Rectifications (8) – ‘Cutting edge…’ ….‘World class…’
Torrey Orton
May 12, 2009
Following the suggestion of Confucius, I continue some rectification of names for our times. Elsewhere I offer some ‘solutions’ to some problems of linguistic degradation. Relevant observations appear towards the end of my Dances with Difference (4) post.
‘Cutting edge…’ is what we say when we mean that whatever we’re doing is just far enough behind the leading edge to actually do something reliably enough to be marketed to early adopters. Those in the know know that the failure rate of pure research is 98% , of applied technical research like drugs, invented materials (plastics, etc.) and so on, a good chunk fail and of start-ups around the survivors of the previous culling even smaller but startling amounts fail with appropriate variations between activity domains.
The earlier you are in the innovation cycle the more likely it is that your product /service will not last the course. Early adopters are the consumer side of this process. We often end up with memorials to failed beginnings - Betamax video, Atari’s, Commodores, Mac Lisas, Visicalcs (don’t remember this one? – Quicken, MYOB and siblings’ grandfather). How many internet start-ups came and went in 5 years of the bubble at what aggregate loss?
On these figures we may be wise to stay away from leading edges and doubt the likelihood that the cutting edge could slice a spud. I prefer takeoffs like The Bleeding Edge by Charles Wright, weekly in THEAGE Green Guide . He hopes to straighten us out about fallacious, falsified and fraudulent offerings in the ITC arena (a domain of notoriously cutting edges). His rendition of a Telstra customer service event is a classic example of modernised customer services where we are scored by the cutting edge of their leading edge business practices, for our good they’d say.
In a world where any can opener and financial product and face cream, not to say health “solution” and car is cutting edge, just how much junk are we being sold and how compelling is the argument for our purchasing NOW? The compulsion these days, I guess, arises from the great emptiness of repetitive acquisition syndrome. I find it surfacing in my therapy practice among the 35-50’s as a surrounding aura which soundlessly and sightlessly sucks meaning out of people with no replacement or alternative on offer. They are barely aware apart from a slight sense, as one said, of a low level anxiety underlying everyday life.
As for ‘world class’, it may be possible that there are world class performances in all domains of human activity (and those of nature for that matter). How we could say with much assurance that they are world class is a matter of interest. But that doesn’t prevent people pretending almost daily to have or be doing or making world class things themselves as a core come-on in a sales or marketing strategy. They usually cite some evidence base for the claim, but most (all?) are subject to doubt from a big enough perspective, if not for the accuracy of the framework and processes they have used.
This has never stopped any one from making such claims. Freedom of expression plus necessity of competition ensure the economic viability of discretionary misrepresentation. So they are able to proceed to the next step unimpeded, if not without guilt. This step is the implicit or explicit proposition that everyone should be attempting to become world class themselves, preferably by buying whatever the claimants have on offer. More evidence is given for the transferability of the class in point, with lots of numbers, a few instruments or tools, and a large existing client base as influencers for the prospective sales. Celebrity endorsement by using does all the preceding at half the expense, apart from the aesthetic expense to the rest of us of acquisitive presence syndrome.
This practice is systematised in, for example quality systems (which succeed at less than 50% of implementations), leadership development ( a new one each 6-12 months) and training programs (which themselves hang off the apparatus of quality and leadership). About this time in the product development life cycle the relevant driver of sales is identity polishing for prospective purchasers through membership of the group who buys / uses world class products. Advanced product /services can amplify the drivers by, again implicit or explicit, compliance mechanisms guarding the entry way to markets, right to advertise services, etc.
However, it has been discovered over the last ten years that many of this type of products / services cannot be transferred from one context to another with any assurance. Yet, they sale on in the marvellously self-sealing cycle which characterises, e.g., weight-loss programs, though perhaps with better performance ratios. The weight-loss mob manage an approximately 95% failure rate, which doesn’t stop anyone from signing up for more. Probably all you need to do to be ‘successful’ in weight works is change your product name occasionally to meet the needs for fashion statements in health care. I imagine they follow the latest research on contributing factors. Maybe weight loss is really about how you look – trying to lose is the look for oneself for many of us?
