Pressed for results – an action learning project in practice

Universities across the world continue to be challenged to produce graduates who can contribute productively to increasingly complex, dynamic and competitive workplaces occurring in a global marketplace. The response of many universities to the changing workplace environment has been to include a cooperative education component or work-integrated learning experience within undergraduate degree programmes.This chapter examines cooperative education and the learning theories that underpin work-integrated learning. The theoretical basis of action learning is discussed and a case study illustrates how action learning can be integrated into projects undertaken as part of a work-integrated learning experience. The case study exemplifies how action learning can enhance the student learning experience and provide opportunities to bring about change in practice in the sport and recreation industry.

To help sales leaders understand their customers' business and innovate ways to create value for customers, PepsiCo's Strategic Customer Leadership Forum combines executive involvement, multiple learning modalities, and action learning projects that focus on real work and produce real gains for PepsiCo and its customers. A fast‐paced curriculum enhanced with technology—including computer‐based simulations and online assessments—emphasizes experiential learning in the context of addressing actual customer issues and goals. Executive sponsorship of action learning teams and selection of projects “keeps it real” and builds high‐level commitment to the learning process. © 2007 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Action learning is a process of accelerating people's learning about real-life problems in context. It involves bringing relevant people together to address either individual or organizational issues in a manner that produces learning throughout the process. Relevant group members may work in the same organization or have knowledge useful to addressing the problem. Action learning does not rely on experts. Rather, it strives to bring diverse perspectives into the group and generate fresh questions that challenge participants to consider deeply held assumptions. It uncovers assumptions that may be impinging effective action and reflection. Action learning is a recurring, experiential process of embracing an issue, raising new questions, reflecting on problems and solutions and making necessary changes. Action learning is concerned with creating options that never existed, rather than copying how others have solved problems in the past or in different contexts. Unlike some process improvement tools, action learning is open-ended, dynamic and fluid. While the purpose of engaging in action learning may be clear, the result is often unexpected. It helps participants understand their internal processes of decision and action and become aware of how these patterns impact the environment around them. Action learning is best applied to issues that are shrouded in uncertainty and potential solutions are multiple and often contradictory The Process of Action Learning about Gender One example of an action learning project is in a group of eight Midwestern women who have formed an action learning set to explore how they learn about gender in their work and lives. The group was initially formed at my request as a research project. Five of the group members work for various public agencies dedicated to the prevention and treatment of domestic violence. Two members, including myself, work in higher education, and one works in a non-profit environmental organization. Two group members are African-American and six group members are Caucasian. Through this action research project, we have worked to collectively reflect and act on issues affecting gender in both our work and personal lives. The group's story provides an example of how women or other marginalized groups can use action learning to create support and foster individual and collective development. All participants volunteered to partake in the action learning process and the group membership is intact after one year. The participants working with domestic violence operate in a field marginalized by policy-makers, public agencies and society in general. Domestic violence is an emotionally-charged field, yet, prior to the formation of this group, the women had few outlets to discuss their frustrations and experiences based on sexism and racism. The women not working in domestic violence also experience discrimination in their contexts based on race, ethnicity and gender. The initial problem brought before the group was about how we learn about gender and use the knowledge in our lives. The first meeting was slightly guarded as each of us assessed the level of risk we wanted to take and gauged the level of trust within the group. The follow-up meetings evidenced increasing levels of risk taking and trust among all of us. The meetings have helped to build trust by spending entire days in a relaxed, remote setting. Exploring our lives as women in a masculine world has included dialogue, drawing and the sharing of inspirational items such as musical pieces, poetry, personal journal entries, artwork and writing. We have worked at understanding what it means to be women in a patriarchal world, mused on our learning processes, and have evolved into a support group challenging each other in various ways. We have unanimously agreed that the group is fulfilling a previously unmet need of providing a safe space for us to learn about ourselves as women. …

PurposeThis paper aims to explain and illustrate the potential for workplace learning from small group projects and the role of action learning in fostering personal, professional and organizational outcomes.Design/methodology/approachThe paper uses a briefing session with resource and other examples to outline an effective process for establishing small group projects in the workplace.FindingsAction learning releases the potential of all team members by enabling them to grow, to innovate and develop their creativity and talent by learning about themselves, from each other and from the workplace.Practical implicationsThe paper outlines the approach used by one of the world's leading family resorts to ensure that personal and organizational learning keeps pace with change.Originality/valueThe paper draws on prior experience and examples to explain how an outcomes‐directed process has been embedded in a large resort with large‐scale team member participation.

