Learning as a support for organizational innovation: possibilities and limitations.

The present paper tells an intervention story where two collectives, from business and academia, came together to address a business problem through collaborative action research. Amongst other things, the project created new ways of learning and therefore, knowing about the ‘business problem’. The author argues that in order to talk about an organizational intervention in a learning context, it was helpful to focus observation at the level of practice, in this case the different learning practices brought to the project by the organization and the research group. The ‘scientific narrative’ focuses on how the two practices interacted. The present story’s plot revolves around the following question: what happens when one collective – used to a particular style of learning – decides to engage with another collective – with a different approach to learning? How does this engagement effect the first collective’s approach to learning?