To Fred Nickols (maybe only Fred has any interest in this any more, in
which case we should probably take this off line),
Whew, I'm so confused. How can you and I agree on so much yet end up
saying apparently contradictory (and apparently quite simple) things?
I read your messages, nodding my head affirmatively all along, then when
you reach your conclusion (that it is not useful to talk about groups as
having goals) my head wants to spin around backward!
Your poem has thrown some light on why we speak the way we do. You seem
to be mostly concerned about having someone (like a boss) impose goals on
a group. That's a very real concern, and I resist the imposition of goals
(and values and beliefs) with all my heart and strength. And, like you (I
think), I'm not willing to say that a group has a goal simply because
someone "in authority" declares it for them.
So far so good, I hope.
Now, when you respond to the mob behavior example be explaining how the
group could do something to which every individual member is opposed, I
say, "Yes, those are probably the kinds of mechanisms that make this sort
of thing happen." But then I want to say, no matter the mechanism, it
happens. And if a group acts as if it had a goal that no member has (as
they sometimes do), I want to be able to say that the group had a goal.
If the group did not have a goal, who had it? (Remember, we agreed that
no individual member had it.) To whom do we assign the obvious goal that
the group worked to achieve, if not to the collective itself?
This sound a bit nitpicky -- but I tried to explain that reducing group
goals to individual goals has pragmatic effects on how I do what I do
(which is to help organizations/groups change.) I do not take an
individual (one-person-at-a-time) approach. I act as if the group has
goals (and norms, and beliefs, and values), and work quite directly on
changing those things. And, when I do this well, the collective behavior
of the group (and of the individuals within it) changes -- which is what
they wanted me to help them do.
Maybe I should also say that most of the time I do this "subversively."
That is, I'm not working for the (hidden or otherwise) agenda of a "boss"
but am working with the needs and desires of the group members to effect
these changes. It is "subversive" in the sense that it "subverts" the
existing corporate culture, and in that it uses "subversive" methodology.
Unscrupulous people might, and have (historically -- Hitler jumps to
mind), use similar methods to force their goals on a group. I won't. I
have walked away from contracts, even when I was nearly starving, where
this was the intent. When I do work with organizations, it is usually
"the boss" who is one of the people who changes the most. (In general,
middle managers must go through the most change, however.)
Does this help at all? If not it's probably semantic preference without
real substance and we should shelve this discussion and get on with our
lives, huh? Thanks for the dialogue.
--"John Gunkler" <jgunkler@sprintmail.com>
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>