Do big organizations promote learning? In today's Big Shift Blog on HarvardBusiness.org, John Hagel, John Seely Brown, and Lang Davison argue that big organizations can and must help individuals learn, experiment, and innovate. However, big organizations are not best equipped to promote learning and innovation because learning and relationships are difficult to scale.
The Argument For Big Organizations
Hagel, Seely Brown, and Davison (HSBD) argue that big organizations must move from a focus on efficiency to individual learning, experimentation, and innovation. HSBD argue that "scalable learning will replace scalable efficiency," and that big organizations are "best positioned to develop and support scalable, long-term, trust-based relationships." HSBD ask, "How could any one person, on their own, replicate the scale of relationships such an institution would offer?"
Learning And Relationships Are Difficult to Scale
The problem with HSBD's enthusiasm is that learning and relationships are difficult to scale. First, learning is highly resistant to scaling. Many organizations have knowledge sharing systems. Knowledge sharing systems require collaboration for individuals to benefit. Morten Hansen of Berkeley and INSEAD argues that the decentralization of information in organizations presents the challenge of assimilating it. Hansen concludes in his new book, Collaboration, that while collaboration is required for knowledge sharing, collaboration in the wrong situations produces negative outcomes.
Second, big organizations face several barriers to developing and supporting scalable, long-term, trust-based relationships. When it comes to relationships, the size of your network does not determine its value. Extensive research demonstrates that the structure of your social network matters a great deal. Ronald Burt of the University of Chicago shows that having structural holes in your network increases information, creativity and innovation. Structural holes exist where there are disconnections in your network, and you act as the bridge between these discrete clusters of relationships. (Structural Holes is available at Amazon.com)
Further, turnover in organizations of all sizes disrupts relationships. Big organizations tend to have higher turnover rates (e.g., Deutch, Langton, and Aldrich, 2000), and turnover frustrates the process of building trust-based relationships.
Collaboration Curves, Open Innovation, And Learning
In an earlier piece, HSBD cite open innovation and crowdsourcing to argue that "we're seeing the emergence of a new kind of learning curve as we scale connectivity and learning through pull, rather than scaling efficiency through push. We call it the "collaboration curve." Collaboration curves hold the potential to mobilize larger and more diverse groups of participants to innovate and create new value."
But individuals do not need to be in big organizations to benefit from collaboration curves. They can learn by participating in developer networks or other crowdsourcing avenues. In addition, smaller organizations (e.g., Firefox) can benefit from collaboration curves without incurring the downsides of diseconomies of scale and scope.'
Thus, HSBD's own collaboration curve suggests that big organizations are not necessarily needed for learning, experimentation, and innovation.
Certainly there is much more to to say about whether big, medium, or small organizations are best positioned to promote learning. One thing is clear -- the focus on organizational size is misplaced. For the reasons discussed, there are reasons to question whether big organizations are necesarily the best places to foster individual learning and innovation.
