EXPERTISE IN TRANSITION

Engeström’s (2003) three types of learning in collective systems of co-confi guration type organisations are interesting. Firstly, transformative learning is about learning that radically broadens the shared objects of work by explicitly objectifying and articulating novel tools, models and concepts. Horizontal ¹⁶ and dialogical learning creates knowledge and transforms boundaries and “knots” between activity systems in multi-organisational terrains. This is the structure of the situationally constructed social spaces, arenas and encounters needed in new forms of expansive learning at work. The focus of research is on actions of bridging, boundary crossing, “knot working” and negotiation. Thirdly, subterranean learning studies the imperceptible cognitive trails (based on Cussins’

conceptualization of cognitive trails) serving as stabilizing networks that ensure the viability of the new concepts, models and tools, thus making the multi-organisational terrains viable (Engeström, 2003, the idea of cognitive trails is based on Cussins, 1992).

The activity-theoretical model is increasingly used to study and facilitate expansive learning processes in multi-organisational terrains of object-oriented activity. This type of developmental work research is radically different from traditional approaches that 16. In some connections horisontal learning can be understood as being about helping people to learn from each other, from

their peers, i.e. people-to-people learning as an alternative to the standard “top-down” “training” tools.

cherish a vertical view of competence and expertise. Characteristic of the traditional view is a discourse of ‘stages’ or ‘levels’ of knowledge and skill. Such a vertical image assumes a uniform, monolithic model of what counts as an ‘expert’ in a given fi eld.

However, the world of work is increasingly organised in ways that require horizontal movement and boundary crossing.

Döös et al. (2005) studied learning in a large mobile communications company in Sweden. They focused on the development engineers learning at the interface of two technologies, the old telecom and the new datacom. They identifi ed three types of learning in which employees needed to engage so as to accomplish their tasks on the edge of a new technology: learning basic knowledge, co-creating new knowledge and learning changing-knowledge. Even though this classifi cation is somewhat confusing from the overall perspective of workplace learning typologies, Döös et al.’s results provide an interesting insight into a telecom company crossing a boundary towards being a datacom company.¹⁷ The elements of renewal, transition and change are dominant elements in her fi ndings.

Learning basic knowledge took place especially with the introduction of new technologies when the old technologies were left behind. When a new technology was introduced into a company, it meant basically returning to “a state of knowing nothing” even for the experienced engineers. (Döös et al., 2005) This is one of the salient points where learning meets what was previously said about building expertise around learning and renewal (see e.g. Loogma et al., 2004, Isopahkala, 2005). The old skills and competencies simply do not remain for ever at the core of one’s expertise in a world where technologies and their applications do not live forever. The capability for continuous learning is a prime constituent of employees’ future employability, too. From an individual’s perspective the development of expertise in R & D envi-ronment is not a linear, straightforward process. For Dyer & Ericksen (2005) serial incompetence is predominantly caused by people themselves looking for new horizons and opportunities and thus changing jobs. However, people should be prepared for periods of “incompetence” even if they do not change jobs, for example in cases of technology or product changes in their current context. In Döös et al.’s (2005) case learning basic knowledge related to new technologies was about frequent returning to a state of knowing nothing.

In Döös et al.’s (2005) fi ndings the co-creation of new knowledge implied close interaction processes while carrying out diffi cult work tasks. The outcome of the co-creation of new knowledge was knowledge that did not exist before in the organisation and, at times, not in the world – the latter being a consequence of working at the cutting edge of development. Mostly this type of co-creation took place in face-to-face situations, but there was also proof of more remote, slow and mediated co-creation 17. Döös et al. (2005) call learning basic knowledge, co-creating new knowledge and learning changing-knowledge as learning

processes. In my view, these are not learning processes, but rather different approaches to learning or different types of learning.

dialogues over the boundary of a mediating tool, e.g. mail conversation. From an activity theoretical perspective, this would refer to sense making and negotiation proc-esses that take place in and between activity systems when working in the direction of the common object of activity. Expansive learning entails a great deal of creative reconstruction, questioning, confrontation and debate over defi ning what the actual object of activity is. (Engeström, 1999a, pp. 40-41)

Learning changing-knowledge questioned hitherto acquired knowledge through the necessity of taking in new facts and aspects in relation to already existing knowing.

It was about searching for clues, being on the hunt for relevant information, saving ideas, solutions and contacts for future problem arrivals. Döös et al. (2005) describe this type of learning as a “continuous attuning” and the outcome is “knowledge under recurrent construction”. The products being developed and tested were unstable and the employees thus needed constantly to “shoot at a moving target to get hold of this moving thing for a moment”. Changes were so frequent that it was practically never possible for the testers to know exactly what was valid for the version currently being tested. People could never be confi dent that they fully understood how the systems being developed worked; everything was more or less “in a loose state”. The engineers were trying to “catch” the latest situation and to “collect bits and pieces of information, and relations between them”; they were constantly “on the hunt”. (Döös et al., 2005) What they are basically describing here is situated and constructive learning from an individual perspective. The activity described above is deeply embedded in common practice. What is interesting in Döös et al.’s fi ndings is the vivid description of the

“hectic search” and “hunt” that the research participants described. In Orlikowski’s (2002) words Döös et al.’s (2005) development engineers were traversing temporal, geographic, social, cultural, historical, technical and political boundaries while “learn-ing chang“learn-ing knowledge”. They were also us“learn-ing various boundary practices in their activities. Constant state of fl ux is also one of the characteristics of the self-organising systems described in Section 4.2.

