Earlier this month I was the keynote presenter at a conference of
religious educators. The theme of the conference was "Congregations as
Learning Organizations". Participants were particularly interested in the
relevance and adaption of business LO/OL ideas/principles to religions or
"faith communities".
We came to the conclusion that learning styles vary between different
denominations and also vary within the hierarchy of a denomination. In
general, learning in faith communities is incremental rather than
transformative and on the market/deliver end of the value-chain rather
than on the design/make end. Yet there is variability. For example,
Catholics are more presciptive about their beliefs than are say Unitarians
and hence do little to examine underlying assumptions. However, the
Catholic church is good at incremental learning with regard to how to
deliver/package its product - Sunday mass is also held on Saturdays now
compared to 20 years ago, the Friday fish requirement is now optional, but
the Credo is still the Credo.
While religions or faith communities are voluntary organizations, they
should not be grouped together with other non-profits when it comes to
learning characteristics. The former hold onto a critical set of
underlying assumptions and beliefs that critically shape what and how
their organizations learn.
Regards,
Tony DiBella
ajdibella@aol.com
www.orgtransitions.com
--Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>