Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity (Paperback)

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Editorial Reviews

Review

"The terms of debate about 'knowledge management' and 'learning organizations' are slowly, and finally turning from issues of information and technology to those of human capabilities and the sources of motivation, creativity, and problem-solving skills that create real value in the new economy. Wenger is light years ahead in understanding those sources, and the critical importance of informal communities and 'social learning' in fostering them." Phillip Brook Manville, Partner, McKinsey & Co.

Product Description

Learning is becoming an urgent topic. Nations worry about the learning of their citizens, companies about the learning of their workers, schools about the learning of their students. But it is not always easy to think about how to foster learning in innovative ways. This book presents a framework for doing that, with a social theory of learning that is ground-breaking yet accessible, with profound implications not only for research, but also for all those who have to foster learning as part of their responsibilites at work, at home, at school.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press; 1 edition (December 1, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0521663636
• ISBN-13: 978-0521663632
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #147,246 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars excellent conceptual thinking, March 25, 2001

By A Customer

For those grappling with the need to understand and talk about how people come together and interact beyond the org. chart, this book has a lot to offer. Theoretically-based, it focuses on a social theory of learning that is broad enough to cover a wide range of human activities, well beyond what we would normally consider to be 'learning'. 'Communities of practice' offers a comprehensive framework for understanding and analysing what people do in the context of their social milieu. The author includes many examples and uses a work-place vignette to illustrate the relevance and power of his ideas. If you are not afraid of theory and abstraction and are open to new concepts, this book may indeed be revolutionary.

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars brilliant, July 12, 2001

By	Ben Kleinman (New York) - See all my reviews

One cannot be practically effective without being grounded in a philosophy. Philosophy leads to strategy, and strategy leads to a coordinated set of tactics and the opportunity to be proactive. Without it, tactics are reactive.

This book provides an outstanding philosophical guideline for making sense of the workplace and communities of practice. It is easy to divine practical solutions to common workplace issues and problems as you read it. His vignettes show mistakes that businesses make, and how the communities compensate. Preventing those mistakes in your business allows your communities to solve other problems. Additionally, you will understand where, why, and how your communities and how they help you, and because of this recognition, perhaps you can continuously remove the obstacles to their success.

45 of 54 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A thought-provoking inquiry on learning as a social process., August 4, 1998

By	John D. Smith ([e-mail]) (Louisville, Colorado) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Communities of Practice: Learning, Meaning, and Identity (Learning in Doing: Social, Cognitive and Computational Perspectives) (Hardcover)

A wonderful book that uses communities of practice as the entry-point to think about learning along several rich dimensions (e.g., meaning in relation to participation and artifacts, the relationship between identity and learning).

Definitely worth a slow, reflective reading.

Provides a lot of context for thinking about organizational learning.