Organisational Learning, Knowledge Management and Complexity Fusion - Exploring the "flavour of the Month"

The fusion of organisational learning and knowledge management theory in recent years has prompted some important insights into learning and knowledge in organisations which are yet to be reflected in integrated practice. The meeting of the traditional perspectives in each of the fields has triggered sophisticated discussion about the the unit of analysis for learning (Stacey 2003a; Field 2004), nature of knowledge (Blackman and Henderson 2005; Spender 2006), and the process of learning and how it contributes to organisational knowledge (Spender 1996). Quite recently, the discussion has been further enhanced by authors who have become preoccupied with complexity theories in their application to organisations (Stacey 2003a; 2003b; Firestone and McElroy 2004). The findings of the study described here provide insight into the relationship between learning and knowledge in organisations through the lens of complexity as well as providing some input into developing theories of complexity as they apply to organisations. The fusion of perspectives in organisational learning, knowledge management and complexity contributes to integrative discussion and informs more holistic representations of organisational experience. The study described in this paper provides empirical support for the blending of themes apparent in the ‘flavour of the month’. It supports the consideration of organisational learning and knowledge management within a single theoretical frame and points to organisational practice which accommodates the blending of learning and knowledge functions in organisations. It does also, however, draw attention to the difficulties in merging the theories unproblematically and highlights the relevance and importance of maintaining some traditional individual flavours of the informing theories in their mix. That learning and knowledge management in organisations should remain discrete in practice is at odds with contemporary theory and the findings of this study. Their separation disregards the opportunity inherent in the complementary flavours that each brings to the organisational table.