Starting Dialogue LO6167

John Paul Fullerton (jpf@mail.myriad.net)
Fri, 22 Mar 1996 09:25:45 +0000

Response to Malcolm. LO6068

Some comments

> (dialogue, of course) about the things that really mattered to them, as
> well as what sort of program they wanted but were unable to have.

There possibly is value in stating the parameters as complete
potential. I noticed the positive nature of many statements when
reading "The Fifth Discipline" and the "Fieldbook". One example is in
developing personal vision. Part of the method involved responding to
questions like "Imagine your life as you would most want it to be.
What does it look like? What kind of things to you do? What kind of
things do you have?" There's a parallel application for vision for an
organization and it says things like "How do you interact with
customers? What is it like to work there?" There's no emphasis on
"you can't have this right now!" Maybe it's related to "pictures of
the future".

The other thought was that it seems to me that there must be people
within a dialogue that somehow "help it along", whether intentionally
or through the influence of dialogue and what it involves. In order
for people to "give themselves" to the process, they must know what
it is. Dr. Deming said something like, "without theory there are no
questions; without questions, no learning; hence without theory there
is no learning." In relation to trying to follow the guidelines of
TQM, it made much more sense - real sense - to me after I learned
something more toward the theory of TQM rather than the "14 points"
and "the general idea".

Perhaps in dialogue it would help if people knew that there was an
element of not really trying to get anywhere in particular, if that
is true, and what it means to bring forth and table one's own
assumptions and participate in "reminders" and help to others to
table their assumptions, also. If people see that as part of the way
dialogue works and know that dialogue has had profound effects in
other use, maybe it will increase "skillful" participation in
dialogue.

Please note that I've never participated in group dialogue or seen
it! And I'm not saying that these recommendations are necessary for
application in the group mentioned.

Have a nice day
John Paul Fullerton
jpf@myriad.net

Have a nice day
John Paul Fullerton
jpf@myriad.net

-- 

"John Paul Fullerton" <jpf@mail.myriad.net>

Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>