E-Learning Readiness and the Effects of Organizational Culture

1. Introduction

In the current challenging world, knowledge-based skill of employees is an important requirement for organizations to have competitive advantage. Traditional learning is not able to meet the targets defined for the learning requirements of employees. It is shown (1) that the e-learning is a suitable solution for organizations to cope with the changing nature of business related knowledge required to remain competitive and to reduce the learning cost. Clearly, it is required for organizations to have the necessary readiness before implementing e-learning projects (Minton, 2000). According to Schreurs and others (2009) e-learning readiness is an important factor affecting the successful adoption of e-learning.

Although a vast number of organizations tend to utilize the e-learning technology to gain from its benefits, but because of the amount of investment required and the high rate of failure, many of them are reluctant to do so. That is, why it is necessary to find how ready the organization is to adopt the technology. The assessment should be done from different points of view, including employees, technological infrastructure, and innovation.

While the e-learning readiness is a key factor which affects the successful adoption of e-learning technology, the organizational culture plays a vital role in the successful implementation of the technology (Lea, 2003). According to Kinuthia (2007) culture affects the employees’ acceptance of learning process.

There are many researches focusing on factors that affect organizational learning. Bates (2000) believes that organizational culture can facilitate the learning process. He also argued that culture can make the process hard. An organizational culture of risk taking, providing new approaches to encourage a spirit of collaboration, and support for the implementation and adoption of e-learning is important and necessary. Schein (1993) believes that the organizational culture should support the learning process. He concluded that the development of learning would be hard if organizational culture fail to support the learning process. Therefore, organizational culture is a key factor if successful adoption of e-learning in an organization.

In this paper, the effect of organizational culture on e-learning readiness is investigated. In order to identify models of organizational culture, we have utilized Cameron and Quinn’s 4-dimension model (Cameron & Quinn, 2011). We have also used Aydin and Tasci (2005) model to measure the e-learning readiness.