Learning to Manage

Tamkin P, Barber L | Report 345 | Institute for Employment Studies | Jun 1998

This study explores various learning experiences of managers in several large and well known organisations.

There is a lot of management development going on in organisations and much of it hopes to transform managers, with the emphasis on empowerment, communication, and flexibility. These people skills seem to be in short supply and extraordinarily difficult to promote.

This study examines how managers learn and what kind of learning really makes a difference, through the experiences of individual managers and those that work with them. It shows how certain learning events allow managers to change their thinking and personal styles and become more reflective, action focused, innovative, strategic and people orientated.