Bill's Notebook

“An examination by The New York Times highlights the chasm between the oil industry’s assertions about the reliability of its blowout preventers and a more complex reality. It reveals that the federal agency charged with regulating offshore drilling, the Minerals Management Service, repeatedly declined to act on advice from its own experts on how it could minimize the risk of a blind shear ram failure.”

This is going in my book on organizational failure.

The bright side of wrong

Elizabeth Corcoran gives a great argument in the ongoing debate about technology’s effect on our minds.  She makes an important point- “I keep wondering why we lump all “technology” into the same basket. By doing so, we ignore the most important distinction of all: whether we are sponges for absorbing other people’s ideas, or whether we’re making our own.“

She gives an example of how children learn more when they are given tools to create content rather than tools that just deliver content.  Now, she talks about technology in the classroom but this equally applies to technology in the workplace.  Think of the training that consists of delivering content (lecture, PowerPoint, brown bag talk, etc.) versus the training where people are encouraged to play with the new software program or tool.

I consider the basis of learning to be the creation of mental models.  You cannot just transmit your mental model completely to me; I have to create one unique to my own mind.  You can give me information to build the model and you can create experiences that will shape the mental model but the final product is still through my unique mental processes.  But every mental model starts with engagement.  Thus, this is why allowing people to make content rather than absorb content is the key to effective learning.

Nick Carr, who criticizes the Internet while reaping the benefits of having such a great platform to push his neo-Luddite views, has published a book warning us all that online links are destroying our brains.  It takes a brave person to ignore the evidence that the Internet is actually good for our brains but Carr has made a great living by being the quotable tech contrarian.  But if Mr. Carr is concerned about threats to our minds, then I have news of the most diabolical threat to the modern brain.

The morning commute. “In 2008, scientists at the University of Michigan did a very clever study illuminating how this activity led to dramatic decreases in working memory, self-control, visual attention and positive affect. Other studies have demonstrated that people who are less exposed to this activity show enhanced brain function. They are better able to focus and even recover more quickly in hospitals.”  As we walk down the city street (or drive down U.S. 1), we constantly are fighting to keep our attention focused while being distracted by neon signs, people who suddenly switch direction in front of you, and that really attractive jogger.  The mind is constantly scanning for dangers but we keep pulling it back to focus on our path.

Another good argument for teleworking. 

It’s basically the disappointment of expecting a cool toy on Christmas morning and you actually receive a pair of sensible pants.

Two interesting articles about organizational culture in the latest issue of the “Journal of Organizational Change Management.”  The first article is a cultural analysis of organizational memory and its role in organizational change while the second article describes how organizational memory can hinder learning a new technology.

In the first article, McCabe gives a more detailed description of organizational culture as a collection of shared memories.  These memories can contradict each other or just be ambiguous about past organizational events but, woven together, these memories form a dynamic and conflicting culture for the organization.  McCabe disputes the common belief of many management theorists that the past can be erased in favor of the new reality because the past always blocks change.  Organizational memory is more complex than that because some memories can help facilitate change while other aspects resist change.  McCabe concludes by stating that organizational memory cannot be managed as part of the change process but must be accounted for.

McCabe’s article illuminates the findings in the second article by Becker.  The second article deals with the process of acquiring new technology in an organization.  As Becker explains, for employees to adopt a new technology they must unlearn the old technology.  They do this through releasing mental models of the workings of the old technology and create mental models of how the new technology works.  Memories of past change efforts can hinder the process of unlearning if it promotes fear and anxiety among the employees.  Becker does not have any specific remedies for dealing with organizational memory and unlearning but she does argue that further research is necessary to fully understand the unlearning process.

The relevance to Gov 2.0 is clear.  Many agencies have long and painful memories of past change efforts that have been woven into the current culture.  Gov 2.0 advocates must understand and acknowledge the past while developing strategies to alleviate the fear that will prevent government employees from unlearning the current way things are done in favor of making government transparent, open, and engaging.  Gov 2.0 advocates must take the positive aspects of the past and use those events to counter the negative past events while realizing that culture cannot be fully controlled.

References:

Becker, K. (2010). Facilitating unlearning during implementation of new technology. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 23:3. 251-268.

McCabe, D. (2010). Taking the long view: A cultural analysis of memory as resisting and facilitating organizational change. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 23:3. 230-250.

Three interesting articles on memory.  The first is from the Frontal Cortex and it is a great summary of the second article which is an eight-part series on Slate’s experiment in altering political truths.  What Slate has done is to create four political myths and then inserted them into news stories (like 1984’s Ministry of Truth).  Then, Slate surveyed their readers to determine who picked up on the fakes.

Many readers picked out the fakes.  But, of the ones who didn’t, they were sure they remembered the incident.  The numbers rose when people were shown faked photos of the mythical events.  In some cases, people had elaborate memories surrounding the faked event.

Why does this happen?  Because, as Frontal Cortex explains, we reconstruct our memories every time we remember something.  And the more we remember something, the less accurate it becomes as we reconsolidate the memory.  We start adding new interpretations to remembered events and we add details that were not possible at the time of the memory.

Why isn’t memory a fixed and unchanging mental construct?  One possible answer could be in the third article – “Modeling the mobility of living organisms in heterogeneous landscapes: Does memory improve foraging success?”  This research article describes how foraging animals who inject some randomness into their search are seven times more effective than foragers who rely on their memory of past finds when both are searching in a changed landscape.

So, could reconstructing memories give us an advantage by allowing us to incorporate later experiences and thus we have a better understanding of past events that can guide us in current problem solving?  Are our imperfect memories a way to inject randomness into our thought processes and make us more effective thinkers?

This is why it is always a good idea to make notes when we need to remember something important or significant.  I have found that revisiting a journal entry from years past is always surprising because my memory of the event usually differs from what I wrote at the time.  Even photos can be a great check on our memories.

Unless you do have a photo of you meeting Bugs Bunny at Disneyland.  Then you know that someone has faked the photo.

“Mr. McGuire: I want to say one word to you. Just one word.
Benjamin: Yes, sir.
Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?
Benjamin: Yes, I am.
Mr. McGuire: Plastics.
Benjamin: Just how do you mean that, sir?”
The Graduate – 1967

In the late 60s, plastics may have been the growth industry but, according to Mike Loukides at O’Reilly Radar, the ability to work with data is the new growth industry.

Plasma rocket technology is a game-changer in space exploration.  With plasma rockets, we could travel to Mars in 39 days rather than the estimated 18 months by chemical rockets.  Plasma rocket technology will also make commercial mining of asteroids a real possibility.