So what is the role of leading edge world class products? They are fashions to some extent. Also they express our inclination to improve and the importance of a vision or standard of excellence as a motivator for many. Whether they are any good or not, they are ‘cutting it’ by stretching or slicing the fabric of current practice(s) - a necessary stage in change of any sort.
Thanks to Brassie and Hamid’s complaints about my lack of channels for anger, and Brassie’s personal support for my making a difference suggestions a few weeks back, I’m going to provide some channels for cutting edges and world class actions to sustain them:
1- Remember cutting edges are mostly local now.
2- Leading at your own scale and pace will provide plenty of edge at a controllable level (see anger).
3- Engage others with you in these small scale high personal return edgeworks.
4- Discourage yourself and others from consuming the blandishments of large scale cutting edges of the sort that amass easily into large group obsessions; any fundamentalist engagement has this kind of potential at its core.
5- Ask others to sharpen the cutting edge you are walking.
That’s for starters. You may notice that this is a recommendation for little insurrections, non-violent of course. You’ll discover how leading your edge is by others’ efforts to dull it. By the time I get finished with this linguistic cleansing I may have the foundations for a movement…of something(s) for someone(s) to somewhere(s).
Finally, some cutting edges which led to world class losers: Edsels, New Orleans flood controls, CDO’s built from sub-primes plus 0% down-payment loans = GFC, non-renewable energy sources plus unlimited consumption plus excess uses = climate change; the extreme management practices of Enron and World Comm; the unsurpassable returns of Storm Financials, the bonuses of financial wizards. What are your favourites?
Showing posts with label language. Show all posts
Showing posts with label language. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Monday, March 2, 2009
The Rectifications…of names and things (2) – ‘Deal with it... Get over it… Move on....’
The Rectifications…of names and things (2) – ‘Deal with it... Get over it… Move on....’
Torrey Orton
March 2, 2009
Following the suggestion of Confucius, I continue some rectification of names for our times. Elsewhere (http://diarybymadman.blogspot.com/2009/02/thoughts-on-dream-of-science-without.html ) I offer some ‘solutions’ to some problems of linguistic degradation.
‘Deal with it’, ‘Get over it’, ‘Move on’ …These are among the public tools of socially (re)enforced denial. It is professionally encouraged by the psycho-popularists who claim thought can overcome all (like will, focus, commitment and so on in the leadership field), that our historical wounds can be erased by thought correction exercises and happiness will reign in the land.
The prominence of the ‘Deal with it, Get over it, Move on’ mantra in public discourse, and its purveyors’ prominence in the celebrity stakes, adds an implicit ‘ya oughta’ tone to the suggestion for most of us. As if we are failing to be the fully human beings our adverts tell us we can (should) be … a kind of self wounding by the future. Should we get over that, too?
Having a history, of any sort, is to have ways of doing, thinking and feeling things which are soft-wired in the memory of our bodies, our social patterns and our minds. All our habits were functional when learned and, so, are resistant to change. They consciously reject change (if it is possible without damage to the self sustained by these developed habits), or unconsciously subvert it (if conscious and visible resistance is contextually dangerous). The conditions for unconscious subversion are as obvious (but undiscussable in their contexts) as is the behaviour through which it is enacted – sniping, whingeing, etc. These are often the best influencing tools of the structurally low powered and the situationally disempowered.
When habits are successfully changed, they usually come with a patina of experience. This may add to the lustre of the success, but as often signals a complexity which slightly intensifies the use of the new competence or skill. Obvious example: ex-smokers who parade unconsciously their lost obsession’s replacement by another like patches or worry beads. Less obvious example: the newly assertive person whose previous passivity is expressed in the unnecessary apology which precedes their assertions (acknowledging that there are times where preparing the other for a surprise is a good idea if you want to be heard about something likely to shock them).
