Knowledge is constructed, not transferred

You cannot have a learning organisation without a shared vision...A shared vision provides a compass to keep learning on course when stress develops.

It's common to say that trees come from seeds. But how can a tiny seed create a huge tree? Seeds do not contain the resources need to grow a tree. These must come from the medium or environment within which the tree grows. But the seed does provide something that is crucial : a place where the whole of the tree starts to form. As resources such as water and nutrients are drawn in, the seed organizes the process that generates growth. In a sense, the seed is a gateway through which the future possibility of the living tree emerges.

Collaboration is vital to sustain what we call profound or really deep change, because without it, organizations are just overwhelmed by the forces of the status quo.

People with high levels of personal mastery...cannot afford to choose between reason and intuition, or head and heart, any more than they would choose to walk on one leg or see with one eye.

The Industrial Age is not sustainable. Its not sustainable in ecological terms, and its not sustainable in human terms.

The rate at which organizations learn may soon become the only sustainable source of competitive advantage.