Improving Your Team's Learning Curve

If your team received a grade on how well it learns, would it get and A or an F? Its score could predict how successful your company will be in the long term. Gone are the days when a management team could simply master a winning formula and execute its way to market dominance. If today's competitive environment has taught us anything, it is that lurking around the corner is an innovation, a new competitor, or a new way of doing business that could dramatically change the field of play.

So just what do we know about how teams learn? Not as much as we should. While business researchers have studied manufacturing learning curves in industries that make microprocessors, cars, and medical devices, how teams of professionals learn is just beginning to get their attention. And some early results are surprising.