Thursday, September 15, 2011

The Anonymous 'Tip Off'

On Sep. 14th I got a genuine feedback: 
  • " What exactly is your product? 
  • Is it a service, a philosophy, a methodology, a software, or what? 
  • Some concrete example will do wonders for the readers who want to understand what you are trying to do. I have glanced through your posts and all I see are some musings on various management related issues, all heavily infused with management speak." 
I responded: 
  • Product: Transformation of the enterprise with culture induced by technology.
 That was loose. I ought to have said ‘Produce’ instead of 'Product'. But at the frontier one does tend to engage in the spirit and not the semantics. I developed my last post to define and explain the delivery. Back came the banana skin I had left lying around: 
  • Transformation is the end result; it cannot be the means - which is what I mean by product.
 My transformation relates to metanoia or the change of the mind. It is a produce that deals with the world within a person. It cannot be seen for it has to do with better judgments and execution. The nature of transformation must first be understood for it is a by-product. Since it follows from philosophy it cannot be understood from a grasp of the product.

There is little to grasp from the product for it is a system for the daily interactions. Its USP of compelling adoption and delivery of Feedback can be comprehended only if the nature of transformation is understood. The audience must know what they are looking for.

Transformation is like talking of God. He lies in the story. My last post is a story. It is difficult to define God for those who have not experienced his roots. For 5000 years man has progressed in the belief there is no God in the organisation. People like Sun Tzu and Senge talked of him but could not create him. Man still had to drive success with battle plans and principles. There was no Faith. This explains the mess today.

It took me five years to create the product but thereafter ten years to understand the nature of transformation. I would still have been struggling had it not been for Deming and Senge. They have gained fame for their understanding of Knowledge but not flourished cause they could not create the organisation and energy to drive transformation. They failed to create Faith. I have created the intelligent energy to organise and drive the Knowledge force that brings about transformation or change of mind for better working and action and emergence of reality as well as Collective Wisdom. The product or the means is the infrastructure I set up. It operates a compelling process for the daily interactions. Transformation in thinking follows with the Feedback created.

I have an academic paper coming up in a renowned systems journal on the subject of transformation and how it follows from interactions. The emphasis is on the specific properties of the interactions. Collaboration is also interaction but it is incapable of delivering transformation except in very very rare cases. That is why Enterprise x.0 will fail like E 2.0. Till the paper is published I would urge the interested reader to see my project description at:
The project is the end product of years of philosophy development, remarkable success with a prototype and ready software for an enterprise scale pilot. I need the pilot to establish the new reality. Words and pictures cannot reveal the possible to the uninitiated. For new Knowledge one has to make up the mind: is the possible desirable? If the answer is yes then one has to follow Einstein:
  •  “The problems we have created in the world today will not be solved by the level of thinking that created them.”       
Before concluding this post is abstract ask yourself: 
  • Why has collaboration, with all its hyped and clear product definitions and case studies, failed?
  • Why is Japan, a highly advanced Knowledge creating economy, in the pits?
  • Why is the US struggling despite the best 'products' technology has to offer?
  • Why have administrative reforms failed in India since 1956?
  • What is needed for success and growth?
Perhaps the answer is more than what a product or a case study can provide. They may only confuse and confound.  Till a clear systemic answer going to the roots of the problem emerges to the last question we shall be at cross purposes for the black cat can be sighted only in a lighted rtoom. I or my posts cannot be blamed for the absence of light. You may be looking for a different light.  Experiments/pilots are an acknowledged way for distributed people to share the same page. Even prototypes may have meaning only for the creator since scale differences spawn a lot of questions. So the real questions are: Is the need the pilot addresses worth it? Is the philosophy powerful enough? Is there an alternate philosophy over the horizon?

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