This document discusses linking reflective learning and knowledge maturing in organizations. It proposes that reflective learning is important for individual and team development but challenging to embed at the organizational level. Knowledge maturing provides a framework to explain knowledge development across individual, team, and organization scopes. The goal is to link reflective perspectives with the knowledge maturing model. Three propositions are outlined relating expertise, knowledge maturity, and discrepancies to reflection and knowledge maturing. Examples from care homes illustrate the propositions. The implications are that knowledge maturing can enrich reflection models and organizational learning, especially if individual expertise, knowledge maturity, and discrepancies are considered.

1. Linking Reflective Learning
and Knowledge Maturing in
Organizations
ARTEL Workshop 2013, Paphos, Cyprus
Birgit Krogstie, Andreas Schmidt,
Christine Kunzmann, John Krogstie, Simone Mora

2. Motivation
 Reflection is a key activity for workplace learning
 Current approaches to understanding and supporting
reflection focus on the individual and the team level
 It remains challenging how reflection is embedded into
organizational knowledge development
http://spironto.de 2Sep 2013

3. Knowledge Maturing
 Knowledge Maturing is a promising perspective on
explaining knowledge development across the scopes of
the individual, the team, and the organizational level
 It also clearly differentiates between artefacts and the
knowledge they (try to) represent
 Goal:
 Linking individual and team reflection perspectives
developed within MIRROR
 with the knowledge maturing model (originally developed
in MATURE, now further developed in LAYERS)
3Sep 2013

4. Knowledge Maturing
http://spironto.de 4Sep 2013

5. http://spironto.de 5Sep 2013

6. Propositions
1. Expertise moderates knowledge maturing through
reflection
2. The maturity of knowledge used in reflection moderates
the reflection process
3. Discrepancies between knowledge elements trigger
reflection and thereby affect knowledge maturing
http://spironto.de 6Sep 2013

7. Examples
 Examples of reflective learning in two care homes
 Rose Garden Care Home
 Two days observations
 Three in-depth interviews with carers
 Care principles are explicit in a flower-model of care
 Community Care Home
 Semi-structured interview
 Prior contact to the care home
 Characterized by high degree of stability
http://spironto.de 7Sep 2013

8. 1. Expertise and Knowledge Maturing
 Relationship to care principles in the Rose Garden Care
Home
 Carer 1: (new to the care home)
 learns care principles by heart to be prepared for
management inquiries
 seeking to learn from others how to apply them
 Carer 3: (senior carer)
 aware of trade-offs and conflicts in practice
 debates with management, thereby actively contributing to
developing the collective knowledge about „doing the right
thing“ further
8Sep 2013

9. 2. Maturity and Reflection
 Community Care Home
 Relevance of documentation requirement is a recurring
topic for reflection, which is unproductive
Legal requirements presented as standardized knowledge on
good care
But: this view is not shared
 Problem:
Artefact (legal requirements) mixes two different purposes
and associate knowledge maturity: delivering good care and
compliance
Pretended maturity indicates non-changeability
 Rose Garden Care Home
 Care principles as mature knowledge
 Scaffolds everyday practice, and provides a shared point of
reference
9Sep 2013

10. 3. Discrepancies
 Individual – collective knowledge
 Senior nurse observes new carers and reflects about her
strategies for onboarding them
 Artefact – collective knowledge
 Care plan vs. (collective) knowledge about a resident
 Reflection leads to changes of the care plan
 Another example
 Documentation requirements (what needs to be
documented)
 Vs. Knowledge what is useful
10Sep 2013

11. Implications for design
 Example: Note taking app for carers in the Rose Garden
care home that is using the care model as a conceptual
anchor
 Prop. 1: Introduce different levels of contribution
 Beginners: learning care principles
 Experienced: linking experiences to discover discrepancies
 Prop. 2: Allow for promotion of notes to higher level of
maturity
 Prop. 3: Allow for explicit between experiences,
collective knowledge (care model) and artefacts to
discover discrepancies
 Add additional aspects such as personhood, time, consent
11Sep 2013

12. Conclusions
 Knowledge Maturing is a useful framework to embed
reflection models into the overall organizational
knowledge development
 Propositions
 Individual expertise influences the quality of reflection
processes.
 The maturity of knowledge involved in reflection sessions
influences reflection processes.
 Discrepancies between individual & collective knowledge
as well as artefacts are triggers for reflection.
 Combinations of these perspective can enrich both
reflection models and models of organizational
knowledge development
12Sep 2013

13. Team
 Birgit Kroegstie, NTNU, Norway
birgitkr@idi.ntnu.no
 Andreas P. Schmidt, Karlsruhe University of Applied
Sciences, Germany
andreas_peter.schmidt@hs-karlsruhe.de
 Christine Kunzmann, Pontydysgu, UK
kontakt@christine-kunzmann.de
 John Krogstie, NTNU, Norway
krogstie@idi.ntnu.no
 Simone Mora, NTNU, Norway
simonem@idi.ntnu.no
http://spironto.de 13Sep 2013