There is concern that management and business research favours rigour and theory over relevance and practice. There are pressures from funding councils for researchers to show more impact. The paper shows how the bridge between the academic world and the world of practice can be served by action learning. Consideration is given to the difficulties…

This paper aims to make known the materials on action learning that are held in the universities of Salford and Manchester, with the aim of bringing these unique resources to the attention of researchers and other interested parties. It is a joint effort between the Editorial Board members of the Journal, Action Learning: Research & Practice…

The paper examines whether, if leadership is defined by the willingness to tackle wicked issues, and if action learning is employed for leadership development purposes, do the action learning participants on leadership development programmes address such wicked issues? It adopts a version of dialogical sense-making to consider this and describes…

If everyone is contributing, if action learning involves collective learning, then new knowledge is created through a collaborative process. This is not expert knowledge and no 'one truth' is produced, this is a collective knowledge arising from a common purpose and a shared quest. Such knowledge continues to evolve without the intention to fix or…

This article concerns the origins of the idea of action learning, especially the claim by Revans that his Memorandum on "The Entry of Girls into the Nursing Profession" in Essex hospitals written in 1938 was the first step in the development of action learning. Whilst Revans repeatedly made this claim, there is no evidence in the actual…

This paper presents a case study based on the evaluation of the two VAL (virtual action learning) sets. We report participants learning both leadership and the VAL process based on the basis of telephone interviews. We conclude that what is learned about leadership is connected with how learning takes place and suggest that the content and process…

This paper explores selective literatures in the two fields of action learning and innovation, and seeks insights into the processes of, and connections between, innovation, engagement and implementation. We searched the action learning articles for references to innovation, beginning with the work of Revans, who highlights the innovation paradox,…

This paper explores the idea of unlearning in Critical Action Learning (CAL) as applied to the wicked problems of organisations and societies. It draws on data and ideas developed during a research project conducted for "Skills for Care" by Pedler, Abbott, Brook and Burgoyne ("Skills for Care" 2014) and from experiences on…

This paper brings together the reflections of the authors on their shared and individual experiences of virtual action learning. Whilst many conclusions are shared, there are also some points of difference in practices.

This essay is about how to learn to organise to tackle the intractable and most difficult problems of organisations and societies. It opens with a discussion of the nature of such problems, which are the spur for Revans' action learning and the focus of some recent thinking on leadership. Action learning works on the basis of peer relationships…

This paper explores the contribution that action learning can make to the formation of social capital via experiences of action learning projects in NHS Pathology Services in the UK. The paper describes the development of action learning practice in recent years, reviews the notion of social capital and considers how action learning might…