ref: Clyde Howell
>Let me offer something from a little more obscure field (relative to
>LO) than sociometrics. This is partly thinking
>and processing out loud.
>Did anyone ever see the movie Paper Chase (not the series). Timothy
>Bottoms plays Hart, a young law student, who is struggling with a
>course in contract law. In one scene he is talking
>to a young woman (who turns out to be the daughter of the dreaded
>professor of the contract law class) as he
>describes the dynamics of the class.
>Hart characterizes the students in the class into three distinct
>groups. ...
...snip...
Hello All,
First an introduction - this is my first post to this forum. My interest
in LO concepts have became accentuated over the last 9 months as a
colleague and I have been working to develop a new business concept and
explore the evolutionary concepts associated with its growth. We work in
high tech systems development. (More info available as it applies.)
Anyway, something about the previous message struck a cord.In particular,
I have always heard that notion of positioning within a classroom and the
correlation to performance within. I would now like to challenge the
notion of the correlation between "public" exposure and involvement.
Based on recent personal experience I would like to ask the group to
consider the concept of the hidden organization. Consider for a moment
situations where within a group of people it is appropriate for an
individual to take the center stage in terms of driving a project (my
personal experience of late where it was necessary for my colleague to be
considered the project owner). And yet, behind the individual are many
others who contribute to the conceptual formulation of the idea, yet the
rest of the group may not be public at all.
I'll cite another recent example from Forbes magazine
(http://www.forbes.com/forbes/97/0127/5902086a.htm) regarding Steve
Ballmer who Forbes billed as an integral figure behind Gates who helped
drive the aggressive nature of the Microsoft organization. I quote:
"Behind every visionary stands a butt-kicking enforcer.
Meet Microsoft's Steve Ballmer, Bill Gates' alter ego. "
As an underinformed individual my misguided interpretation had always
centered around Gates. The article about Ballmer offered another
interpretation of how the organzation functions.
Consider who has the visibility.
Please comment,
-D
-- Dan Kaufmann Nova Technology dank@novanova.comLearning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>