Collection
Learning

Bruce Henderson revolutionized the practice of business strategy by combining the observed phenomena of learning curves and cost decreases to generate the experience curve . This work is based upon empirical data indicating that organizations "learn" with experience. But how does this happen? And is it possible to accelerate the pace of learning? Some of the articles in this collection explore the social context for learning and show how an individual's novel idea can take years - or centuries - to be adopted by society.

Human learning is still something of a mystery. Much current research is concerned with discovering the physical processes of the mind that account for this phenomenon. While our ability to learn and to think abstractly are clearly valuable evolutionary adaptations, evolutionary psychology  teaches us that there are some types of situations that our minds are not developed to handle easily.

A whole school of business strategy has emerged under the banner of "learning". These strategists point out the power of exploration in strategy creation, downplaying the roles of planning and control. Perhaps the key to competitive advantage can be boiled down to a single maxim: learn faster.