Thematic Seminar- Leader Lab (A)

Topic

How does Shell use Action learning as a base for their leadership

development program?

Submitted By: Ena Thapa

Student No: 64337

Character Count: 17144

Word Count: 2619

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 Table of Contents
1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................................. 3
2. Methodology ........................................................................................................................................... 4
3. Theoretical Framework ......................................................................................................................... 4
3.1 General Understanding of Action learning (AL): ......................................................................... 4
3.2 Gist of Action learning?? ................................................................................................................ 5
4. Shell Oil: A case study in Action Learning ......................................................................................... 6
4.1 Shell Oil: ............................................................................................................................................ 6
4.2 Shell’s Learning programs: ............................................................................................................ 6
4.3 Leadership Development through Action learning in Shell ....................................................... 7
5. Conclusion .............................................................................................................................................. 8
6.Bibliography ............................................................................................................................................. 9

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 1. Introduction
After the Global crisis, every organization are compelled to find the new skills and capabilities
within the organization ( Hudakova, I., & Misun, J. (2010)) to cope with the changing external
environment. This external environment has both opportunities and threats where organization
should plan proactively to grasp those opportunities and minimize the threats. Emerging risk
such as digital technology and innovation (Donaldson.M, 2015), change in government policies,
economic fluctuations, change in customer preference, etc. (M. J. Marquardt et al., 2012) are
the main challenge of the business word and the organization cannot thrive until it is well known
about these threats. Action learning (AL) can help them to deal with these external threat as it is
a continuous and never-ending process of learning and helps organization members to learn
from both good and bad experience. It helps organization to make its strategy for the future
development and their existence in the war of sustainability in today’s complex business
environment. Many companies use action learning as a tool to develop their long-term goals in
which they themselves form a team which helps them to solve the problem, develop strategy
and even suggest the management for the necessary changes. This becomes possible because
there are number of workers participating in the teamwork who have different sets of experience
and different understanding of the problem. This creates the diversified groups leading to
intensive discussion as the may not agree on what others are saying and will try to present their
own perspective on that specific subject matter or ask questions to be clarified with the doubt.
Interesting thing about this is that they have to come up with solution in which everyone agrees
and this needs lot of effort and discussion. By saying this I don’t mean that it is the end of the
AL, it is a continuous process as mentioned above and will continue as change occurs which is
never ending process.

Recently many companies are adopting AL to adapt to the changing needs of the
organization. Leading companies like Unilever, BP oil, Shell oil, Starbucks, coca cola and many
other companies have adopted AL to design their extensive learning program. They make this
program to enhance the capabilities of their workers so that they can be used when needed. I
have taken the case related to Shell oil in which they have recently applied action learning
program to increase the performance of their leaders. Depending upon the available resources,
I will find the reason why shell have chosen action learning as a tool to increase the potential of
their leaders?

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 In this paper, I will present the methodology I am working with for this research as a second
topic. On third topic, will mention some theoretical framework related to the Action Learning, I
will also mention some theories related to experiential learning. Fourth topic of this research is
going to about the Shells’ profile, their learning programs and the implementation of AL into their
development programs. Last topic will be dedicated to the conclusion based on the analysis of
the research topic. I will give some suggestions too under this section.

2. Methodology
Due to the limitations of the time, I have used the secondary data for my research purpose on
the case study of shell. I will be using different information available in their website to collect
the evidence for the application of action learning in their leadership development program. I
will also refer to the different literatures available related to AL and the different viewpoints of
the authors. Overall, for the extensive learning of my research topic I will look into every
available resource which can be accessed as a base of my research topic. This will help me to
answer my question relating to the implementation of AL in Shell and its benefits for the
organization.

3. Theoretical Framework
In this section of study, we will discuss different theories related to the Action learning as they
will be appropriate for my case study. The first sub-topic will give general understanding of the
Action learning and we will try to be closer to the concept of Action by looking into the definitions
of AL.

