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Reconsidering the Variables
 Considering
that the WZB has recently broken with tradition and recruited, Prof.
Juergen Kocka, a historian rather than a social scientist, as its
President, it was particularly fitting that he chair the workshop on
learning from the past and the future. “Learning and time have a lot to do
with each other,” he points out. Of course forgetting—or unlearning—and time
go together, too. But Kocka adds, “Is learning always a good thing?”
Harvard Business School historian Prof. Jeffrey Fear emphasizes that,
in fact, wrote learning from past lessons isn’t always best. “There is a big
difference between learning history and learning from history,” he
says. For example, past financial performance is a poor predictor. But
history can be a useful repository of organizational learning and corporate
memory, reconstructing the language and meanings that shaped decision-making
in the past and understanding the sources of current culture and identity.
 However
he also feels, to echo Kocka’s question, that since change management means
overcoming the past, history shouldn’t be a burden. “Organizations need to
be oriented towards the future,” he says. “For investors and stockholders,
it’s not what you did for me yesterday, but what you will do for me
tomorrow.”
Learning from the future, or course, is also a dubious proposition.
Graham Galer, has been looking for better methods to identify the ‘weak
signals’ of future change since he helped pioneer scenario planning at Shell
(he is now an associate of the
Global Business Network). Exploring alternate
futures, he says, “challenges manager’s mental maps.” New ideas and
strategies emerge. He adds that scenarios are also useful tools for testing
current strategies are appropriate.
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