Jack Park
Palo Alto, California
650 388 1108
jackpark@thinkalong.com



Date: Tue, 23 Sep 2002 10:12:33 -0700

03 00050 60 02092304




Mr. Morris E. Jones
morris.jones@intel.com
Intel Corporation
2200 Mission College Blvd
Santa Clara, CA 95052 8119
..
Subject:   Bridge to a New Way of Working Begins with Study

Dear Morris,

Thanks again, Morris [for your letter today on Rod's request help building a bridge to a new way of working that begins with study... ]
..
I think it to be quite amazing that what you say here mirrors many of my own views on the situation.
..
When I read Rod's records, what I see is his constant warping of what he observes to fit into his own metaphors and views. Rod has asked me to take a look at some writing of Dave Snowden and Rod's own take on Snowden's work. Meanwhile, Rod complains that Snowden must not understand knowledge management (as Rod understands it) because there is no apparent "work product". Always, Rod returns to his record as proof that he (Rod) is the only person on the planet that understands knowledge management (as Rod defines it).
..
Yesterday, when Rod completely ignored what you wrote, I pretty much decided that I wanted to write to Rod and ask him to take me off his cc list and stop phoning me. I didn't act; he called last night. We had a very long talk. During most phone calls, I get wind that Rod seems to understand that something is amiss, and he will even agree quite strongly with some of my opinions. But, nothing comes of that.
..
I am going through this kind of problem with another very intelligent human right now, one who completely agrees with me that he needs to back off his instructivist mannerisms and become more constructivist. In that situation, as with my experiences with Rod, nothing changes. Nothing, it seems, will ever change.
..
I'm just not smart enough to know what is right in the present situation; rather, I live on my own intuitions and my own process of reinventing myself (a divorce will do that to some people). I knew a man who went to his grave extremely unhappy that he never became the likes of Bill Piper, Clyde Cessna, Walter Beech, or any of the other aviation greats, even though he was the designer of a couple of extremely important aircraft (Piper Cherokee, and Lockheed P2V). I just don't want to go to my grave unhappy that I didn't make it in some field, so, I take quite seriously the notion of periodic self-reinvention. Bill Lear's autobiography reveals his strong belief that people should change careers every 5 years. That notion, it turns out, seems to hold for me. That tiny story fragment lays the foundation for the way I view Rod and his activities; I have a powerful distaste for ossified thinking and stuck records.
..
Right now, I think Rod's best hope resides in Gary Johnson, who, I think, is about to take possession of a copy of SDS. I don't think Gary is burdened, as I am, with the notion that looking at SDS would interfere with his own processes (as it would with me: what I see in a product, I often hack into some open source project, and I just don't want to be known for stealing proprietary ideas).
..
Rod's process, in my view, is one of story telling. Snowden claims that story telling is the right process. So do I. I'm playing with "augmented story telling" where there are two spaces, one for story telling (protected, not interactive) and one for story discussion (fully interactive). SDS lacks the other space. When I mention this to Rod, he gets thoroughly confused and thinks I'm asking him to let others edit his records (I am not: read what I just said), and then he says: "write to me and I'll mention your ideas in the record" (yea, right! as filtered with Rod's own view of what I just said). When I talk about interactive, that's precisely what I mean. SDS is not that in any sense of the term.
..
In any case, it seems to me that we have pounded on Rod enough for one day. As mentioned below, there doesn't seem to be progress, but for me, it's not all that entertaining anymore.

Sincerely,



Jack Park
jackpark@thinkalong.com



..
Copy to:
  1. Rod Welch, rodwelch@pacbell.net