The “slope of ineffective efficacy” is at a point just after the bulk of the planning process is completed, and after the “implement” order from required managers has been achieved. It is at this point at which one can bring in that throng of “must have buy in” mid-level managers with the most positive and least negative impact.
It’s too late for them to scuttle the project politically in the planning stages.
It’s too early for them to claim it’s somebody else’s project, and scuttle it because one is not getting any credit. In fact it’s just in time for them to claim credit themselves, which is critical.
Most important, it’s too late to scuttle the project by “adding value.”
During the period in a project life-cycle I term the “slope of ineffective efficacy,” mid-level managers can be brought on board, claim some ownership, not have any direct hands-on impact, and they can benefit themselves by gloaming onto the success, while not really being in a position to try and kill the project.
150 or so technology teachers gather once a month for a meeting … an old fashioned, analog, meeting.
Announcers announce announcements (which were sent out in email beforehand). Managers manage. Specialists present their specialities. Pointers point at points with pointers. Counterpoints are made. Facsimiles of discussions are had.
Askers ask questions. But in the active engagement of an analog meeting, many times no answers are available. “That’s a great question, and I’ll look into it, and get back to you.”
Days later, a singular answer is delivered to a singular asker. But we all did get to hear the question posed, and that is certainly something. But what? I don’t know, I’ll have to look into it and get back to you.
One of my cohorts, a jocular and intelligent fellow, posed the idea of USING the technology we are teaching to somehow facilitate the meeting. “It has to be better than sitting around a table while people shamelessly check their email and rudely interrupt the presenter?” he said.
Heresy you say? Perhaps. But if one believes less in a religion that worships the gods, than in one that feels sorry for them. (I mean, they created all this, and can’t possibly feel good about it.) One might venture to noodle on such a concept.
BUILD A MEETING:
A little like ‘build a bear’ shops found in malls across the country, there should be some structure (or the children wouldn’t be able to start), but enough freedom (so when they are done they feel like a creator).
Here’s one way, using a wiki.
(For those technology teachers among us worried about new technology, see a multitude of wikis done by 2nd graders on wikispaces.com)
1) Create an “Agenda Page” (a central directory page) for the upcoming meeting (perhaps months in advance).
2) Create “Issue Pages” for each item on the agenda. (Hyper-link from the Agenda item to it’s corresponding Issue Page and back to the Agenda page)
3) Anyone involved in the meeting could create an agenda topic and corresponding issue page prior to the meeting.
4) Anyone could add their questions, thoughts, ideas, solutions to issue pages.
The value of this would be as follows. The meeting would be about things of interest to the people attending the meeting. They came up with them. Most of the hard questions and issues would have been hashed out, discussed, answers researched and delivered, all before getting together at the meeting.
The meeting itself would be shorter, more on point, more poignant to the participants.
NOTE TO THOSE ADDICTED TO OUTLOOK PUBLIC FOLDERS FOR GROUP COMMUNICATION:
Pros: You already know how to use this technology.
Cons: Information is not collected, not key-word search-able, information does not get compiled into a group edited document, it is more like confetti–scraps of errant information floating without structure and no good way to search it. Heck even Microsoft is talking about getting rid of this Outlook public folder technology in the next few years.
Solution: Put an RSS feed on the wiki so all changes are sent via email to the outlook public folder at which everyone is used to looking. Remove write privileges for everyone so the only way to “post” in public folders is to add or alter the wiki. Eventually, everyone will start using an RSS reader and the Outlook Public Folders will have no use and go away.
Life After Wiki: Then, all the information collected in the dialog will truly be collected and key-word-search-able available ongoing in a quickly reference-able format for when one needs the information sometime in the future, or not.
This would be using the technology we are trying to get teachers to use in the way we are trying to get them to use it.
“You have enemies? Good. That means you’ve stood up for something, sometime in your life.”-Winston Churchill
Karen Gerstner is leaving a school district outside Washington, D.C.. She had a “small” job, as central office manager for the elementary Information Technology Resource Teachers.
She did what many in central offices don’t. She told the truth. She spoke truth to power. She advocated for “reason” and “rationality” and “helping students” even when it wasn’t popular to do so.
Other central office types have told me, “Oh, she would have gotten much farther if she hadn’t ruffled so many feathers.”
Really! That’s how you measure success? Not bothering people? That’s the wider problem with modern Education. We promote people who wear nice sweaters, have expensive readers, and don’t say anything to anyone that might mean anything, thereby ensuring they don’t say anything anyone might find objectionable.
Karen was different. If something was wacky, she would raise her hand and point it out. A radical idea, I know. But a function greatly needed in Education. In private industry, malarkey doesn’t last long. It gets killed by people who are better than it. In Education, that’s not the case. The bull wins too much of the time.
Karen was one of the things that made me think there was hope. She was the Jiminy Cricket at the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party. Someone to say, “Now Hold On Now!” Someone with enough gravitas to be listened to, and the chutzpah to call people on their bull.
I, for one, will miss her greatly. And hope someone else will step into the role of adult in a swirling sea of Educational Executives working more to cover their asses than doing their jobs.
I’m talking about Education in general. Of course, if you are an executive or work in a central office and are “good,” well then, you know I’m not talking about you in particular.
A disgusted 4th grade teacher in Massachusetts sent in this parable.
THE SETUP: It is easier to create one software configuration and copy it onto all the computers in a school, rather than loading all the separate software programs on each computer individually.
However, creating the master software configuration in this way is not an “out of the box” solution. Like teaching, one must know the technology, the ability of the staff, and the proclivities of the students.
And here begins our story in a small New England public school system…
THE STORY: In any school system there are maybe one or two people who really know how to create a software configuration and do it well. Folks are naturally drawn to and follow these thought leaders.
Then, in steps the central office.
It’s called “creating a process” or “defining best practices.” A noble intention when it is indeed the intention.
However, in this case the central office was trying to cast their influence.
This type of central office cube-troll had made their career by not saying anything to anyone that might mean anything, thereby ensuring they would not say anything objectionable to anyone.
When “thought leaders” raise their heads in this school system, this type of central office cube-troll runs around in front of the parade and starts tossing around a baton as though they know what’s going on behind them.
What came from this was a “best practices” document which was wrong. When the two people who knew what they were doing tried to correct the document, the central office dismissed them, because, well you know, the folks in the central office believe they got there because they know more than everyone else, right?
The result was the “best practices” document remains at best a factory second, a bastardized facsimile of the correct way to create a software configuration, and the central office has proceeded to train the whole county with their version.
Now nothing works well in this New England school system. Teachers are dismayed by technology and less of it is being used.
THE MORAL: Central office figures are at their best when they are pushing the thought leaders into the limelight rather than pretending they are experts.
