Developing yourself as a manager is the key to success. This is a process that requires you to take responsibility for your personal development, learning new skills and planning your career. You will be introduced to some approaches, techniques and activities that can assist you in self-analysis and planning. The key learning point is that personal development does not just happen: you must take responsibility for identifying your development needs in order to achieve your life and career objectives.

Over the next 20 minutes you will have the opportunity to assess how you learn and develop as a manager. The ideas and concepts used in developing yourself will help to provide a framework for personal development.

What is learning?

We will begin by looking at some definitions of learning. As you read through them think about what they have in common.

Lifelong learning refers to the process by which individuals continue to develop their knowledge, skills and attitudes over their lifetimes.

Lifelong Learning Project

Management learning is an area of both professional practice and theoretical inquiry and has as a special concern the linking of these two domains in a way that advances both. Professional practice adds to management learning theory and theoretical insights add to practitioners' activities.

Burgoyne and Reynolds

It is no longer functional to define education as a process of transmitting what is known; it must be now defined as a lifelong process of enquiry. And so the most important learning of all - for both children and adults - is learning how to learn, the skills of self-directed enquiry.

Knowles

The recurring theme is that of learning as a continuous process. Different responsibilities need new skills and understanding. Flatter organisational structures require you to be adept at teamworking and to combine managerial with technical and professional roles. The impact of new technology is profound and the pace of technological change is increasing. These are all reasons why personal development is essential and lifelong learning a necessity.

Learning takes several forms. We can group these different ways of learning into three main types with the acronym MUD:

M : learning from memory (eg speaking a new language)

U : learning from understanding (eg financial analysis)

D : learning from doing (eg operating new software)

Learning as an adult

Knowles identified four characteristics of adult learners that distinguish them from children. You may find that they apply to you.

• Self-directive . You prefer to be in control of what and how you learn.
• Experienced . You recognise that you can draw from your experience when you learn.
• Ready to learn . You are more interested in learning things that seem urgent or relevant.
• Problem-centred . You are more interested in learning in situations in which you want to understand better or behave differently.

In 'The Modern Practice of Adult Education', Knowles indicated that managers learn by drawing on their experiences and applying that learning to current problems. You are probably doing something similar as you study this Element.

How managers learn

Learning from experience can become a deliberate and structured process for managers. This is represented in Kolb and Fry's experiential learning cycle , a model which may already be familiar to you. It presents learning as a cyclical process with four stages:

• Concrete experience . You recognise there is something you do not understand or need to understand better.
• Reflection . The range of activities that are associated with finding out more - observation, collection of data, reflecting on the experience and the issues raised.
• Conceptualisation . The point at which you begin to form some ideas that may explain what you are trying to understand.
• Testing . When you see whether you really have developed an understanding and whether your ideas work in a practical setting.

Kolb and Fry argue that it is reflection on our experience that leads us to a greater understanding of the world around us. This in turn leads us to the creation or understanding of concepts, models and theories. In testing such concepts, models and theories in the real world, we gain further experience on which to reflect. The testing prepares us to refine our thinking as we follow this cyclical process all over again.

Learning styles

We all have different learning styles. Recognising the style that suits you helps to identify a suitable approach to learning and personal development. Honey and Mumford identified four styles:

• Activist . 'I'll try anything once'
• Reflector . 'I need some time to think about this'
• Theorist . 'How does that fit with the outcomes we achieved last time?'
• Pragmatist . 'What does this mean in practice?'

The diagram illustrates how these learning styles relate to the learning cycle. The purpose of Honey and Mumford's classification is to help people identify the style in which they learn best. Understanding the style in which you learn best is a crucial step in selfdevelopment.

Try to identify your style of learning from the four listed. You may find that you fit neatly into one category or you may find that you learn by using several styles.

Think about something you have recently learned, such as a new procedure at work. Note what you did at each stage of the learning cycle.

Identifying your learning style provides the beginning of a framework for your personal development.

When you realised that you had to learn more, you may have reflected on your experience of similar situations. You may then have used a theory or model to think of proposals for addressing the problem. In some cases you may have tested your solution before applying it to your whole work area.

There are three main types of learning, from Memory, from Understanding and from Doing (MUD). Knowles suggested some characteristics of adult learners: self-directed, experienced, ready to learn, and problem-centred.

Kolb and Fry's experiential learning cycle consists of: concrete experience, observation and reflection, conceptualisation, and testing.

Honey and Mumford proposed four learning styles: activist, theorist, reflector and pragmatist.

Individuals need to take control of their future by identifying their preferences for learning and development.

Further study

The Adult Learner : The Definitive Classic in Adult Education and Human Resource Development - by Malcolm S. Knowles, Elwood F. Holton, Richard A. Swanson

After completing this Element you should be able to:

describe the importance of managerial learning

analyse your own learning styles

plan the first stage of a framework for personal development.