Michael McMaster perhaps protests too much in the following dialog
Michael writes
>Margaret asks some good questions about "breakthroughs" ...snip..
>her earlier statements reveal the traps that lead to the
>warnings of danger
>Here's the first:
and he quotes Margaret
>> it seems that there is a lot of pressure to
>> produce breakthroughs for clients these days.
and responds
>The danger signal is that clients want breakthroughs "produced". Not
>pursued. Not goals created which are for learning. No! They want the
>breakthrough and don't much care about the process, the learning or even
>authenticity.
I think Michael assumes too much of the worst. No where was it implied
that a beakthrough was to be achieed by any means. No one said that the
client didn't wish to learn from the process.
Can we not assume that the need for a breakthrough establishes a tension
between the current performance and the desired, or even needed,
performance and the challenge to the team is to find a creative solution
to achieving the desired level of performance?
Michael again
>She then says she's heard many definitions but no practices. ...snip...
> The practices are not so mysterious - and they all involve
>learning if there is anything but manipulation and motivation involved.
Again an assumption that people are being manipulated. I am currently
working with a client that will turn over more than 3.3 billion dollars
this year. The profit margin will be about 1.5 per cent and is shrinking.
That this client needs to learn how to increase the margin, and quickly is
very evident. In fact though we may be able to start the client toward
being a learning organization, we need immediately effective ways of
reversing the trend in the margin without destroying the effectiveness of
the organization. And the client wants to be ethical and fair to their
employees.
Michael's response to a comment that a company has set breakthrough
objectives is;
>The "breakthrough objectives" are not, I bet, objectives of learning. Nor
>are they set for the learning that will be attained in pursuing them.
>They are production results for their own sake.
In the first place it is such a long process to develop a learning
community I do not believe that a learning objective could ever be
'breakthrough'. If I even recommend that a client set an objective to be
a LO I'd recommend a completion date many years in the future. Not
breakthrough.
If the client is anywhere on the journey to a LO goal then every objective
will have learning aspects. As Michael has stated in this forum, every
organization in some way is learning. So where's the beef?
Then Michael advises
>The second lesson is to go for results FOR LEARNING and not for the
>results themselves.
I suggest that we go for both. Nail the results and illustrate the
influence learning has in attaing them and its potential to extend the
results. Getting the results is like hitting management over the head with
a six foot two by four - you have their attention. Then show them the
reasons the team could produce them -- the learning that occurred.
You then say
>The third lesson is that you don't need anything else.
Concur! You have the breakthrough performance as recognized evidence of
the value of a learning culture. Advertise it, offer to take on the next
challenge under the condition that you are allowed to spread the learning
further. I wonder what would have happened to the AutoCo example now
being documented if the team had said to management, we know this works,
let us take on another new model introduction and prove that it is
repeatable.
--"William J. Hobler, Jr" <bhobler@worldnet.att.net>
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>