Learning Plasticity

Limitations on learning are barriers set by humans themselves, as learning is a continuous process to unleash individual or collective potential.

The neuro-plasticity is the brain’s ability to rewire, connect, and adapt, "build" new neural pathways. The business plasticity is the organization’s capability to change, adapt and innovate with speed. With rapid change and exponential growth of information, either individually or collectively at the organizational level, it’s important to increase learning plasticity for adapting to changes smoothly.

Neu­ro­plas­tic­ity: Neu­ro-­plas­tic­ity refers to the life ­long capacity of the brain to change and rewire itself in response to the stimulation of learning and experience. In neuronal terms, this involves disabling some of the “wiring” and working on the new ones. All of that requires a deliberate mental effort. The neuro-cognition involves exploring varieties of meanings/thoughts, abandoning old connections, and establishing new relations to trigger creativity.

Learning plasticity: With the exponential growth of information and shortened knowledge life cycle, hyper-complexity and fierce competition, you simply can't resolve the 21st-century problems with the mindsets shaped half-century ago. A creative mind with learning plasticity is able to absorb all necessary knowledge and adjust its thinking processes according to changes in its environment, as well as applying the acquired knowledge and lessons learned to succeed in new situations, and to connect wider dots for sparking creativity. From workforce management perspective, growth mindset and learning plasticity are not “nice to have,” but must have digital professional quality.

Flexibility: The business plasticity is based on responsiveness, changeability, and innovation. The emerging digital technologies such as social platforms and tools provide a flexible way to learn, share and collaborate. A learning organization is more comfortable with complexity, ambiguity, paradoxes and they have a penchant for candor.

Digital learning is multidimensional, dynamic, flexible, interactive, informal and integrated. The digital tools and apps make learning informal, but more cost-effective and interactive. High organizational learning relates to high response in recognizing and addressing system constraints. Thus, learning agility at both individual and business level is a digital capability and culture shift. It will directly impact the speed of digital transformation.

Limitations on learning are barriers set by humans themselves, as learning is a continuous process to unleash individual or collective potential. There is no single path that will raise the plasticity of an individuals, business functions or company. The key is not to choose one path over the other but to tailor your own path, practice more for adapting to change and improving learning plasticity.

Posted in: Learning