Study Guide: Chapter 19 — A Sixth Discipline?

Core Idea

The five disciplines form a critical mass sufficient to make learning organizations a systematic undertaking — but, like the DC-3 needing the later, unrelated arrival of jet engines and radar to become a real industry, they are probably not the final word.

Key Terms

Critical mass of disciplines

Case Summary

Radar, a wartime by-product unrelated to aviation research, combined with the jet engine to turn the DC-3's breakthrough into a real airline industry over a decade later.

Application Checklist

• [ ] Treat the five disciplines as sufficient to start, not as a closed, final list
• [ ] Watch for unrelated fields (as radar was to aviation) that might supply a future sixth discipline

Self-Test

1. Why does Senge use the jet engine and radar as a hedge on his own five-discipline framework?
2. What does the DC-3 analogy suggest about where future breakthroughs might come from?