .28*** .21*** -.36*** -.53***

Source: EWCS 2005

Learning organisations in public and private sectors in EU-27

Private Sector Public Sector

Manufacturing construction and utilities

Services Total Public

administration Education

Health and social

work Total

Methods of work 56.4 64.3 60.6 68.1 85.8 68.1 74.3 Autonomy in work Speed or rate of work 59.9 67.0 63.6 70.5 78.7 65.5 71.9

Learning new things 69.2 67.5 68.3 80.7 86.5 83.8 83.7

Problem solving activities 75.6 81.8 78.9 84.7 86.6 86.5 85.9 Cognitive

dimensions of work Complexity of tasks 64.5 58.6 61.4 71.7 65.2 70.9 69.2

Self assessment 73.1 67.1 69.9 65.5 78.9 74.8 73.4 Quality

Quality norms 84.6 71.7 77.7 65.9 69.6 78.7 71.1

Task rotation 49.2 47.9 48.5 56.6 45.4 65.5 55.3

with decision on task division

29.4 32.4 31.0 32.9 39.9 46.1 40.3 Teamwork

without decision on task division

34.8 28.5 31.4 36.1 17.3 27.1 26.8

Monotony of tasks 48.9 40.6 44.5 41.1 30.8 38.8 36.8

Repetitiveness of tasks 28.0 22.8 25.3 20.0 14.8 25.5 23.8

Automatic 36.6 15.3 25.8 11.1 3.5 8.9 7.8

Norm-based 62.8 42.8 52.2 31.8 35.1 31.4 32.8

Hierarchical 49.1 40.7 44.6 39.3 27.6 29.0 32.1 Work pace constraints

Horizontal 57.1 47.6 52.0 46.9 31.1 51.4 42.6

Source: EWCS 2005

4 core characteristics of complex work:

Complex tasks Learn new things Choose or change

the order or tasks Choose or change

the methods of work

The complexity paradox (1) Degree of work

complexity Rank

2005 Trend 95-05

EU-15 (-) Scandinavian countries

Denmark 1 (+) Finland 4 0 Sweden 2 0

British I sles I reland 9 (+) UK 10 (-)

Western Europe Austria 5 (+) Belgium 7 0 Germany 13 (-) France 8 0 Luxembourg 6 (+) Netherlands 3 0

Mediterranean countries Greece 14 (+) I taly 11 (-) Portugal 12 0 Spain 15 (-)

Source: EWCS 1995, 2000 and 2005

The complexity paradox (2)

Source: EWCS 1995, 2000 and 2005

Degree of work complexity Trend analysis

1995-2000 : -0,089*** 1995-2005 : -0,079***

Individual level

Female : (-) Age : min (15-24) max (35-44) Computer use : (+) Self employed : (+) Fixed term contract : (-) Supervisory role : (+) Secteur : min (manufacturing) max (construction) Occupation : min (elementary) max (professionals)

Country level

Number of patents : (+) % of tertiary attainment: + % of trade in GDP : (+) % of aged 50 and more: - Unemployment rate : + % part time: (-) % females: (+)

Random component

Intra country correlation in % : 5,94%

Work complexity has all the more decreased that forces are present that should contribute to its development: ICT diffusion, growing experience and education, development of the service sector

Increasing heterogeneity across EU-15: evidence of a country effect in this trend

Objective reasons→ standardisation→ polarisation

Subjective reasons→ overqualification→ organisational changes

The complexity paradox (3)

The bottleneck to improving the innovative capabilities of European firms might not be low levels of R&D expenditures, which are strongly determined by industry structures and consequently difficult to change, but the widespread presence of working environments that are unable to provide a fertile environment for innovation.

If this is the case, then the next step for European policy is to encourage the adoption of ‘pro-innovation’ organisational practice, particularly in countries with poor innovative performance.

Policy issues: Innovation

At the individual level, further training is positively correlated with learning and lean forms of organisation

Institutional set-up matters: a mobile workforce and labour market policies emphasising expenditures in further training favour learning types of jobs

Could a lack of intermediate skills acquired in vocational education and further training create a learning bottleneck and favour more standardised organisations?

Need to target further training policies on part time and precarious workers

Policy issue: Training

evaluation practices, employment security and pay system based on collective performance are positively correlated with learning and lean types of jobs

Learning cultures mediates the impact of HRM variables on the likelihood of employee learning

HRM policies probably play a role in mitigating conflicts in change situation

Need to identify best HRM practices conditional on innovation patterns and institutional settings

Policy issue: HRM practices

Conclusion: measurement issue Indicators for innovation need to do more than capture

material inputs such as R&D expenditures and the available pool of technical and scientific skills. Indicators also need to capture how these material and human resources are used and whether or not the work environment promotes the further development of the knowledge and skills of employees.

Need for more data to inform evidence based policy taking into account the interaction between institutions, learning models of organisation and innovation patterns.

A survey instrument linking information from employers with information from employees would allow to build a rich set of indicators for scoreboards as well as conducting research giving analytical insights to set hard facts into context.