This mantra (DGM) is part of a stream of public consciousness including ‘going forward’ and its associate redundancies like ‘In X hours time…’ - a measure of the energy required to go? Would it be less consuming to go backwards, as we are often accused of doing? These also measure the distance which is put between us, and between us and our lives by our time(s). An unnecessary verbal qualification often has the implicit effect of distancing us from our partners in talk, of suggesting there is something more there than the apparent, something in our relationship which is defective, or about to become so. And, they are difficult to challenge or explore because they are at the edge of awareness. That’s where the denial gets a foothold.
Torrey Orton
March 2, 2009
Following the suggestion of Confucius, I continue some rectification of names for our times. Elsewhere (http://diarybymadman.blogspot.com/2009/02/thoughts-on-dream-of-science-without.html ) I offer some ‘solutions’ to some problems of linguistic degradation.
‘Deal with it’, ‘Get over it’, ‘Move on’ …These are among the public tools of socially (re)enforced denial. It is professionally encouraged by the psycho-popularists who claim thought can overcome all (like will, focus, commitment and so on in the leadership field), that our historical wounds can be erased by thought correction exercises and happiness will reign in the land.
The prominence of the ‘Deal with it, Get over it, Move on’ mantra in public discourse, and its purveyors’ prominence in the celebrity stakes, adds an implicit ‘ya oughta’ tone to the suggestion for most of us. As if we are failing to be the fully human beings our adverts tell us we can (should) be … a kind of self wounding by the future. Should we get over that, too?
Having a history, of any sort, is to have ways of doing, thinking and feeling things which are soft-wired in the memory of our bodies, our social patterns and our minds. All our habits were functional when learned and, so, are resistant to change. They consciously reject change (if it is possible without damage to the self sustained by these developed habits), or unconsciously subvert it (if conscious and visible resistance is contextually dangerous). The conditions for unconscious subversion are as obvious (but undiscussable in their contexts) as is the behaviour through which it is enacted – sniping, whingeing, etc. These are often the best influencing tools of the structurally low powered and the situationally disempowered.
When habits are successfully changed, they usually come with a patina of experience. This may add to the lustre of the success, but as often signals a complexity which slightly intensifies the use of the new competence or skill. Obvious example: ex-smokers who parade unconsciously their lost obsession’s replacement by another like patches or worry beads. Less obvious example: the newly assertive person whose previous passivity is expressed in the unnecessary apology which precedes their assertions (acknowledging that there are times where preparing the other for a surprise is a good idea if you want to be heard about something likely to shock them).
This mantra (DGM) is part of a stream of public consciousness including ‘going forward’ and its associate redundancies like ‘In X hours time…’ - a measure of the energy required to go? Would it be less consuming to go backwards, as we are often accused of doing? These also measure the distance which is put between us, and between us and our lives by our time(s). An unnecessary verbal qualification often has the implicit effect of distancing us from our partners in talk, of suggesting there is something more there than the apparent, something in our relationship which is defective, or about to become so. And, they are difficult to challenge or explore because they are at the edge of awareness. That’s where the denial gets a foothold.
Friday, February 27, 2009
Thoughts on the dream of science without politics
Thoughts on the dream of science without politics
Torrey Orton
Feb.27, 2009
I wrote the following in response to the policy draft mentioned below. I blog it now because it captures the outlines of my understanding of the world we are in and some challenges for science and public decision making arising from it (and recursively, contributing to it!). My intent was to add context understanding to the deliberations of the summit. I am not hopeful of immediate impact but I am certain of the need for my effort. These sketches will be explored in two larger pieces on (1) blame and responsibility in the Victorian fires review, and (2) is politics possible now? The Policy Position Draft is in re-write now by participants in the Summit.
