Critical Perspectives on thechnology and organisation Essay - 1

Critical Perspectives on thechnology and organisation - Essay Example The case study by Scarbrough & Lannon (1989) describes the impact of innovations and technology on the UK banking sector and discusses possible problems and advantages of technology implementation. The authors suggest that innovations and technological change can help to improve knowledge and learning in different service sectors. One reason for this is that once new technical knowledge is acquired, it can usually be embodied in a readily transferable form. The smoothness and slope of the corporate technical learning curve depend on two factors: (1) how well learning about the particular technology is transmitted from site to site and (2) how representative of later sites the first ones that influence developers design decisions are. Scarbrough & Lannon (1989) underline that technology has a great impact on learning and service improvements. It is possible to apply ‘double loop learning’ to the case of the Bank of Scotland to describe learning and knowledge creation infl uenced by technology. â€Å"Double loop learning’ was first developed by Argyris & Schon in their work Theory in Practice: Increasing Professional Effectiveness published in 1974. â€Å"Double loop learning’ can be defined as â€Å"is learning where assumptions about ways of seeing things are challenged and underlying values are changed. Double loop learning, in questioning givens or taken-for-granteds, has the potential to bring about a profound shift in underlying values by cracking their paradigms or ways of seeing the world† (Argyris & Schon 1992, p. 18). Also, ‘Double loop learning’ can be characterized through reflection, particularly with others in dialogue. Applied to the case by Scarbrough & Lannon, it is possible to say that â€Å"double loop learning’ is achieved by means of technology and innovations. Scarbrough & Lannon (1989) state that learning and