Project Managers Description of Learning Aspects : Brain, heart, two ears, and one mouth

Sammanfattning

Introduction: All human activity involves knowledge acquisition or learning and includes all the individuals' abilities. Many project organisations struggle with learning despite methods such as lessons learned. Aim: The study aimed to investigate and further develop knowledge about unlearning and re-learning in change-and implementation projects. Method: This study had a qualitative explorative design with a pragmatic basis. A purposeful selection was used, and eight project managers participated in the study. The participants came from a government agency, a multinational company, and a small private company. Thematic analysis was used to analyse the collected material. Results: Four themes crystallised from the analysis of the material. These four themes were: 1) The body is where learning originates, 2) Learning leadership, in a nutshell, 3)The role of methods and digital knowledge management systems-helpful or harmful? 4)To have the courage, maturity, and desire to become a learning project organisation. The most important results of the study were about risk-taking, maturity, willingness, and motivation as decisive concepts for unlearning and re-learning within project organisations. Discussion: The study shows that the organisation’s ability to take risks, together with the organisation’s degree of maturity, can be the learning aspect that is most important when it comes to leaving old knowledge for new knowledge within project organisations. Conclusion: In projects, learning, unlearning, and re-learning are closely intertwined with organisational learning. There may be a need for more models for learning within projects that consider the more soluble and time limiting organisational form.