Jim, I like this conversation more and more. In returning theory back to
a common experience, I return myself to it as well. I frequently engage
executives in dialogues to discover the theories that they're using (or
that are using them) and then to invent new ones. They find that they
"don't know what a theory is or how to work at that level." And then they
find that they do but have let it use them for so long that they forgot.
I find this crucial when engaging with issues of organisational design. To
be an executive, you had to have become unconsciously competent at using
organisational structure. That is, the whole arena is in the background.
Now you're being asked to design in an area where you are so familiar with
the thing that you are incompetent at design. The design of the old was
given and you've never been called upon to consider design - let alone to
actual engage in design. So what we get is shuffling of the existing deck
chairs.
> Every attempt to understand human things has to begin from common
> sense - not because common sense is infallible, since it obviously isn't -
> but simply because it's common.
An exercise I return to from time to time that relates to this arena is to
explore what might be the fundamental human experiences that cannot be
avoided, that occur without language or socialisation being required. I
don't have many but the exploration is useful. Most are non-verbal
gestures or at least can be expressed that way.
I think this is consitent with what you say below
> I also assume that human experience is common. This is a working
> assumption, not an ontological commitment; it allows me to rummage
> endlessly underneath different terminologies and verbal expressions for
> what might be common experiences. One might think that such a principle
> would stultify; on the contrary, it renders the world colorful and
> mysterious. It makes it possible, for example, to ask whether the
> difference between a Learning Organization and -?- (the other kind of Org,
> whatever we choose to name it) might have been visible in - say - the
> medieval church, or in classical Greece.
A wonderful HR professional at BP that I worked with, Terry Kirchin, used
to test all HR policies by asking, "Would I do this at home with my wife
and children? And if I did, how would it go?" Performance evaluation
never got past him with this test. Fortunately he is a very funny guy and
could make a great story of imagining himself sitting his wife down and
letting her know that a year had gone by and he was going to assess her
performance. It got very good when it came to sex. Anyway, you get the
message.
I dont' have to imagine the first of your offerings because I do it
frequently and find it productive. Not only for what you offer below but
that the models themselves change individually and collectively in the
process - always.
> Imagine conducting some intense daylong seminar or discussion of some sort
> in which the participants become aware of their individual and group
> models or metaphors. By the end of the day each model is fully
> articulated and everybody is comfortable discussion his or her model.
But this next one is very exciting. I will do it with a group - I think
it will have to be over more than a day to get the results aimed at - and
I'll report what happens. I'm sure that it will reach the state you have
suggested and I want to experiment with that. I think it would be a
mini-example of what Heidegger speaks about as the whole nature of the
"already always" of language and socialisation and tools. That is, it
matches what happens anyway.
> Now imagine the same process in reverse. A concept or set of concepts is
> introduced, discussed, becomes a model, begins to affect conduct, group
> dynamics, and is eventually wholly assimilated AND IS NO LONGER TALKED
> ABOUT. If I try to imagine this reversal in full lifelike detail, I am
> led to the almost paradoxical conclusion that at the very moment when the
> model becomes most effective and pervasive, it ceases to have a name.
It would likely cease to have a name because the name would be superfluous.
--
Mike McMaster <Michael@kbddean.demon.co.uk>
"Postmodern society is the society of computers, information, scientific
knowledge, advanced technology, and rapid change due to new advances in
science and technology." Postmodern Theory, Best & Kellner