U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
San Francisco District
333 Market Street; Room 806A
San Francisco, CA 94105 1905


Date:   Monday, January 04, 1999 3:50 PM



Mr. Thompson F. Keesling, Architect
Assistant Chief
Construction Operations Division
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
San Francisco District
333 Market Street; Room 806A
San Francisco, CA  94105 1905

Subject:  Our old friend Communications Metrics
Tom, In answer to your letter today, my concern regarding quality control refers to possible inaccuracies that may occur due to note-taking by consensus.

First you have the problem of the note-taker's interpretation of events and then you have individual spins on the information recorded.

Perhaps there has to be a fundamental agreement on the scope of information one needs. Either we record everything via tape or transcript or select only what is both objective and relevant from the beginning.

Maybe the information has to be categorized such as, a decision, a question, an action item, or fact, versus mere opinion and conjecture. I liken this to the evidence we gather to prove a theory. In a similar manner, we need to decide what information we really need to make good decisions.

I believe this could take some thoughtful planning to avoid information overload and/or cognitive distortions.

Sincerely,



Ms. Merry Goodenough, ESQ
Office of Counsel