People networks were a major source of knowledge in Döös et al.’s results and peo-ple networks were global, timeless and partly non-situated, however, connected through the products and the problems that were to be solved. Individuals engaged in helping out others and sharing what they knew, knowing that no single person could have enough knowledge him/herself to perform the needed work tasks. Contact networks were joint constructions, they had to be taken care of and “one was not overexploit a useful contact”. Learning changing knowledge was the kind of learning Döös et al.

count in the category of “frequently expanding the here and now-boundaries”. Writ-ten information and documents were also important for Döös et al.’s (2005) research participants. However, written information and documents were often diffi cult to locate and gain access to. The software engineers had diffi culties in obtaining docu-ments from other business units which may see them as proprietary or hold them as a source of income. They also had diffi culties on the boundary of handover from one

stage of a project to the next in terms of other units not being willing to allocate time to do an adequate handover. (Döös et al., 2005)

Another perspective on expertise is unlearning, not staying within the boundaries of what has once been learned. According to Starbuck (1989, pp. 24-29), unlearn-ing is more of an organisational characteristic than an individual one. He claims that individual human beings can learn without having to erase what they already know;

they can record new knowledge on top of their current knowledge. Organisations, especially older ones, fi nd it hard to ignore their current knowledge, because they have built up explicit rationalisations for why they are doing what they are doing and because they tend to associate specifi c people with specifi c policies. Thus organisations need to integrate their knowledge into very rigid and coherent structures where, in addition, political and intellectual elements fortify each other. Organisations can read-ily learn knowledge that is compatible with what they already believe, but they fi nd it very diffi cult to learn knowledge that contradicts their current knowledge. Before they become willing to accept radically different knowledge, organisations actually have to unlearn what they know by dismantling their existing ideological and political structures. Organisations that constantly survive crises are good at unlearning. For such companies it is possible to “invent tomorrow”, which means that new alternative ideas or different strategies emerge from the organisation. In the activity theoretical framework “unlearning” would require investigating the historical developments of interrelated activity systems and negotiating possible changes or transformations in the current setup and practices (Engeström, 1987, 2001, 2003, Ahonen & Virkkunen, 2005).

Isopahkala-Bouret in her dissertation (2005) focused on expertise under changing circumstances. She revealed how IT expertise and expert identity is linked to the organisa-tional discourse of continuous learning and transitions: the expert is a continuous learner and continuously in transition and is not complaining about it. The objective was to understand how professionals narratively make sense of expertise and how confusing role transitions impact on interpretations of expertise. The study presents “renewal”

as a struggle for professional recognition. She showed how corporate competence man-agement and development discourses impact on employees’ defi nition of expertise.

Professionals had to negotiate the value of their experience and adjust to prevailing ways of presenting expertise. Her criticism is levelled specifi cally at discourse that constructs a socially correct interpretation of how expertise is understood and who are justifi ed in declaring themselves as experts. The fact that work was in a constant state of fl ux was lamented only if it prevented learning. Transitions and the acquisition of new responsibilities were seen as a necessary part of expertise. However, for some research participants, the role transitions were simply about adjustment anticipation and the ensuring of one’s position in changing circumstances. Isopahkala claims that information technology professionals divide into two groups: those who have the right skills and a positive at-titude towards learning (they are the experts) and those whose knowledge is no longer

needed and who do not have the means and resources to update their competence.

Isopahkala concludes that negotiation about the status of expertise requires acceptance of the prevailing developmental discourse and a defi nition of one’s value in terms of project resourcing. At the same time it is impossible to fi nd words for expressing dissatisfaction – since no one wants to be taken as “change resistant and out-of-date.”

Casey (1995, pp. 190-192) concluded from her study in a large U.S. based tech-nology that in the post industrial and “post-occupational” era people “opt” between three different strategies. The defensive ones would rather be somewhere else; they are the change-resistant ones. The colluded ones are “compulsively” optimistic; they “feel great”, they are “unleashed” to become winners for the corporation and for themselves.

(In post-industrial era it is not enough to be just compliant and dedicated). In its ideal corporate form the character of the new corporate self is a colluded self: “over agree-able, compulsive in dedication and diligence, passionate about the product and the company”. The third type fi nds him/herself in capitulation. In capitulation, “the self negotiates a private psychic settlement with the corporate colonializing power”.

On the one hand, cynicism, ambivalence and contradiction constitute an im-portant part of work and organisations as suggested by Whittle (2005). On the other hand, as shown by Casey (1995), Isopahkala (2005) and Järvensivu (2006) the expec-tation for optimism, acceptance of change, learning and renewal to be constituents of people’s work identity and expertise, is already strongly institutionalized in today’s working organisations. Dyer & Shafer (2003) argue that dynamic organisations com-pete through marketplace agility, which requires that employees at all levels engage in proactive, adaptive and generative behaviours (p. 7). This has deeply penetrating effects on the expert work, expertise and its renewal, too.