Ten years ago, the concept of lifelong learning would have been considered ideological and unworkable, involving individuals and companies in a radical re-think.
Today it has become accepted as a vital component in the continuous improvement and ongoing success of companies, as two conferences will illustrate over the next three days.
The first conference, Towards a Learning Organisation, is running today at Paisley University, the second in the series of Skills For Life And Work conferences organised by Renfrewshire Education Business Partnership.
The second conference, which will run on November 4 and 5 at the SECC, is Tactics & Trends.98, the fourth conference of its kind. It will focus on The Critical Moment - The Dawn of the Learning Age, with an accompanying exhibition, Lifelong Learning.
Tactics & Trends.98 will be an opportunity for those involved in every aspect of education and training to focus on today's learning issues and participate in the debate over developments.
The conference will be addressed by speakers from the various fields of education, the policy makers and practitioners, the recipients of the service, and delegates from commerce and industry.
Apart from Minister of State Brian Wilson MP, the speakers include Professor Bob Fryer, chair of the National Advisory Group on Continuing Education and Lifelong Learning, Professor Nigel Payne, chief executive of SCET, Vincent Lowe of the Malaysian Smart Schools Project and Professor Stephen Heppell of Ultralab at Anglia University.
Speakers reflecting company policies on learning include Karl Chapman, managing director of CRT, Mike Fischer, managing director of Research Machines, Chris Yapp, learning technology strategist for ICL, and Paul Mountford, managing director of CISCO UK.
There will be a parallel programme of workshops focusing on learning competencies, professional development, management, assessment and learning process benefits. REPB's conference has been designed by Peter Swinson of Swinson Advisory Service.
''By positively encouraging learning within the workforce, organisations can enhance the contribution, creativity and commitment of their employees and benefit from increased competitiveness to meet today's fast changing business environment,'' said Swinson.
''Learning is an attitude of mind that builds the independence and confidence to adapt to change, come up with new ideas, make decisions and deliver them. Learning in business is about the development of an organisational culture that encourages learning behaviours.
''A learning culture provides a more effective link between strategy and its implementation. While the workforce provides such a link in all companies, this link is likely to be all the stronger with investment in workforce skills.
''Organisational learning, however, involves ownership of both strategy and of the tactics of implementation by the workforce, thereby generating a higher degree of loyalty, commitment, initiative and innovation. It is a product of the workforce being able, willing and allowed to exercise learning behaviours.''
While such principles might be easily adopted within larger organisations, the smaller company approach is different. Following a keynote presentation Making Learning Count in Scotland's Future by Evelyn McCann, director for skills development at Scottish Enterprise, experiences of good practice in the workplace will be demonstrated by Eddy Yacoubian, managing director of the Falkirk-based systems development business Campbell Lee Computer Services, Helen Moreland, director of human resources at Real Time Engineering in Glasgow, and Aberdeen-based Graham Dey, general manager of Maritime Hydraulics (UK) Ltd.
The companies chosen are seen to encapsulate a learning culture largely based on the positive promotion of openness, trust, delegation and personal development of their respective workforces.
Yacoubian said: ''We are an open company and have only three secrets: a sealed envelope in a personnel file, the board minutes and a handbag or case,'' he said.
''Salaries, appraisals, expenses and so on are all open to everyone. That is our policy. Our customer files, our supplier files, our monthly management accounts and our personnel files are all open. We share everything.''
He considers communication to be the basis of learning within any organisation. At Campbell Lee, everyone in the company is given the plan for the year ahead, with financial training and development plans, appraisals and objectives documented and distributed.
''We have four very simple principles,'' said Yacoubian. ''If we have the best marketing system, provide the best customer service, the best systems to measure how we are doing quickly and the best people, we can do anything.
''We bring our people on board, and tell them consistently what we expect of them. Profit comes through people and at the end of the day, we are all in business to make a profit.''
Apart from the Scottish business case studies, the conference at Paisley will introduce the concept of shared learning between organisations.
The FASNET Learning Network programme, evolved in the Irish Republic, encourages groups of small companies to come together to share their experiences of developing and growing businesses.
Assunta Delany, manager for FAS in Dublin West, will address the conference, and the potential for a network operating in Renfrewshire, East Renfrewshire and Inverclyde will be debated.
FASNET is seen to demonstrate how small companies with limited resources can work towards becoming learning organisations.
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