Re: Australian Climate Action Summit – Policy Position Draft #2 Jan. 23, 2009
I’m concerned at the hope implicit in the segment extracted below.
“ … an Independent Science Committee that:
… identifies policies, measures and targets required to tackle climate change underpinned by sound science not political convenience.” (pg. 53, Sec. 8 Keeping Australians Informed; Australian Climate Action Summit – Policy Position Draft #2 23 Jan. 2009)
There is no human organisation that does not have ‘politics’, including scientific and religious ones. The ‘politics’ of life is about purposes and the distribution of resources to achieve them – a task all organisations have to handle. To distribute by any political system requires negotiation about the priorities, ends and such – even if a kingdom or a dictatorship. Failure to adequately and appropriately resource our priorities leads to their under-fulfillment. We have a lot of evidence of that now. In order to establish support for particular priorities and ends, we argue for them with facts and values and beliefs seeking to attract people to our preferred objectives.
So, for these among other reasons, the hope of separating “sound science” from “political convenience” is a dangerous fantasy about the world we are in. Getting to a world in which this is not the case will have to pass through this one, the denial of which will produce its own confusing problems on top of the current ones… and so…
What is this ‘political’ world now?
1) At the moment, public confidence in most sources of information is flagging, most notably in science or ‘evidence’ based sources. As well, we are all swamped with pithy data and summary generalisations from positioned commentators through which we can seldom see a common thread other than the domain name – health, education, etc. – or the attracting dog whistle. This leaves us wondering if they are talking about the same world even if the headline says transport, or education or health. How can we tell the truth rather than just lean towards our natural political or social comfort zone?
2) Back to our calamitous times. The world of material certainties is fading around us as a (perfect) storm of personally uncontrollable forces assail us. Not merely is it the economy stupid. It’s also the climate and the fluids (fuels and waters), the food and the pervasive speed of movement of them all, plus a gathering of insights and innovations which mark the growing edges of the sciences.
Second, we are engaging these forces from a weakened position in our fragmented relationships. And these weaknesses will be enhanced by the times which are the reasons for our worries in the first place. Making the effort for the longer term will be even more important as each day of its decline passes.
3) In addition, underlying these things are damaged components of our core adaptation systems. Let’s call them deep institutions:
· Everyday language is so debased that truthful speaking about almost anything in public life is impossible – all things are commoditised, some fetishized as a result, and reduced to potential calculables in short term ROI projections. This is the language of business speak and its associates celebrity speak and greed speak.
· The public deliberative process is now conducted almost wholly in adversarial terms – demonising the others as the first move; every public issue is now a “debate” (a secondary school exercise for verbal bullies – see Parliament at work) to be settled by point scoring, not truth making. This derives in part from the first point – the only common denominator is feelings: fear, loneliness, etc.
· As the tangible and intangible pressures on daily lives increase, relationships fragment and thought fundamentalises , and the two aggravate each other. These affects are visible across any political spectra you prefer – but, most obviously the ‘Right’ and ‘Left’.
· Our systems and tools of political representation are damaged. In other Anglo countries the participation rates in major elections – national and regional / state – yield results based on victory by less than half of less than half of the possible electorates (and politicians are reviled almost without exception across the electorates). So, only with the greatest bi-partisan care are decisions prevented from being illegitimate in the eyes of their populaces. Similar patterns can be found across the EU, especially about the EU itself.
· Add the above together and you have the basis for the no accountability processes and discourses which dominate public space – it’s all spun.
So what to do now?
