Chris Argyris Quotes

• Most people define learning too narrowly as mere 'problem-solving', so they focus on identifying and correcting errors in the external environment. Solving problems is important. But if learning is to persist, managers and employees must also look inward. The need to reflect critically on their own behaviour, identify the ways they often inadvertently contribute to the organisation’s problems, and then change how they act.

  Chris Argyris

  Errors, People, Focus

  "Teaching Smart People How to Learn". hbr.org. June 1991.

  44 Copy quote

• Smart people don't learn... because they have too much invested in proving what they know and avoiding being seen as not knowing.

  Chris Argyris

  Smart, Teaching, Learning

  53 Copy quote

• In fact, people themselves are responsible for making the status quo so resistant to change. We are trapped by our own behavior.

  Chris Argyris

  People, Facts, Management

  Chris Argyris (2010). “Organizational Traps: Leadership, Culture, Organizational Design”, p.10, OUP Oxford

  47 Copy quote

• Individual learning is a necessary but insufficient condition for organizational learning.

  Chris Argyris

  Individual, Organizational, Insufficient

  Chris Argyris, Donald A. Schön (1978). “Organizational learning: a theory of action perspective”, Addison-Wesley

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• Managers who are skilled communicators may also be good at covering up real problems.

  Chris Argyris

  Real, Covering, May

  "Skilled Incompetence" by Chris Argyris, hbr.org. September 1986.

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• Success in the marketplace increasingly depends on learning. Yet most people don't know how to learn.

  Chris Argyris

  Leadership, People, Marketplace

  Chris Argyris (2008). “Teaching Smart People How to Learn”, p.1, Harvard Business Review Press

  37 Copy quote

• One must treat theory-in-use as both a psychological certainty and an intellectual hypothesis.

  Chris Argyris

  Intellectual, Use, Psychological

  Chris Argyris, Donald A. Schön (1974). “Theory in practice: increasing professional effectiveness”, Jossey-Bass

  29 Copy quote

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