The learning and development profession faces many challenges. Learning transfer from traditional training hovers at a dismal 12% (Collins 2023), and despite the billions spent on leadership development, the results don’t always bear out (Haslamet al 2024). Add to that the pace of technological change and the rapid advancement of AI and it’s clear that workplace learning needs a revolution. 
“Together we are stronger,” they say – but for Stephanie Van Aken, Head of Operations and Founder of IDEAS Academy, achieving team cohesion felt anything but powerful.
Facing mounting pressure and internal roadblocks, she knew something had to change. Her team was struggling to overcome obstacles and react to mistakes constructively.
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“When you bring people together and truly listen, magic happens,” says Senior Action Learning Coach and founder of MyCoaching Marcia Yokota, reflecting on her transformative work with the Red Cross in Peru. Facing internal conflict and the risk of losing global standing, the Red Cross chapter in Peru was at a critical juncture. The organization turned to action learning to mend fractured relationships and rebuild trust.
Action Learning has quickly emerged as a tool used by organizations and companies worldwide for solving their critical and complex problems. At the same time the methodology effectively develops leaders, builds collaborative teams and improves professional capabilities.
A gamechanger. That, according to Jos van den Berg, is Action learning. A way of thinking and working together that he was introduced to several years ago and not only uses in his work as director-owner of Repair Care, but has integrated into his whole personality. “They say I’ve turned 180 degrees and I think that’s fantastic,” he says.
The first group reframed the problem to “how to quantify the behavior of employees in embracing the corporate culture”. They have reached the realization stage of the project and have some preliminary results.The second group went through problem reframing. The topic became “How to make Mela’s stocking more resilient in the VUCA era.”
Melbourne Business School (MBS) approached me to integrate Action Learning coaching into their Executive Development program for one of their clients. The program covers a spectrum of competencies, starting with strategy, financial acumen, business economics, and digital marketing. It is designed to upskill managers across a single organization; these managers stem from diverse business units or companies within the conglomerate.
From my conversations with clients, I would say they would be patting themselves on the back if it was at least a 6.As I work with business leaders, heads of departments and managers across different industries over the years, I often hear a similar comment or concern from them. One of their frustrations is how to get the team members to speak up more, to contribute ideas,to challenge them to think out of the box.
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This reflection is based on more than 10 years of Action Learning practice in the French national context, and the difficulties countered in optimizing the learning benefits of this great collaborative intelligence method.In France, the field of learning is closely linked to that of training, and therefore to teaching and its pedagogical approaches. What’s more, the notion of “apprenance” is still
often misunderstood, and not distinguished from that of training, which focuses essentially on cognitive learning and too little on behavioral learning.