First, at the internal level within peak climate groups (and local ones!!) one approach is to build workable truth relationships through which to share the ‘facts’ as we discover and articulate them. These would be existing relationships at work or in personal associations of various kinds (sports, religious, community groups). We should add a focus on linguistic reform to their everyday activities – for example you could work on a few weasels by:
countering expressions of personal unaccountability – e.g. ‘whatever ‘ replaced with an explicit expression of feeling about the relationship at that moment; ‘It’s all about…’ replaced with statements of the actual undertaking or intentions, etc.;
making assertions about matters of public concern – especially environmental, health and educational – which present the whole picture of the issues, or the reliability / validity constraints of the unknown features of the evidence about them;
challenging uses of business-speak which obscure real differences – e.g. ‘customer’ for patient, student, etc.; ‘assets’ for human capabilities, relationships, etc.; ‘business’ or ‘industry’ for activities which are certainly not businesses or industries (education, health, law); ‘market’ for relationships which are not transactional (student, patient, parishioner, plaintiff, etc.…); and,
interrupting premature closures in discussions and meetings – e.g. ‘at the end of the day…’, ‘the reality is…’, ‘the truth is…’, ‘the fact is..’, etc. - by presenting the discussed and unresolved content as dilemmas or uncertainties which pre-mature closure denies.
Second, at the external influencing levels:
1- keeping the perspectives in view on major issues – starting with acknowledging one’s own in every influencing initiative;
2- identifying where the specific issue being discussed borders, depends on or has interdependencies with other issues;
3- sponsoring face-offs between different positions focussing on what facts they could agree on in their domains of struggle – and which are emotional argument for the hidden paradigm;
4- providing key issues development scorecard(s) for (a) major life need domains – education, health, economy; and (b) daily life quality indicator domains – crime, cost of living, transport performance ….;
5- having an articulated cultural / historical differentiated models of well-being within which the target issue(s) can be interpreted;
6- the contexts considered should include local, regional and global comparisons or applications of the points argued; and,
7- an assertion of possible common ground across all discussants should be made as part of each contribution to the discussion (these might include shared facts, beliefs values and standards).
Torrey Orton
Feb.27, 2009
I wrote the following in response to the policy draft mentioned below. I blog it now because it captures the outlines of my understanding of the world we are in and some challenges for science and public decision making arising from it (and recursively, contributing to it!). My intent was to add context understanding to the deliberations of the summit. I am not hopeful of immediate impact but I am certain of the need for my effort. These sketches will be explored in two larger pieces on (1) blame and responsibility in the Victorian fires review, and (2) is politics possible now? The Policy Position Draft is in re-write now by participants in the Summit.
Re: Australian Climate Action Summit – Policy Position Draft #2 Jan. 23, 2009
I’m concerned at the hope implicit in the segment extracted below.
“ … an Independent Science Committee that:
… identifies policies, measures and targets required to tackle climate change underpinned by sound science not political convenience.” (pg. 53, Sec. 8 Keeping Australians Informed; Australian Climate Action Summit – Policy Position Draft #2 23 Jan. 2009)
There is no human organisation that does not have ‘politics’, including scientific and religious ones. The ‘politics’ of life is about purposes and the distribution of resources to achieve them – a task all organisations have to handle. To distribute by any political system requires negotiation about the priorities, ends and such – even if a kingdom or a dictatorship. Failure to adequately and appropriately resource our priorities leads to their under-fulfillment. We have a lot of evidence of that now. In order to establish support for particular priorities and ends, we argue for them with facts and values and beliefs seeking to attract people to our preferred objectives.
So, for these among other reasons, the hope of separating “sound science” from “political convenience” is a dangerous fantasy about the world we are in. Getting to a world in which this is not the case will have to pass through this one, the denial of which will produce its own confusing problems on top of the current ones… and so…
What is this ‘political’ world now?
1) At the moment, public confidence in most sources of information is flagging, most notably in science or ‘evidence’ based sources. As well, we are all swamped with pithy data and summary generalisations from positioned commentators through which we can seldom see a common thread other than the domain name – health, education, etc. – or the attracting dog whistle. This leaves us wondering if they are talking about the same world even if the headline says transport, or education or health. How can we tell the truth rather than just lean towards our natural political or social comfort zone?
