> In my reading of "The Prince," "Mach" didn't have much to say
> about systems
Collaboration Technologies holds a contrary view:
Machiavelli knew--and wrote--a great deal about "systems thinking."
Collaboration Technologies has developed a Software Toolbox of
Collaboration Utilities, among which is a test of "collaborability"
based on the writings of Machiavelli. (See below for how to License
this psychometrically validated instrument on a sliding scale.)
Collaborative Technologies Offers this Dual Definition:
Collusion is Reaching Out to Friends
Collaboration is Reaching oOut to Strangers
Collaboration Technologies also Offers this Corrolary:
Pure Collaboration is Unstable. It is like dancing on top
of a great inverted word-salad bowl. Without external cause
a group who deifies pure collaboration will inexorably slip
off into competition, unilateral action, anomie, or bureaucracy.
The proper strategy is to "invert the salad bowl" so that
collaboration becomes the attractor or default state with
excursions into all these fruitful diversions strongly encouraged.
(Ask about Collaboration Technologies' "Salad Bowl Test" (Beta
version, i.e., not yet systemically validated)
Collaborative Technologies Defines the Boundarying Operation Thus:
We achieve (systemic) life by engaging in Autonomy
We achieve Autonomy by engaging in Boundarying
We achieve Boundarying by Opening/Closing our own boundaries
and/orinsiding/outsiding the living systems of which
we are a part, where the typographical construction "/"
denotes the relationship of (Yin/Yang) complementarity, and
"opening," "closing," "insiding," and "outsiding" are primitive
terms resting undefined within this conceptual framework.
Definition Pair:(Don't worry, I'm getting to To the Machiavelli Test)
Summing is closing to another's closing;
Systeming is opening to another's opening.
NOW: Machiavelli dealt exquisitely with closing summing operations,
While neglecting opening systeming operations. Not half bad!
Collaboration Technologies has developed a "Collaborabilty" Measure
based on the writings of Machiavelli. The MACH Test has two forms
a long form (20 Minutes, self-scoring) and a short form (5 minutes,
self-scoring). We recommend self-scoring and display of group
results (with or without self-chosen fictitious names). We believe
that top-down confidential administration colonizes "subjects."
The long form has been extensively validated, but the short form,
which is a selection of the most descriminating test items,
has not been subjected as a unit to neither systemic (Rasch, IRT
bootstrapping which measures the questions as well as the answers)
nor empirical validation.)
Collaboration Technologies offers unrestricted licencing of these
instruments, plus a DEST TEST of emergent (as opposed to designated)
groups leadership, on a sliding scale relative to your or your
system's annual net income. If you don't make no money, you get
copies free.
James E. Durkin PhD
Collaboration Technologies
663 Coventry Road
Kensington, CA 94707
Tel (510) 524-8922
e-mail: colabtek@vdn.com
--Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>