In an era where technology advancements allow for almost instant copying of product and services, what can keep an organization ahead in the highly competitive & global era?

According to respected Harvard Business School faculty Prof. David Garvin, the speed and quality of an organization’s learning is the only long-term sustainable advantage.

Speaking at the NASSCOM Leadership Forum, which started today in Mumbai, Prof. Garvin said, “Future is not as predictable as it used to be! Today, the rate at which organization learn, and implement the learning for business purposes, is the only sustainable competitive edge!”

Emphasizing the need for learning organizations, Prof. Garvin pointed out the 6 critical tasks that organizations should do to emerge as a learning organization. These are:

1. Collect Intelligence about environment
2. Learn from the Best Practices of competitors
3. Own up and learn from the past failures
4. Experiment with new approaches
5. Encourage systematic problem solving
6. Transfer knowledge within the organization

Talking about Indian organizations that score high on Learning culture, Prof. Garvin said, “MindTree and Gensar are two organizations that are very good on this parameter. I am actually writing cases on them!”

Asking individuals to be humble and open to new ideas and learnings, Prof. Garvin advised the participants of the leadership forum, “Be humble and avoid being defensive in your everyday work life.”

Dr David Garvin is the C. Roland Christensen Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School. He teaches courses in leadership, general management, and operations in the MBA and Advanced Management programs, as well as serving as chair of the Elective Curriculum and faculty chair of the School's Teaching and Learning Center. He has also taught in executive education programs and consulted for over fifty organizations around the globe, including Booz-Allen & Hamilton, BP, Frito-Lay, Gillette, L. L. Bean, 3M, Mitsubishi, Morgan Stanley.

MBAUniverse.com will continue to provide more learnings from the Nasscom Leadership Forum 2010. Stay tuned for more live reports of Day 2 and Day 3.