Learning and development
This chapter is about how organizations make arrangements for appropriate learning
and development to take place by various means, including training. It is divided
into three sections: learning, development and training.
The formulation and implementation of learning and development strategies is
dealt with in Chapter 41.
LEARNING
Defined
Learning is the process by which a person acquires and develops new knowledge,
skills, capabilities and attitudes. As Williams (1998) defined it, ‘learning is goal
directed, it is based on experience, it impacts behaviour and cognition, and the
changes brought about are relatively stable’. Honey and Mumford (1996) explained
that: ‘Learning has happened when people can demonstrate that they know some-
thing that they did not know before (insights, realizations as well as facts) and when
they can do something they could not do before (skills)’. Mumford and Gold (2004)
emphasized that: ‘Learning is both a process and an outcome concerned with knowl-
edge, skills and insight.’
38