Innovation: examining workplace learning in new enterprises

Innovation is argued here to be a significant and complex dimension of learning in work, involving a mix of rational, intuitive, emotional and social processes embedded in activities of a particular community of practice. Dimensions of innovative learning are suggested to include level (individual, group, organization), rhythm (episodic or continuous), and magnitude of creative change (adaptive or generative) involved in the learning process. Drawing from a study of women who leave organizational employment to develop an enterprise of self‐employment, this article explores these dimensions of innovative learning. Two questions guide the analysis: what conditions foster innovative learning; and what are the forms and processes of the innovative learning process? Findings suggest that innovative processes involve multiple strategies and demand conditions of freedom, patience, support, and recognition.