3.1 General Understanding of Action learning (AL):

As we all know there is a famous proverb “practice makes man perfect”. We can see the similar
concept in the AL where Revans (1983) has mentioned that his students who were holding a
senior position in their company were made to engage in different varieties of job. Among them,
some were asked to do a practical case study while some were doing the job rotation, this help
them to gain new experience apart from their existing experience of the current position. This
gives them an opportunity to understand every aspect of the organization and helps them make
ready to tackle any problems that might be coming forth in real life which any lectures and book
alone can’t provide to the students(ibid). Kolb has also something to mention in regard to deal
with the world with the experience achieved previously. Kolb (1984) states “Learning is the
process whereby knowledge is created through transformation of experience.” People who are
participating in Action learning can learn from their own experience of solving problem in real life

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as they are there to help other and take help from other regardless of either solving the same
problem or not. In this regards experience plays an important role in the action learning process
as they are the foundation to solve the problem by exploiting the possibility to do more better.
Revans (1983) “Even the most primitive creature must have learned from their own experience,
by carrying on with what they found good for them and by refraining from what they found to be
harmful “. This is an evidence that whether the experience is good or bad, something can be
learned from them and used as a referral for future use.

When the word “learning” comes to my mind, I always think what is there to learn if we don’t
have question to ask? M. J. Marquardt et al. (2012) has also mentioned that even asking simple
question “why important” among the group working for high-priority issue yields a motivating
factor for the organization to change. Similarly, the question “why difficult” may identify the
obstacles and sources of resistance to change. Asking question is a base of the better
understanding of the problem and which will eventually help organizations to solve the
problems, develop strategies, etc. “The process of learning requires the resolution of a conflict
between dialectically opposed modes of adaptations to the world"- Kolb (1984) This concept of
kolb also clarifies the purpose of asking question in action learning process.

3.2 Gist of Action learning??

Edmonstone (2011) referred to the Revans saying in his article that, “the day he had
to define it in words would be the day he would have nothing more to do with, he preferred to
focus on what action learning is not?.” This clarifies how vast is the concept of action learning
which cannot be defined with some words. However, Edmonstone counters this concept
defining action learning saying “[Action learning is] A method for individual and organizational
development based upon small groups of colleagues meeting over time to tackle real problems
or issues in order to get things done, reflecting and learning with and form their experience and
from each other as they attempt to change things.” This definition clarifies that Action learning
comes into existence where organization needs changes and are done by the group of learning
teams who can learn from each other’s experience. Concept of Kolb comes here in the support
of this definition. Kolb (1984) gives emphasis on the experience as the center part of the
learning process, where learning is a continuous process grounded in experience. He also says
that learning is a process not an outcome. Organizations operating under dynamic environment
always have response to the changes happening in the external environment, this might be
challenging to the organization. Learning programs might be a rescue for the organizations
which are having hard time in coping uncertainties.

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 4. Shell Oil: A case study in Action Learning
In this section of the paper, I will first give the overall introduction of the company, after I will list
some of the learning programs Shell is conducting and lastly, I will explain how they used action
learning as a tool to their leadership program.

4.1 Shell Oil:

Royal Dutch Shell (Shell), headquarter based on Netherlands, is one of the biggest companies
in the energy and petrochemical industry operating in 70 countries worldwide and have an
average 86,000 employees. Shell has a financial report showing a of $305.2 million which make
them to hold 11th position in Forbes Global 2000 list in the year 2017. They have their business
operations divided into upstream, Integrated Gas and New Energies, Downstream, and
Projects & Technology. Their main values are honesty, integrity and respect for people they
believe that their General Business Principles, Code of Conduct, and Code of Ethics will help
everyone at Shell to act in line with those values and comply with relevant laws and regulations.
Addition to this, maintaining a diverse and inclusive culture within their company is also the
value which lies within them (Shell, 2018).

4.2 Shell’s Learning programs:

Shell is aware of the power of the skilled and experienced employees in order thrive in the
competitive business as they have different perspectives which helps them to create
connections (Shell ,2018). despite of having a multi-cultural workforce they have been aspiring
to survive in those diverse and inclusive culture. In order to foster the diversity of and inclusion,
they are conduction wide ranges of learning program and activities such as employee and
leadership program, mentoring initiatives, progressive policies that supports flexible working and
network of over 75 employees resource groups. Apart from these programs, employees of shell
are developing their skill and bordering the horizons of their knowledge through four Earthwatch
program sponsored by Shell. They were; Earthwatch expedition program, earthwatch expedition
enhanced learning program, Earth skill network and Fresh water watch. Among them
Earthwatch expedition enhanced program was a specialized program in which participants were
able to enhance their knowledge as this program was a combo of both research expedition and
interactive sessions. This program inspired, educated and enabled them to gain an expertise in
which they might become sustainable advocates for Shell as they have a deeper understanding
of sustainability issues and shell’s approach as they are the part of both research and

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interactive group. As Shell is dealing with the energy business, it’s one of the main stakeholders
of the environmental issues. They need to have the sustainable development program so that
operate their business without any hinderance. So, to serve this purpose Earthwatch program
contributed in enhancing the skills of the employees.

