Action Learning Set: How It Works, Questions to Ask and How to Run One

TL;DR

• An action learning set is a small group, usually five to eight people, that meets regularly to work on real problems through questions instead of advice.
• Reg Revans developed action learning from the 1940s, starting in the coal industry. His shorthand: learning equals programmed knowledge plus questioning (L = P + Q).
• A typical set meets every four to six weeks for half a day, for six months or more. Each member gets about an hour of “airtime” in turn.
• The set adviser holds the process, not the answers, and works towards being unnecessary.
• It is not a big-room format. At a conference its best use is as the follow-up: form sets at the close and let them carry the ideas back to work.

An action learning set is a small group of colleagues who meet regularly, each bringing a real work problem, and help each other through it by asking questions instead of giving advice. If you run leadership programmes, it is one of the most useful things you can attach to a conference.

It starts where the conference ends.

One honest note first. Most formats on this site are designed for a hall, not for twelve people in a training room. This one is the opposite: six people round a table. I am a conference host, not an action learning set adviser, and I will say where that line sits.

What is an action learning set?

An action learning set is a group of about five to eight people who commit to meeting over several months to work on problems that have no textbook answer. Action Learning Associates suggests five to seven members, the World Institute for Action Learning four to eight. Some organisations say action learning groups or teams instead.

One person presents, everyone else asks questions, and the presenter leaves with actions they own. The NHS England handbook puts the aim plainly: leave with realistic actions that help solve or understand the issue.

What makes a good problem? INTRAC’s guide says sets work better on complex issues with no clear technical answer, where the presenter has some responsibility and influence. “Which booking system?” is a project. “Why does my team go quiet when I join the meeting?” is a set problem.

Where action learning came from

Action learning is the work of Reg Revans (1907 to 2003), a Cambridge physicist who also long-jumped for Britain at the 1928 Olympics. INTRAC tells the origin story. At Cambridge he watched Nobel Prize winners, stuck on hard problems, sit down together and question each other, whatever their field.

He took the idea to the National Coal Board, where he was director of education from 1945 to 1950. Pit managers met in small groups on site and questioned each other instead of calling in experts. Then came hospitals: Revans led the Hospital Internal Communications project in London from 1965 to 1968. George Boak’s 2022 review describes it as an early healthcare use, from before the method had fully taken shape.

His formula is still the shortest summary: L = P + Q. Learning is programmed knowledge (what is taught and read) plus questioning insight. Michael Marquardt later proposed adding R for reflection. Keep P and Q in mind. They explain why sets pair so well with a conference.

How does an action learning set work?

An action learning set works in cycles: members meet, take turns presenting a live problem, get questioned, commit to action, act between meetings and report back. The numbers vary by programme:

The ground rules carry most of the weight. INTRAC lists three: one person presents at a time, members question in a counselling style without advising, and the set must be safe for people to admit what they need. Confidentiality sits over all three.

Advice is the hardest habit to break. Bond warns about “advice packaged as a question”: anything that begins “Wouldn’t it be a good idea if you…”.

What does the set adviser do?

The set adviser holds the process so members can concentrate on the problem. Bond’s list covers creating a safe space, keeping the discipline, modelling helpful questions, pacing the questions and watching the time. Answers are not on it.

In practice the adviser steps in with a short question or observation. INTRAC’s examples: asking someone to rephrase a question more openly, or noting that the set is giving advice instead of letting the presenter find their own answer. Expect more of this early on.

The aim is to become unnecessary. Revans was wary of sets depending on a facilitator, and Pedler’s summary of his view says the facilitator should make the set independent at the earliest possible moment. Mind Tools suggests a practical route: use a set leader for the first few cycles, then let members decide.

Finding skilled facilitators is one of the recurring challenges in Boak’s review. Book an experienced adviser early and train internal ones as you go.

What questions do you ask in an action learning set?

Ask open questions, one at a time, always to the presenter, moving from clarifying to probing to action. INTRAC groups its question bank the same way. A selection, lightly reworded:

Clarifying
– What happened?
– What makes you say that?
– Who will be affected if this works?

Probing
– What is the gap between how things are and how you want them to be?
– What assumption are you making, and is it stopping you?
– Who are “they”?

Moving to action
– If the decision rested entirely on you, what would you do?
– Who might help?
– What will you do before we next meet?

Checking the set is helping
– What haven’t we helped you with yet?

Let silences run. And if a question starts with “Have you thought about” and ends with the answer, it is advice.

An action learning set running order for a half-day meeting

This follows INTRAC’s sample format, which the guide calls flexible. It suits five or six members with two presenters. The break is my addition.

The first meeting is different. NHS England suggests agreeing ground rules then: confidentiality, honesty and safety, plus attendance and how long each speaker gets.

How can action learning sets follow up a conference?

Action learning sets make a strong conference follow-up because the conference supplies the P and the set supplies the Q. Boak found that most of the learning and development programmes he reviewed paired action learning with inputs such as lectures and workshops.

It has been done before. The ODI toolkit describes Bond’s 2002 to 2003 pilot: nine NGO staff in two facilitated sets for a year, plus two workshops that brought everyone together. Traidcraft Exchange began with a “have a go” session during a run of workshops, then ran two sets for nine months and trained four participants as internal facilitators.

Here is how I would tie sets to a leadership conference. These are my suggestions, not a method from the sources:

1. Before. Recruit members and an adviser in advance, and only volunteers: the ODI toolkit says sets work best when commitment is voluntary.
2. During. Seat each set together for at least one session, and build that into the agenda template early.
3. At the close. Give sets 20 minutes to agree ground rules and a first date. Ask every delegate for the one challenge they will take back to work.
4. Within six weeks. Hold the first meeting while the conference is still fresh.
5. At the next conference. Sets report back on what changed, as themes, not confidences.

In a hall, step 3 is where phones earn their place. With RoomReader, the live Q&A software I built and include with hosting, every delegate submits that one challenge from their seat and the room sees the themes on screen before it leaves. Any decent audience response tool can do it, and your closing remarks are the moment to say what happens next.

Plan for the problems Boak’s review found: weak organisational support, heavy workloads, reluctant participants and sponsors changing jobs. If the director who opened the conference moves on, find the sets a new champion fast.

Where a conference host fits

I am not an action learning set adviser, and I would not pretend to be one at a table of six. That job is quiet and patient, and it belongs to a specialist.

What I do is the room around it, especially the opening and the close. Over 20 years on stage and television and more than 800 events, one view has held: engagement is not a gimmick bolted on at the end, it is how you keep a room with you from the first minute. If you want conference facilitation for the day that launches your sets, send the agenda or check availability at hello@conferencehost.uk.