This article deals with experiences from an action learning project against bullying and degrading treatment among nine Swedish preschools. Even though definitions of bullying and degrading treatment tend to lead to thoughts of school-age children rather than preschoolers, previous research shows that bullying occurs in preschool as well. Our data consist of documentation of improvement work carried out in the preschools that were analysed from both a peer culture perspective and a school improvement perspective. Our main results show that the preschools, by identifying challenges and actions anchored in the local context, ‘hit the target’ in their work against bullying and degrading treatment in the preschools. However, the children and their perspectives were rarely taken into account in the improvement work, which we consider as ‘missing the point’. Didactic implications for further preschool action learning projects are discussed.

The paper is based on a study of the experiences of a syndicate consisting of five members forced by the course management in a nine month Future Leaders in Digital Business study programme at the Wits Business School in Johannesburg, South Africa. Syndicates were formed to complete the research component when the other modules were done at individual level. The Action Learning Project component, required syndicates to undertake a study that would be implemented to improve some real work problem. Qualitative study design was followed to uncover the meanings from the experiences narrated, using phenomenology to reveal the meanings and implications of these experiences. Purposive sampling required the participation of the five students from the syndicate. The findings revealed synergistic gains that came through the activities, and showed the possibility of teams functioning at optimal levels that can lead to no one underperforming while everybody over-performs and benefits plentifully.

The Rural Extension Centre (REC) has developed an approach to accredited training that is based on adult learning principles and is driven by an action learning approach. One of the central features of this approach is the use of real workplace based learning projects to allow participants to immediately apply the theory of the subject being studied in a practical and useful way. The emphasis is on learning in these projects, however, they are directly based in the workplace with immediate benefits for the individual, their organisation and their clients. Action learning is applied in the courses offered by the REC at three levels. The levels are micro-, macro- and mega- that is; on a daily basis in the residential sessions, on a weekly basis as developing learning projects and on a subject basis over the three to four months that the subject takes. The learning project is a key vehicle for learning between the residential sessions. During residential sessions time is taken to ensure that the theory is delivered in a practical and useful way, to the extent that in some subjects there is real case study activity which allows the application of theory as the week goes on.

New Mexico State University has designed a course in Organic Vegetable Production centered on a working CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) Farm. This project, named “OASIS” (Organic Agriculture Students Inspiring Sustainability), was funded by a 3-year USDA Hispanic Serving Institutions (HSI) grant from 2002–05. The project has multiple objectives, including: to provide students with a multi-disciplinary experiential educational opportunity; to investigate the feasibility of small-scale organic drip-irrigated farming in the Chihuahuan desert; to demonstrate the CSA model to the local community; and to trial vegetable varieties. The class is co-listed in the Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences and the Department of Agricultural Economics and Agricultural Business. Recently, the class was adopted in the Honors College and also became part of the General Education (G) program at NMSU. The course meets twice a week during two 2-h class periods. In-class time is divided between lectures, active learning projects, and work at the 0.26-ha field plot. The class content covered by the instructors includes organic regulations, history of CSAs and organic agriculture, evaluating the profitability of CSAs, the production of specific vegetable crops, planting and harvesting procedures, and postharvest requirements. Guest speakers are also part of the regular class structure and have discussed various topics such as beneficial insects, tillage, cover cropping, and weed management. The “living classroom” allows for these lectures to draw upon the experiences of students working on the farm. Although the course presents several challenges, the hands-on experience gained by the students is considered to be invaluable.

This article outlines an active learning project that gives students hands-on experience in developing an undergraduate situational judgment test. The five-part activity models the process for constructing a situational judgment test—a tool commonly used for employee selection in organizations. The project is designed to help students assimilate concepts associated with the development of and decision to use different selection tools. Student reactions indicate that the exercise promotes student attention and engagement, stimulates learning about employee selection tools and concepts, and helps students understand the process of constructing and validating selection methods. Student development is a positive side effect of the exercise as constructing undergraduate situational judgment test items requires participants to explore and evaluate solutions to the problems faced by the typical undergraduate.

