The document outlines key concepts from Peter Senge’s 'The Fifth Discipline,' focusing on systems thinking, personal mastery, mental models, shared vision, and team learning. It emphasizes the importance of organizations as learning entities where individuals grow and collaborate to achieve collective goals. A learning organization nurtures new thinking patterns and fosters genuine commitment among its members.

1. Vasudevan Fifth discipline
1

2. PhD graduate from
MIT in Systems
Management
Founding chair of
SOL (Society for
Organizational
Learning)
1990 wrote The
Fifth Discipline
2
Vasudevan Fifth discipline

3. 3
Vasudevan Fifth discipline

4. Vasudevan Fifth discipline 4
*
Systems Thinking
Interdependency and change
Focus on whole not individual parts
Long-term goals vs. Short-term
benefits
Better appreciation of systems
leads to more appropriate action

5. Vasudevan Fifth discipline
5

6. Vasudevan Fifth discipline 6
*Personal Mastery
Organizations learn
only through
individuals who learn.
Strive to clarify and
deepen personal
vision.
Deeply aware of
growth areas and
Tension between
Vision and Reality

7. Vasudevan Fifth discipline 7
*Mental Models
Deeply ingrained
assumptions and
generalizations
Honest and critical
scrutiny of entrenched
mental models
Transcend mental
models in order for
change to take place

8. Vasudevan Fifth discipline 8
*Shared Vision
A genuine vision leads to
people wanting to excel and
learn
Leaders must translate
personal visions into shared
visions
Unearthing shared ‘pictures of
the future’ that foster genuine
commitment rather than
compliance
Leaders learn the counter-
productiveness of trying to
dictate a vision, no matter how
heartfelt.
(Senge 1990: 9)

9. Vasudevan Fifth discipline 9
*
Team Learning
Team learning starts with
‘dialogue’= the capacity of
members of a team to
suspend assumptions and
enter genuine ‘thinking
together’
Allows the group to
discover insights not
attainable individually
Shows group how to
recognize the patterns of
interaction that undermine
learning
(Senge 1990: 10)

10. 10
*A Learning Organization Is...
Where people continually expand
their capacity to create the results
they truly desire
Where new patterns of thinking are
nurtured
Where collective aspiration is set
free
Where people are continually
learning to see the whole together
“When you ask people about what it
is like being part of a great team,
what is most striking is the
meaningfulness of the experience.
People talk about being part of
something larger than themselves,
of being connected, of being
generative.”
(Senge 1990: 13)

11. Vasudevan Fifth discipline 11
*Senge Video Clip