THE WELCH COMPANY
440 Davis Court #1602
San Francisco, CA 94111-2496
415 781 5700
Date: Wed, 18 Sep 2002 12:36:27 -0700
03 00050 61 02091801
Mr. David J. Snowden
Director
snowded@uk.ibm.com
Cynefin Centre
IBM Global Services
..
Subject:
Bridge to a New Way of Working
Dear Dave,
The attached letter to John Maloney a few weeks ago on August 23 describes an
opportunity for building
bridges to a new way of working. ..
Thought it might address
your question on June 10 about who has paid for SDS
and Communication Metrics? There have not been a lot sales due to
the reasons set out in the attached letter to John summarizing market
conditions, and citing discussion with Pat Lincoln at SRI on May 27, 2001.
..
As noted previously, you have hit on important ideas about knowledge that are
supported by SDS technology explained in POIMS.
..
Transformation to a new way of working is slow, however, because even where
people agree, there is often lack of common effort to advance common
objectives. It, also, appears that advance from information to a culture of
knowledge requires a breakthrough methodology that permits steady progress on
KM. Reasonable
people can disagree on this,
as discussed with Doug Engelbart
on March 27, 2000.
..
Still, your recent report that
other KM efforts have not met expectations, may
justify investing time to study the record using SDS for
converting daily working information into knowledge, as reported by USACE.
..
In any event, we need to
work on building bridges,
as seen by progress on
September 12 when someone at DCMA discovered how fast and easy it is to create
connections to context that grow understanding of cause and effect
..
Sincerely,
THE WELCH COMPANY
Rod Welch
rodwelch@pacbell.net
.. Subject: Groove Seminar Invitation and Work Product Support
Date: Fri, 23 Aug 2002 11:55:37 -0700
You make a powerful point in your letter today about the importance of
multiple ways for people to interact with the world. I agree with
that.
.. It is also true that I am focusing on a new way of doing things which
you correctly note involves POIMS and SDS. These are arcane terms, as
you point out, but nor more so than KM, Groove, and many others which
you seem to embrace with equanimity. Moreover SDS and POIMS derive
from experience using the customary methods you champion, as explained
on 000723....
.. http://www.welchco.com/sd/08/00101/02/00/07/23/141404.HTM#0001
As you can see, the record on 000723 shows reliance over many years on
all of the methods you are using, and this experience led to a new way
of working. As shown in another letter earlier today, I regard your
work as critical for building bridges to a better future that improves
customary ways. An example of the need for a bridge, is the record on
970107...
.. http://www.welchco.com/sd/08/00101/02/97/01/07/074655.HTM#0001
As you can see from that experience, it shows work performed minute by
minute, hour by hour using the kind of direct communication you cite
in your letter today as the driving force of daily work in the real
world. Certainly the people who interacted, like you, were not
burdened by POIMS and SDS, nor by a lot of annoying references. Yet
they were helped because someone took the trouble to line up the tasks
they were doing with objectives, requirements and commitments. If you
look further in the record on 970107....
.. http://www.welchco.com/sd/08/00101/02/97/01/07/074655.HTM#4953
...you will see the president of a company, who held fast to your view
that SDS was actually harmful, eventually changed his mind upon the
accumulation of experience showing that accurate memory saves time and
money.
.. Notice as well, experience a few days later on 970110 showing that a
whole group of people who relied on customary work practices, came to
rely on SDS as a stronger method after gaining exposure over a period
of time...
http://www.welchco.com/sd/08/00101/02/97/01/10/074526.HTM#2487 .. So, while it is true that there are lot of methods for interacting
with people, SDS was designed to augment traditional methods in ways
that enable people to improve performance. Experience has shown that
using SDS saves time and money and failing to do so on complex
endeavors causes mistakes, loss, conflict, crisis and calamity.
Since, as you can see, I have a lot of experience using customary
ways, I wouldn't waste time with SDS, if there were not a long record
showing it adds value.
.. This does not require people to give up customary ways. When literacy
emerged about 700 BC, people did not abandon orality. Still today the
methods you use and advocate are powerful methods for building
community through relationships and for getting things done. Your
methods will remain useful and indeed the dominate methodologies,
because they are grounded in human biology, as set out in POIMS...
.. http://www.welchco.com/03/00050/01/09/01/02/00030.HTM#5106
As a leader and person of prominence in the KM movement, I only hope
that you will join in the effort to strengthen obvious weaknesses in
customary methods, as technology continues to compress time and
distance, creating a new world order that is different from the
conditions that evolved our biological gifts. Leaving room for
advance, perhaps there will come a time that SDS can be seen as
contributing to the long march of civilization, rather than an
annoying hindrance that constantly reminds of alignment between what
we are doing and saying today, and what we set out to do, agreed to do
and are required to do for sake of community.
.. Let's keep building bridges.
Rod
.. John wrote:
>
> Hi Rod,
>
> You seem to have a very narrow, provincial view. Why does something need
> to be a url to be useful? The parochial requirement for addressability
> effectively cuts yourself off from a vast ocean of valuable content,
> interaction and community. It is very odd.
>
> The white board here in my office, or my last telephone conversation,
> the IM just sent and the hall conversation I just had are not
> 'addressable' -- is that a problem too?!? It happens to be the
> environment where REAL work is done.
>
> Work, hence value, is multi-modal by nature.
>
> Textual information, http and url represent only a tiny, miniscule
> really, access to the richness and communication needed to make progress
> and innovate. Their over use, like email, is counterproductive and
> disturbing.
>
> The use of arcane language and unusual arconyms like POMIS and SDS (?)
> contribute to the problem.
>
> Anyway, your Groove invitation stands but it doesn't seem like your
> intransigence will allow you to enjoy the great benefits of discovery
> and exploration outside your own narrow mythology and flawed orthodoxy.
>
> Regards,
>
> John
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Rod Welch [mailto:rowelch@attglobal.net]
> Sent: Friday, August 23, 2002 9:26 AM
> To: jtmalone@pacbell.net
> Subject: You're Invited To Groove!
>
> John,
>
> Thanks very much for this invitation and the opportunity to download
> Groove. As we discussed, would like to see some work product
> demonstrating this is an effective way to invest time.
>
> If there is something on the KM summit in a shared space, then it should
> be addressable to be useful, and in that case, someone can point to it,
> as in a librarian helping someone find a book in the shared space of a
> library. If the Groove shared space is addressable, please provide a
> link for review.
>
> Good luck with the conference.
>
> Rod
>
>
> jtmalone@pacbell.net wrote:
> >
> > Rod,
> >
> > All Knowledge Economics Summit content, community, collaboration and
> > context is carried in this Shared Space.
> >
> > Cordially,
> >
> > John
> >
> > You're invited to participate in a Groove shared space called
> > "Knowledge Economics Summit".
> >
> > The invitation from "John T. Maloney" is in the attached file,
> > "Knowledge Economics Summit.grv".
> >
> > Go to > > Go to http://www.groove.net/go/invite for instructions or to download
> > Groove.
> >
> >
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> > Name: Knowledge Economics
> Summit.grv
> > Knowledge Economics Summit.grv Type: unspecified type
> (application/octet-stream)
> > Encoding: base64