Re: [unrev-II] How DKR Penetration Will Be Achieved

From: Eric Armstrong (eric.armstrong@eng.sun.com)
Date: Thu Mar 02 2000 - 15:49:23 PST

  • Next message: Eric Armstrong: "Re: [unrev-II] Use of Case Studies in a DKR"

    From: Eric Armstrong <eric.armstrong@eng.sun.com>

    Eugene Kim wrote:
    >
    > > There are several reasons that prevent this approach from
    > > being viable. Chief among them are:
    > > 1) Organizations simply do not work that way.
    > > While some seriously desire to improve their productive
    > > capacities, virtually none want to "improve their
    > > capability to improve".
    >
    > I'm not sure I agree. When a company tries to facilitate
    > communication
    > among its employees by building centralized cafeterias, intranet
    > communities, or even rearranging cubicle arrangements, are they
    > improving
    > their productive capacities, or are they improving their capability to
    > improve?
    >
    The *may* be improving their capability to improve, but I would
    argue that their goal is to improve productivity. In other words,
    they are engaging explicitly in a B-process. I'm going to hazard
    a guess that any other effects are unintended, happening by chance.

    More importantly, what would it *mean* to improve your ability to
    improve, in the context of cafeterias? If communal sitting areas
    bring people into closer contact, then "improving your ability to
    improve" must mean getting better at figuring out *who* needs to
    be in contact at any point in time, and rearranging the office so
    that see each other more frequently.

    Imagine that all the offices are on skids. At night, they get
    rearranged so that people who need to see other more are more
    closely adjacent. Maybe the CEO needs to be in touch with
    technical folk this week and marketing folk next week. The
    change in office locations would give low-level developers the
    chance for some spontaneous and possibly eye-opeing contact with
    upper management.

    That idea is preposterous of course (the office rearrangement,
    I mean). But that is one way to construe "improving your ability
    to improve". And the difficulty of actually implementing tasks
    of that nature may suggest why it receives so little attention.

    You can take a horse to water, but you can't make him drink --
    unless you speak his language and can sell him the water!!
    To implement a DKR, it's necessary to speak the right language
    and know how to sell it to executives, managers, and investors.

    Who was it who mentioned their company's DKR-project? That is
    an example of a system that IS fundable, because it is seen as
    a very direct B-level activity.

    ------------------------------------------------------------------------
    DON'T HATE YOUR RATE!
    Get a NextCard Visa, in 30 seconds! Get rates as low as
    0.0% Intro or 9.9% Fixed APR and no hidden fees.
    Apply NOW!
    http://click.egroups.com/1/2120/2/_/444287/_/952040973/
    ------------------------------------------------------------------------

    Community email addresses:
      Post message: unrev-II@onelist.com
      Subscribe: unrev-II-subscribe@onelist.com
      Unsubscribe: unrev-II-unsubscribe@onelist.com
      List owner: unrev-II-owner@onelist.com

    Shortcut URL to this page:
      http://www.onelist.com/community/unrev-II



    This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Thu Mar 02 2000 - 15:57:35 PST