George L. Roth

Biographical Sketch and Research Interests

George Roth (groth@mit.edu) is a member of the research staff at the MIT 21st Century Initiative. He directs the learning history project and conducts other research on organizational learning and change. He has taught courses at Sloan (15.974 Investigating Organizational Culture, Learning and Change) which combine organizational learning skills with research methods, sending students off outside the classroom to practice their own learning skills and conduct masters thesis studies on company improvements initiatives. To help his students, George is continually on the lookout for companies interested in supporting and learning from Sloan Masters student thesis research projects.

George's current research is in the area of how managers in organizations effectively build and sustain large-scale improvement initiatives. His current research interests examine issues associated with organizational change from several different approaches:

• Learning Histories: How can documentation be used to capture, assess, facilitate, diffuse and sustain organizational improvement initiatives. Recent papers include characteristics of documents that support learning, and the process by which learning histories are conducted.
• Large Scale System Change: Issues in moving from team-based change efforts to organizational or system level change. Without moving team-based changes to organizational levels - across teams - change initiatives are not sustained. Recent papers examine empirical issues which have been found as challenging in organizational learning projects. Work in progress examines dilemmas faced by CEO's and top level managers in maintaining improvement initiatives which might produce results, yet are not fully understood and run counter to existing norms of boards and other top managers.
• Technological Change: Technology provides an occasion for change, yet organizations do not create mechanisms for effective change in implementing new technology. Dissertation research found Ïstructuring wavesÓ of technological change - meaning that the confluence of the varied frameworks held by the different organizational subcultures responsible for implementing and using new technology could not be examined as the change process rolled out to the organization. Recent paper examines the issues organizations faces in examining the social context in realizing the benefits of technological capabilities.
• Educational Interventions in Organizational Learning: Organizational learning processes depend upon individual learning processes taking place in organizational setting. Examining the construction of educational programs that build the capability of individuals for their own learning and facilitating learning with others is a recent approach for organizational transformation. Data from the MIT OLC Core Competencies of a Learning Organization Five Day course and Leading Learning Communities Nine Month Program informs this work in progress.
• Business Process Learning: A new research area based on an action research approach to build better business processes based on developing peopleÌs capabilities to think differently about their work and business processes. Traditional re-engineering approaches are conducted by teams which examine, analyze and redesign business processes on behalf of those who work in them. A learning approach to business process redesign would teach people techniques and skills in conceptualizing and analyzing the business processes they are part of, and base changes (their insight) on their proposed designs (their new actions). The new effort seeks to integrate various research activities at various MIT research centers (Microworlds and simulation from Systems Dynamics, Process Handbook from Center for Coordination Sciences and learning tools from Center for Organizational Learning) with field based research involving company reengineering teams and projects.

George's activities outside of his research at MIT include consulting and speaking. He is a co-founder of Reflection Learning Associates, Inc. (P.O. Box 1405, Kendall Square, Cambridge, Ma 02142; tel/fax 617/643-0582; Email: Rlearning@aol.com). Reflection Learning Associates is a consulting firm specializing in learning histories and scenarios, and more generally in developing processes and an infrastructure that helps organizations in reflecting on their past, learning in the moment, and carrying new insights into creating desired collective futures.

George had over ten years experience in industry prior to beginning an academic career. In a variety of engineering and marketing management positions at Digital Equipment, he developed new products, planned product strategy, managed sales operations, designed business development programs, and created and managed an internal entrepreneurship program.

George holds a Ph.D. degree in Organizational Studies, an MBA degree in finance and marketing, and a B.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering. He is certified in group facilitation by National Training Laboratories. Born in Germany, George has also lived and worked in Europe throughout his career. He resides outside Cambridge, Massachusetts with his wife and two energetic daughters.

On-line Publications

• George Roth and Art Kleiner
  Learning Histories: A New Tool For Turning Organizational Experience Into Action, (May 9, 1997) (To be published in the Harvard Business Review, 75th Anniversary Edition, Sept/Oct 1997)
• George Roth
  "Paper Documents: Implications of changing media for business process redesign" (May,1996) (MS Word file).
• George Roth
  "Organizational-level Learning as Cultural routines: A Model for Theoretical and Empirical Development (MS Word file).
• George Roth
  "Managing Structural Tensions in Maintaining a High-Reliability Organization: The study of 'River Point' Nuclear Power Plant (MS Word file).
• George Roth
  "Technological Change as a form of High-technology Ethnography (MS Word file).
• George Roth and Art Kleiner
  The Learning Initiative at the AutoCo Epsilon Program 1991-1994" (May,1996)
• George L. Roth
  "Learning Histories: Using documentation to assess and facilitate organizational learning" (18.004 January 26, 1996, Revised May 3, 1996)
• George Roth and Art Kleiner
  Learning about Organizational Learning - Creating a Learning History (18.001 April 7, 1995)
• George L. Roth and Peter M. Senge
  "From Theory to Practice: Research Territory, Processes and Structure at the MIT Center for Organizational Learning" (18.002 1995)