Thank you for your post concerning F2F and corresponding communication
and welcome to the list.
You wrote
>F2F has the capacity to create sense of deep sharing and warmth which I
>believe is enhanced by the physical presence of the participants
I agree, but I also see the obverse. F2F can be threatening. People do
not contribute because the 'boss' is present. Or one person dominates
the conversation. I have facilitated conversations using a suite of
collaborative software and meetings that did not. The software affords
anonymity for some people and, my perception, the timid or intimidated
people share more freely using the computer.
>One capacity that I appreciate in the electronic medium is the relative
>endurance of the text messages. I can reread someone's words _before_
>dashing out a reply. In the Turning Point Circle, I have been moved from hot
>reaction to inquiry by the chance to reflect on what someone else wrote.
I am a great advocate of reflective thinking. An exercise I received from one
of our daughters calls for a group to think about an idea for two minutes,
to write their thoughts down for two minutes, and then to discuss the
idea. I find it a really good way to intercept the reaction to and receive
the response to the idea. It also works very well to calm down a contentious
interchange in a meeting.
--bhobler@worldnet.att.net Bill Hobler
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>