Re: Shared Vision Tough Spots LO900

jack@his.com
Sun, 23 Apr 95 11:34:47

Subject: Re: Shared Vision Tough Spots LO883

This note is meant as a response to Mike McMaster's wonderful contribution
on vision and mission contained in LO 883, which I cannot summarize, but
here are some of the points that captured my attention:

Mike points out quite clearly that the vision behind putting a man on the
moon was articulated as "exploring space for the benefit of mankind" and
that putting a man on the moon and returning him safely within a decade
was a mission statement. Mike goes on by calling attention to the decline
of the space effort since the achievement of the mission and asks, "What
happened?", concluding:

"We might say they didn't have new missions that were as worthy, demanding
or challenging as the initial one. We might also say that the vision
statement disappeared. Having focussed on the mission - which is easier
to do - the vision statement faded and was never revived. Or we might say
that the conversation - the dialogue - which had produced a field of
possibility ceased and, when the dialogue ceased, the space died. And the
rest is just work."

In my opinion, an important dimension is omitted from Mike's discussion
which, if we can understand it well, will shed light on the core inquiry
of this list:

In the course of pursuing the mission, particular practices emerged which
directed the mission toward a different vision. To adapt Senge's
language, the "shared vision" became unshared... or more likely,
smoothed-over differences in the vision sharing process broke through in
the course of action. By the time we were sending a man to the moon, the
focus had shifted from "pure" challenge to conversion of learnings into
profitable products and services ("technology transfer") and to
applications in the game of "global defense". The technology of space
exploration was reduced to a vehicle for development of other "more
practical" technologies.

Those are, in my view, the specifics. Lurking in the background are
archetypes which describe a flow of relations between development of
knowledge and economic patterns in a nation-state environment within a
capitalist structure.

But underlying all of this is the dynamics by which actions declare
consequences that will impact the vision which informed the actions, and
change them. I connect to this idea a notion I have that practices
generate the theory that explains them...

--
Jack Hirschfeld                  A kiddly divey too, wouldn't you?
jack@his.com