2) Back to our calamitous times. The world of material certainties is fading around us as a (perfect) storm of personally uncontrollable forces assail us. Not merely is it the economy stupid. It’s also the climate and the fluids (fuels and waters), the food and the pervasive speed of movement of them all, plus a gathering of insights and innovations which mark the growing edges of the sciences.
Second, we are engaging these forces from a weakened position in our fragmented relationships. And these weaknesses will be enhanced by the times which are the reasons for our worries in the first place. Making the effort for the longer term will be even more important as each day of its decline passes.
3) In addition, underlying these things are damaged components of our core adaptation systems. Let’s call them deep institutions:
· Everyday language is so debased that truthful speaking about almost anything in public life is impossible – all things are commoditised, some fetishized as a result, and reduced to potential calculables in short term ROI projections. This is the language of business speak and its associates celebrity speak and greed speak.
· The public deliberative process is now conducted almost wholly in adversarial terms – demonising the others as the first move; every public issue is now a “debate” (a secondary school exercise for verbal bullies – see Parliament at work) to be settled by point scoring, not truth making. This derives in part from the first point – the only common denominator is feelings: fear, loneliness, etc.
· As the tangible and intangible pressures on daily lives increase, relationships fragment and thought fundamentalises , and the two aggravate each other. These affects are visible across any political spectra you prefer – but, most obviously the ‘Right’ and ‘Left’.
· Our systems and tools of political representation are damaged. In other Anglo countries the participation rates in major elections – national and regional / state – yield results based on victory by less than half of less than half of the possible electorates (and politicians are reviled almost without exception across the electorates). So, only with the greatest bi-partisan care are decisions prevented from being illegitimate in the eyes of their populaces. Similar patterns can be found across the EU, especially about the EU itself.
· Add the above together and you have the basis for the no accountability processes and discourses which dominate public space – it’s all spun.
So what to do now?
First, at the internal level within peak climate groups (and local ones!!) one approach is to build workable truth relationships through which to share the ‘facts’ as we discover and articulate them. These would be existing relationships at work or in personal associations of various kinds (sports, religious, community groups). We should add a focus on linguistic reform to their everyday activities – for example you could work on a few weasels by:
countering expressions of personal unaccountability – e.g. ‘whatever ‘ replaced with an explicit expression of feeling about the relationship at that moment; ‘It’s all about…’ replaced with statements of the actual undertaking or intentions, etc.;
making assertions about matters of public concern – especially environmental, health and educational – which present the whole picture of the issues, or the reliability / validity constraints of the unknown features of the evidence about them;
challenging uses of business-speak which obscure real differences – e.g. ‘customer’ for patient, student, etc.; ‘assets’ for human capabilities, relationships, etc.; ‘business’ or ‘industry’ for activities which are certainly not businesses or industries (education, health, law); ‘market’ for relationships which are not transactional (student, patient, parishioner, plaintiff, etc.…); and,
interrupting premature closures in discussions and meetings – e.g. ‘at the end of the day…’, ‘the reality is…’, ‘the truth is…’, ‘the fact is..’, etc. - by presenting the discussed and unresolved content as dilemmas or uncertainties which pre-mature closure denies.
Second, at the external influencing levels:
1- keeping the perspectives in view on major issues – starting with acknowledging one’s own in every influencing initiative;
2- identifying where the specific issue being discussed borders, depends on or has interdependencies with other issues;
3- sponsoring face-offs between different positions focussing on what facts they could agree on in their domains of struggle – and which are emotional argument for the hidden paradigm;
4- providing key issues development scorecard(s) for (a) major life need domains – education, health, economy; and (b) daily life quality indicator domains – crime, cost of living, transport performance ….;
5- having an articulated cultural / historical differentiated models of well-being within which the target issue(s) can be interpreted;
6- the contexts considered should include local, regional and global comparisons or applications of the points argued; and,
7- an assertion of possible common ground across all discussants should be made as part of each contribution to the discussion (these might include shared facts, beliefs values and standards).
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