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Course: Fundamentals of Nursing�Topic: Learning Agility

The Nurses International Community

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COPYRIGHT

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Module Goals

Learners will be able to:

Define learning agility
Describe importance of learning agility in nursing
Describe the dimensions of learning agility
Identify the capabilities needed to perform in new situation

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What is Learning Agility?

Lombardo & Eichinger, 2000,

as cited in De Meuse et al., 2010

Defined as:

‘the willingness and ability to learn from experience, and subsequently apply that learning to perform successfully under new or first-time conditions’

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Learning Agility

Agility is to sense and respond quickly to changes in the environment
Agile person demonstrates:

Flexible behaviours
Responds to change

Proactively
Adaptively
Resiliently

Snyder & Brewer, 2019

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Learning Agility

According to Lombardo and Eichinger (2000), four factors that describe different aspects of learning agility are:

People Agility
Result Agility
Mental Agility
Change Agility

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Learning Agility

People Agility describes people who-

know themselves well
Learn from experience
Treat others constructively
Are cool and resilient under the pressure of change

Result Agility describes people who-

Gets results under tough conditions
Inspire others to perform beyond normal
Promote confidence in others

Lombardo & Eichinger, 2000

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Learning Agility

Mental Agility describes people who-

Think through problems from a fresh point of view
Are comfortable with complexity and ambiguity
Are comfortable explaining their thinking to others

Change Agility describes people who-

Are curious
Have a passion for ideas
Like to experiment with test cases
Engage in skill-building activities

Lombardo & Eichinger, 2000

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Take a moment and think…..

Why is learning agility important in Nursing?

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Challenges in Nursing

Roles and responsibilities of nurses have rapidly transformed¹.

From general bedside nurse to advance practice nurse, researcher, manager, etc.

Client management and treatments continue to evolve.

Client’s expectations of nursing care has increased².
Evolving health information technologies³.
Care interventions and treatments keep evolving.

The University of Rhode Island, 2016
Lateef, 2011
Bailey, 2021

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Challenges in Nursing

Nursing in Practice, 2020

Nurses need to be agile to provide optimum level of client care in increasingly complex ever-changing healthcare environment.

For example: In UK, Due to COVID 19 pandemic community and practice nurses were redeployed to roles where they had to employ new or rarely used skills.

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Learning Agility and Nursing

Snyder & Brewer, 2019

Learning agility will enable nurses to:

Anticipate the unexpected
Tolerate ambiguity
Effectively manage stressful situations to moderate the turbulent environment

Nurses who are agile learners are not disconcerted by constantly changing healthcare system

Instead they take the initiatives to find solution
View ambiguity or challenges as opportunity to learn new knowledge
Always looking for ways to promote client care

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Learning Agility Skills

Center for Creative Leadership provides following tips for learning agility:

Be a Seeker
Hone Your Sense-Making
Internalize Experiences and Lessons Learned
Adapt and Apply

Center for Creative Leadership, n.d.

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Learning Agility: Be a Seeker

Seek out more and different experiences.

Memorable experiences impact the way you lead and manage.

Embrace the challenge of the unfamiliar.

Don’t just go through the motion.

Take on new challenges that scares you.

Allows development of new skills and perspectives which may become part of your repertoire.
Tell others what you are doing and ask for their help and support.

Center for Creative Leadership, n.d.

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What Would a Nurse Do?

Aaron is a new nurse who is starting his first day on a busy oncology unit. He will spend a week working with a staff nurse who will orient him to the unit and to staffing policies and client care processes on the unit.

How can Aaron apply the principles of agility during his orientation?

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Learning Agility: Be a Seeker

Don’t get stuck on first solutions

Challenge yourself to come up with new solution even if seemingly tried and trusted ones exist.
Bring in others point of view.
Might uncover ways that saves time and energy.
Surface new learning that might haven’t been considered.

Make it a habit to push for new ideas

What’s holding me back from trying something new and different? If these constraints weren’t in place, how would I approach this situation differently?

Center for Creative Leadership, n.d.