The research reported here was undertaken in a blended learning environment where contact tuition is “blended” with computer-supported (online) learning. The context is a developing country (South Africa). After completion of two full cycles of an action inquiry the planning for the third cycle was undertaken according to an existing process planning model which was originally developed for the design and planning of team-based action learning and action research (ALAR) projects. The illustration of the application of the model focuses on the aspect of student collaboration in a blended learning environment and shows how the original process planning model was adapted and applied during the re-planning phase of the project. The final deliverable is a set of action plans for future collaborative learning that could strengthen student-centred learning experiences in a context which still bears the scars of an unfortunate segregated past.

This paper reports on an ongoing, multiphase, project‐based action learning and research project. In particular, it summarizes some aspects of the learning climate and outcomes for a case‐study company in the software industry. Using a participatory action research approach, the learning company framework developed by Pedler et al. (1997) is used to initiate critical reflection in the company at three levels: managing director, senior management team and technical and professional staff. As such, this is one of the first systematic attempts to apply this framework to the entire organization and to a company in the knowledge‐based learning economy. Two sets of issues are of general concern to the company: internal issues surrounding the company's reward and recognition policies and practices and the provision of accounting and control information in a business‐relevant way to all levels of staff; and external issues concerning the extent to which the company and its members actively learn from other companies and effectively capture, disseminate and use information accessed by staff in boundary‐spanning roles. The paper concludes with some illustrations of changes being introduced by the company as a result of the feedback on and discussion of these issues.

In Software Engineering today, as in the whole of the information systems (IS) profession, there exists a variety of approaches, tools and methodologies to be exploited by the practitioner. There is no reason to suppose that this trend will not continue. The only safe prediction to be made is that changes in tools and techniques will continue to arise at an ever-faster rate. The challenge for educators is in how to equip our students with the knowledge and skills to be effective and discriminating i.e. practitioners, in the manner of Schon (1984). This paper describes an action research project which will attempt to elicit the reflective skills required of while at the same time imparting them to students of Information Systems in an action learning environment. >

This paper presents an action learning project demonstrating how a structured professional learning (PL) programme transformed the capabilities of sessional academic staff, enabling them to transition into unit coordinator (UC) roles. By equipping these staff with the leadership skills necessary to manage digital learning environments effectively, the study explicates a model that enhances student engagement and institutional teaching quality. The aim was to develop a consistent approach to the design and delivery of the PL programme that would position sessional teaching staff to move into UC roles. The work of these UCs is critical in ensuring quality experiences for students who learn in primarily digital-based learning environments. Approaches to professional development that focus on fostering transformational change (Lamm et al., 2021) were taken rather than the transactional information-giving that characterises some PL. Key to the approach was the application of an action learning cycle and scaffolding frameworks and tools. The underpinning critical reflection elicited deep participant input and perspectives that created a fruitful social constructivist learning environment (Chuang, 2021). The paper demonstrates how transformational learning was achieved for the participant group and focuses on explaining their learning journey through the systematic application of Brookfield’s reflective lenses (2017) as well as other key scaffolds. This report provides guidance for a capacity-building model that will inform those in higher educational leadership seeking to develop staff into first-level leadership roles.

The objective of this research was to describe the development of Rengkong art application and its utilization in the learning of literature based on local wisdom. The research employed research and development method. This method was used to produce products and test the effectiveness of these products. Development of mobile-based learning media applications created using Android Studio software. After the application creation process was complete, afterward the testing process and publishing to .apk format were carried out to make it available in the application market, namely the Google Play Store and could be operated on Android-based smartphones. Based on the results of the validation and implementation of the Rengkong application in learning, the following results were obtained: 1) The validation results of Rengkong application development in local wisdom-based literature learning fell into the category of sufficient to be used as learning material. 2) The results of the questionnaire of writing poetry learning towards the students of SMK Negeri 1 Cianjur with 33 respondents, obtained a percentage of 74%. It means that the use of Rengkong application in literature learning based on local wisdom could be used in learning because it was included in the sufficient category. 3) The values of character education in students' poems consist of: five values of appreciating achievement, two values of the love of the motherland, fourteen religious values, six values of honesty, three. values of hard work, six values of responsibility, four values of tolerance, and seven values of creativity

The authors discuss a large system transformation project they designed and implemented in Slovenia at the start of its independence in the early 1990s. Post-mortem insights are useful for practitioners who embark on similarly broad transformation processes. Design issues are discussed such as structuring the pre-contracting phase to guarantee inclusive stakeholder representation and participation throughout the transformation process and how intervention design needs to allow for experimentation and multi-stakeholder alliance building. Application of action research and action learning in a risk-averse environment typical of central governments helped create a sense of ownership, control, and collective accountability in the partner country.