Kent Myers said:
"While the content of your post in 4170 is useful and interesting, I don't
believe it meets the challenge of finding an anomaly and devising a new
explanation....It is not an anomaly, to you and the rest of LO, that
training has no effect."
Well, actually, it _is_ an anomaly, and I do not for a minute believe that
anyone here or anywhere else has a real clear _understanding_ --
explanations, perhaps, but understanding, no -- of why it is less
effective than it ought to be.
Kent: "The rest of your argument has an interesting twist. You say that
complexity foils the existing simple-minded approaches. Then you say that
any "answer" you might offer, because it reduces complexity, is no longer
dealing with the problem, hence is not an answer. The result is that you
aren't required to give an answer, and that any answer offered by others
is judged false exactly because it is an answer. I don't think that this
is playing by the rules."
I was unclear in my initial attempt, but this dialog is helping me. Let
me try again.
Complexity theory teaches us an important lesson. Future conditions are
highly sensitive to initial conditions. Subtle differences in initial
conditions will dramatically change the outcome.
To put that in different words, the reasons why something works or fails
are very context-sensitive. Rules learned in one context may not, and
mostly do not, transfer directly without modification. This is the
foundation of complexity theory.
Referring to your statement above, I think there are rules, but I now
believe they cannot be understood outside the specific context. This
requires experts in the context to make the rules. Therefore, there are
_few_ general rules -- many fewer than we have thought, and they are not
the rules proposed by most of the experts.
This is a different view of the world than what has been used in the past.
By my definition, that makes it a different paradigm. The old view was
that there were universal rules, and as a result, companies have tried
many 'universal' rules without success. First, read Peters & Waterman
(experts, but not context experts) then do it for two years. It fails,
try another strategy, and fail again. Do what the Japanese do, and
flatten the organization. It does not work. Why don't these work? The
approaches were never meant for a different context. The approaches were
void of context, void of thought, void of applicability.
To return to training, why does training fail? Perhaps we delegate it to
trainers, expecting they will add the content. I hope I am not offending
anyone, but I don't think trainers can train without being experts -- more
than just knowledgeable -- about the context. Training, like everything
else, will succeed or fail depending on how well it is integrated into the
specific context.
To my way of thinking, this is a fundamentally different paradigm than we
are currently using, and it _may_ explain why training fails. This theory
has an obvious experiment to validate it. Have training done by people
who are experts in the specific business context, and are also good
trainers. I bet there are companies that do this already, and it might be
interesting to see what their experience has been.
In another piece, I described how American companies were responding to
high overhead costs. Some are responding by downsizing -- copy the
Japanese, a 'universal' solution -- but others are finding ways to turn
the overhead to value-added activities. _That_ is understanding and using
the context. Some day we may know who was right. In the meantime it is a
fascinating world we live in.
-- Rol Fessenden LL Bean, Inc 76234.3636@compuserve.com