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Learning Agility: Hone Your Sense-Making

Luxury of time does not exist in high-stakes, complex, ambiguous, fast-moving situations.

Dive in and start making things happen.

Actively listen to understand what others are saying.

When you feel stressed, pause.

Take a moment to consider what’s really required.

Find another way to understand a problem.

Utilize multiple techniques and engage different senses.
Tap into your emotions to wrest understanding, insight, meaning from the experience.

Center for Creative Leadership, n.d.

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Learning Agility:

Internalize Experience and Lessons Learned

Internalizing experiences and lessons learned is important.

To solidify insights and lessons learned for recall and application later.

Learning agile people recognize that.

others are essential to their learning performance.
others can provide new experiences and opportunities to learn.

Ask for feedback and be open to criticism.

Find someone who you can trust and give you open and honest feedback.

Center for Creative Leadership, n.d.

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Learning Agility:

Internalize Experience and Lessons Learned

Don’t defend

Entering a mode of self-preservation and trying to defend what is, you close yourself off to what could be.
To practice non-defensiveness, always try to thank others.

Reflect, both alone and with others

Shift your thinking beyond merely what happened to ask why things happened the way they did.
Reflection helps surface the intuitive and lock it in for future reference.

Center for Creative Leadership, n.d.

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Learning Agility:

Internalize Experience and Lessons Learned

Step back from the busyness and figure out what you’re learning from a project, from an interaction, from a new experience.

Conduct after-action reviews where you /relevant others reflect by asking:

What happened?
Why did it happen that way?
What should we stop/start/continue doing in order to ensure success in the future?
What changes in knowledge, skill level, attitudes, behavior, or values resulted from the experience?

Center for Creative Leadership, n.d.

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Learning Agility: Adapt and Apply

Learn to rely on your intuition

People who rate high on learning agility report on operating largely on feel and flexibility.
When faced with something new, draw on the similarities from the past to frame new challenge.

Don’t overthink

Inspiration comes from the unconscious, being open to this can spark new ideas and strengthen performance.
Don’t shy away from experimentation as you venture into new territory.

Center for Creative Leadership, n.d.

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What Would a Nurse Do?

Nurse Nita arrived at work to learn that her shift will be significantly understaffed as a result of sick calls.

What activities would demonstrate qualities of learning agility in Nurse Nita?

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References:

Bailey, S. (2021, August 4). How technology has changed the role of nursing. NurseJournal. https://nursejournal.org/articles/technology-changing-nursing-roles/

Center for Creative Leadership (2020). Leading Effectively Articles: Tips for Improving Your Learning Agility. https://www.ccl.org/articles/leading-effectively-articles/tips-for-improving-your-learning-agility/

De Meuse, K.P., Dai, G., & Hallenbeck, G.S. (2010). Learning Agility: A construct whose time has come. Consulting Psychology Journal: Practice and Research, 62 (2): 110-130. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/232583122_Learning_agility_A_construct_whose_time_has_come

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References:

Lateef F. (2011). Patient expectations and the paradigm shift of care in emergency medicine. Journal of emergencies, trauma, and shock, 4(2), 163–167. https://doi.org/10.4103/0974-2700.82199

Lombardo, M.M. & Eichinger, R.W. (2000). High potentials as high learners. Human Resource Management, 39 (4): 321 - 329. © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/246869384_High_Potentials_as_High_Learners

Nursing in Practice. (2020, June 4). Coronavirus: Changing the face of nursing. https://www.nursinginpractice.com/analysis/coronavirus-changing-the-face-of-nursing/

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References:

Snyder, K. A., & Brewer, B. B (2019). Workforce agility: An answer to turbulence in acute care nursing environments?. Nursing Management, 50 (8): 46-50. https://journals.lww.com/nursingmanagement/Fulltext/2019/08000/Workforce_agility__An_answer_to_turbulence_in.9.aspx

The University of Rhode Island. (2016, March 16). How nurses’ Roles are changing. https://online.uri.edu/articles/how-nurses-roles-are-changing.aspx

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