Leading to enhance and develop (LEAD) was another blended 5 months program for
Shells’ leader with the core purpose to make leaders capable of leading themselves, lead others
and lead the business. This program leaders take part in immersive experiences, facilitated
workshops, and peer-to-peer coaching, supported by digital resources and virtual learning.
The program includes 360 feedback and reinforces direct line manager support through on-
going coaching and the co-creation of a development plan to identify and track progress
(i4cp, 2018).

4.3 Leadership Development through Action learning in Shell

In this section of the paper I will try to find out the concept of applying Action Learning in their
leadership program in relation to the above-mentioned theories of action learning. Kayes et al.
(2005) suggest that a conversational space must be created so that the groups can talk and
reflect about their together, Shell crated a forum under LEAD program where leaders can share
their leadership challenges they are struggling with, take help of other, challenge and support
each other. This helped them to build a strong network within themselves ultimately fulfilling the
purpose of the Shell to develop good leaders within the organization. Likewise, Shell took
almost 5 months to work from scrap to the solution, which was a lot of work and a series of
process which they go through as Kolb has stated learning is a process. They also run an
improvement event in which diverse points of view were presented by the participants, and the
assumptions were challenged, supporting the viewpoint of Kolb (1984) saying…. requires the
resolution of a conflict between dialectically opposed modes of adaptations to the world.
Through the action learning program, Shell is reinventing the leadership development in which
leaders are gaining the required skill and expertise to solve their problem and help their team
members. This will eventually help Shell to increase the engagement of their leaders in problem
solving, improving their business performance as well as safety outcomes. (i4cp, 2018).

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 5. Conclusion

In conclusion, Shell found AL as one of the most effective tools to develop their leadership
program, which is understandable due to the capability of the AL itself. It helps organization to
exploit the possible opportunities lying in the external environment which are not revealed and
avoid or minimize the threats that may be forthcoming. It makes people to discuss openly upon
the subject matter which helps to know every individual thinking over proposed discussion and
there may be a chance to come up with brilliant ideas which can be used as future reference.
During the starting phase the idea about the AL and leadership development seemed
unrelatable to me but when the research was going deeper, I started to recognize the
relatedness each concept of AL not only leadership program but also to any learning program in
Shell. When it comes to the question of Why development program? It is obvious to answer by
saying that the organization is going to need a large skilled and qualified manpower which might
not be available in the time of need, for this purpose, they need train their existing workforce.
Shells’ decision to implement AL in their development seems convincible. Since we have heard
so much about AL in lectures, its good experience to see practically implemented in Shell.

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 6.Bibliography

Donaldson, Matthew, 2015. Risky business: How Australian audit committee chairs are
responding to today's complex business environment. Governance Directions, 67(1), pp.26–28.

Edmonstone, John. (2011). Action learning and organization development: Overlapping

fields of practice. Action Learning: Research and Practice. 8. 285-295
Hudakova, I., & Misun, J. (2010). Budovanie konkurencnej výhody v dynamickom a zlozitom
podnikatelskom prostredíBuilding competitive advantage in a dynamic and complex business
environment]. St. Louis: Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis. Retrieved from https://search-
proquest-com.ep.fjernadgang.kb.dk/docview/1700386414?accountid=13607

Kayes, Anna B, et al. “Experimental learning in teams.” Simulation&Gaming, vol. 36, pp. 1–25.
Kolb, D. (1984). Experimental learning: experience as the source of learning and development.
1st ed. New Jersey: Prentice Hall Inc, pp.20-38.

Marquardt, M., Leonard, H. and Freedman, A. (2012). Action Learning for Developing Leaders
and Organizations. Washington: American Psychological Association, pp.131-154.

Revans, R. (1982). The origins and growth of action learning. Lund [etc.]: Studentlitteratur [etc.].

WEBSEARCH

Official Website of i4cp, https://www.i4cp.com/interviews/shell-next-practice-award

Shell official website (2018)

https://www.shell.com/careers/working-at-shell/why-be-part-of-shell/developing-skills-
broadening-horizons.html#iframe=L3dlYmFwcHMvRWFydGh3YXRjaC8=

https://www.shell.com/about-us/our-values.html

https://reports.shell.com/annual-report/2017/consolidated-financial-statements/statement-of-
income.php

https://reports.shell.com/annual-report/2017/strategic-report/our-people.php