Peter Senge's national bestseller, "The Fifth Discipline," revolutionized the practice of management by introducing the theory of learning organizations. Now Dr. Senge moves from the philosophical to the practical by answering the first question all lovers of the learning organization ask: What do they do on Monday morning? "The Fieldbook" is an intensely pragmatic guide. It shows how to create an organization of learners where memories are brought to life, where collaboration is the lifeblood of every endeavor, and where the tough questions are fearlessly asked. The stories in this book show that companies, businesses, schools, agencies, and even communities can undo their "learning disabilities" and achieve superior performance. If ever a book gave meaning to the phrase "hands-on," this is it. Senge and his coauthors cove it all: reinventing relationships, being loyal to the truth, strategies for developing personal mastery, building a shared vision, systems thinking in an organization, designing a dialogue session, strategies for team learning, organizations as communities, and, designing an organization's governing ideas. This is a book that will have you creating a learning organization from the very first chapter! As its name promises, "The Fieldbook" is designed to be referred to I meetings, planning sessions, during reflection, or anytime a conflict or challenge arises. Open it up anywhere and icons and cross references will lead you from defining to problem to thinking about how to solve it. As your field notes accumulate, you will create your own guide to mastering the disciplines of organizational learning.

Includes index.

Getting started. "I see you" -- An exchange of lore and learning -- how to read this book --Why bother? -- Why bother? (A CEO's perspective) -- Moving forward -- Core concepts about learning in organizations -- The wheel of learning -- Leadership fields -- Reinventing relationships -- Finding a partner -- Opening moves / Systems thinking. Strategies for systems thinking -- What you can expect...as you practice systems thinking -- Brownie's lamb: learning to see the world systemically -- Starting with storytelling -- The language of systems thinking: "links" and "loops" -- The archetype family tree -- Systems sleuth -- Enriching the archetype -- Seven steps for breaking through organizational gridlock -- Moving into computer modeling -- Systems thinking with process mapping: a natural combination -- Where to go from here / Personal mastery. Strategies for developing personal mastery -- What you can expect...from the practice of personal mastery -- Loyalty to the truth -- The power of choice -- Innovations in infrastructure for encouraging personal mastery -- Instilling personal mastery at Beckman Instruments -- Intrapersonal mastery -- Where to go from here / Mental models. Strategies for working with mental models -- What you can expect...in working with mental models -- The ladder of inference -- Balancing inquiry and advocacy -- Conversational recipes -- Opening lines -- Bootstrapping yourself into reflection and inquiry skills -- Creating scenarios -- Shell's internal consultancy -- Double-loop accounting -- Where to go from here / Shared vision. Strategies for building shared vision -- What you can expect...as you build shared vision -- Designing an organization's governing ideas -- Building shared vision: how to begin -- Letter to the CEO -- Letter to the CEO's partner -- Strategic priorities -- Where to go from here / Team learning. Strategies for team learning -- What you can expect...from team learning -- Dialogue -- The cauldron -- Designing a dialogue session -- Skillful discussion -- Skillful discussion at intel -- Popular postmortems -- Silence -- Reframing team relationships -- Building an organization that recognizes everyone's uniqueness -- Tools for discovering learning styles -- Bringing diverse people to common purpose -- Designing a company-wide strategy for team learning -- Executive team leadership -- Where to go from here / Arenas of practice. "Our quality program isn't working" -- Springing ourselves from the measurement trap -- Corporate environmentalism -- Training as learning -- Workplace design -- The tricky dynamics of learning in a family-owned business -- Creating a learning newspaper -- Health Care -- Education -- Can large government learn? -- A letter to an aspiring policymaker -- The local community as a learning organization / Frontiers. Organizations as communities -- Merging the best of two worlds -- Bean suppers -- Free agency, employment stability, and community boundaries -- Operating principles for building community -- Microworlds and learning laboratories -- Where the organization develops a theory about itself -- Using microworlds to promote inquiry -- A buyer's guide to off-the-shelf microworlds -- Creating your own management flight simulator -- The Du Pont manufacturing game -- Creating a learning lab, and making it work.