Activity 1 - Marco

Report on your present or previous experiences in the workplace. How best would you describe how your organization learnt.  

As I am a full-time student and do not have full-time job experience before, therefore I am going to share my internship experience as my past working experience. I used to work in an academic library in Hong Kong for my internship. I worked in its system division and was responsible to follow up a project of library collection digitalization. My main duties were inputting and checking bibliographic records. The 5 disciplines would be adopted to describe the organization I am working in. 

1. Personal Mastery
The library created a platform, which is an online discussion forum, for staffs to exchange their suggestions and opinions. They could comment and give suggestions on others’ performances. It could help staffs improve their work in a certain extent. Other than commenting, staffs also can exchange their knowledge on work which can enhance and improve their work performance too. If staffs have any problems or difficulty on work, they could also ask here for help and solution. The forum is a good platform for staffs discussing everything of work. It is not only convenient staffs to exchange information, but also beneficial for building their understanding of each other.

2. Mental Models
As the platform mentioned above has been providing a communication platform for each other, staffs can easy to share their thinking, concern and receive others’ comments. It is beneficial for them reflecting their performances according to staffs’ comments. In a certain extent, it helps staffs understand themselves more and it is beneficial for their mental development in different areas. It is not only on work, but also on their characteristic. 

3. Shared Vision
The vision would be delivered and shared by different channel. It can be shared by face to face, staffs’ regular meeting and the online forum. The vision is always emphasized by the manager. It reminds us to strive for the best and provide quality services. In my opinion, it could help staffs build up a strong team spirit. 

4. Team Learning
Regularly, our supervisor would meet our together to discuss what needed to be learnt for improving the work. For example, the supervisor would introduce some new method for staffs’ communication. Online discussion board is an example which suggested by supervisor to enhance and improve the commutation between staffs. 

5. Systems Thinking

The online discussion forum is beneficial for building up systems thinking of staffs. Staffs can build it up systems thinking through asking question, reviewing questions, answering question and reflecting themselves. It is beneficial for training up staffs system thinking and long-term development of the staffs.