AT de Lange wrote:
"This book is a remarkable foreshadow of the LO in terms of the behaviours
of an ant colony."
At, as you well know, Marais pointed out that the ant colony is a complex
animal (organisation). I have read his books and met old people in the
Waterberg (where I spend much time) who knew him as youngsters.
But to get back to the idea of complex animals (termitaries in Marais
case), my city (and everyone else's on this list) is a complex animal.
Let me tell you about mine. It is about the size of Denver CO.
It covers an area of more than 500 km**2 and consumes DAILY:
650 megalitres of water
1 000 tons of food
4 000 tons of fuel in the form of Coal, natural gas, oil, petroleum.
It spews out into the environment DAILY
537 megalitres of waste water (sewage)
500 tons of air pollutants
1200 tons of solid waste (garbage) - some is toxic
It is growing DAILY.
If this colossus is not properly managed it will quickly foul its nest and
stifle in its own waste products. I spent a number of years with the
engineers that manage the animal, and have great respect for the systems
which they have in place. However, because of money, personnel, and other
resource constraints, the lack of grooming has lately become quite
noticeable, and litter is a tremendous problem. By the way, the majority
of its citizens are BORN litterbugs. It is time, I think, that LO
concepts be introduced to the keepers of my complex animal before
deterioration sets in too badly. I am struggling to gain their attention
in this regard but bureacracies move slowly.
Dear OL enthusiast, what about your complex animal? Is it being managed
well? Using LO concepts and systems engineering methodologies?
Here, right on our doorsteps in our own local authorities lies a
magnificent challenge for us. Just one example, the Madison, Wisconsin,
QP story makes rivetting reading from a TQM point of view, and is
certainly an encouragement. But are there examples of the use of LO
concepts in US cities? or Cities in other parts of the world?
Regards
Keith
Keith Sandrock Systems/Johannesburg Technology (JOHANTEC)
FAX 27-11-339-7997 KSAND@hertz.wits.mech.ac.za
--"K SANDROCK" <KSAND@hertz.mech.wits.ac.za>
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>