Leadership in CoP -- More

Today I read a piece "Vigilant vs. Operational Leaders: Changes at Ford, the Coke-Pepsi Fiasco, and Other Management Moments" on Knowledge@Wharton newsletter.

It looks a little bit like a matrioska... however, George Day and Paul Schoemaker built on top of their research (not "expert opinions"!!!) and analyzed the four traits of leadership:

(a) external focus
(b) conceptual ability
(c) organizational role and
(d) time horizon.

Now, does it apply to CoPs and if so, how?

External Focus.
"Vigilant leaders" - they say - "are more externally oriented: They are open to new ideas, seek diverse perspectives, listen to a wide array of sources and foster broad social and professional networks."

Reading this description, one immediately thinks of Kolb's learning styles and of the diverging learning style in particular:
"Diverging (feeling and watching - CE/RO) - These people are able to look at things from different perspectives. They are sensitive. They prefer to watch rather than do, tending to gather information and use imagination to solve problems. They are best at viewing concrete situations several different viewpoints. Kolb called this style 'Diverging' because these people perform better in situations that require ideas-generation, for example, brainstorming. People with a Diverging learning style have broad cultural interests and like to gather information. They are interested in people, tend to be imaginative and emotional, and tend to be strong in the arts. People with the Diverging style prefer to work in groups, to listen with an open mind and to receive personal feedback."

Now I ask: is there any doubt about the fact that, in a CoP, problems and ideas are concrete and have to be looked at from different perspectives, idea are generated mainly through group brainstorming, and the capability of giving and receiving strong and open personal feedback is an asset, especially for the resident facilitator(s)?

Also note how Day and Schoemaker define operational leaders: "more narrowly focused, have less interest in outside opinions and confine their networking to familiar settings". That is, they are concerned with one or few topics, don't like apparently "off-topic" threads and don't like unfamiliar territory, often resorting to ipse dixit (like many people in the CoP field do anytime Wenger is contested, as if his works were an infallible religious book which doesn't even need interpretation).


Conceptual Ability.
Vigilant leaders also "probe deeply for second order effects", that is, they do not stay content with analyzing their experiences through the lenses of process management, ROI or McElroy's first generation KM. In other words, they aren't ISO 9000 compliant.

Their counterparts, operational leaders, are those first generation KM dinosaurs one can stumble when joining KM groups. They are predictable and focused mainly on the task at hand, they rely on past experience and try to avoid mistakes like the plague. In their brain, Popper's philosophy hasn't sunk yet and they think that for their knowledge to be valid all they need is to try to verify it over and over again, often resorting to qualitative descriptions without any rigor whatsover. They still regard induction as the main pillar of science and behave like Russell's inductivist turkey (slide #14), they call deduction a "theoretical approach", a "generalization" and/or a "lack of context". They have what Piaget would define pre-operational thinking.

CoPs strongly need a leader whose culture and interests go beyond first order effects. The ideal CoP leader would look at the CoP s/he leads in terms of Value Networks rather than first order outcomes.


Organizational Role.
But vigilant leaders also enable people in their company by allowing them to explore areas outside their main focus. The dinosaurs I described above are controlling, focused on efficiency and cost cutting and don't explore outside potential. This is particularly unfortunate when leading a CoP which is all geared onto idea generation and sharing.

Even though methods to measure and test a CoP's effect, impact and outcome, existed and there were consensus among scholars and/or practitioners on which one to use first and why, there would still be a lot of problems related to these measurements.

For one the effects, impacts, outcomes of a CoP cannot be measured for months or even years after its institution. For two, some of those outcomes and impacts do not impact finances, so it might happen that financially there is no ROI (or even a loss) but the return on investment happens through the enhancement of a non-monetary value (say I set up a CoP and its members feel better about working, and are more relaxed and available in the workplace). Furthermore, cost effectiveness is reflective of another unfortunate paradigm called the scarcity model). This does not:
1) take into account that some tangibles are, indeed, limited (not scarce!), and yet some intangibles are abundant (not unlimited!), It just assumes that everything is always scarce, which introduces a theoretical bias in the very system that should be objective enough to represent and quantify a pros/cons analysis;
2) realize that not every outcome can be measured in monetary terms and that doing so is yet another source of lack of science in this practice.
It basically measures abundant intangibles as if they were limited tangibles and as if all tangibles and intangibles were to have the same unit measure (it's like measuring liquids in meters.... plain old stupid).

Time Horizon.
Finally, a vigilant leader's time horizon is longer while an operational leader's is shorter.

But in order to be effective at doing so, one needs to come from an abundance perspective. If time is scarce, one has no time to wait for results. If time is limited, one decides which results to wait for. If time is abundant, one participates to the creation of new perspectives, opportunities, concepts without having an agenda on which one to find or explore.

Since CoPs just die if they are managed (or led) toward an agenda, it's particularly evident how one needs to come from abundance in order to get any result out of them, and needs to be patient as well. This also explains why CoPs are so good in getting results about unstructured practices, where nobody has agendas to push.

Dutch Soccer and CoPs

In Dutch "total soccer" players follow their natural role but *stretch* it
to serve the community (team) and the one having the ball (say, speaking at
a given moment, or having fame etc) has to be willing to pass the ball to
the one in a better position. Plus, when a player is wrong, he better learn
from it or next time the coach kicks him out of the team. Which btw that's
how I see moderation/facilitation in CoPs.

If we espouse the "everything goes" theory we play like Brasil: virtuous
soccer, 85 minutes of *sleep*, 5 minutes of action and no fun on the
observer (lurker) side, a bunch of primadonna worried about them, the, them.

If the lurker doesn't read and enjoy what he reads, something in the "CoP"
is wrong (Miguel?). That's also why inviting people to skip messages is
deleterious (for a CoP).

Mumble mumble

Online Criticism

Just today Jayne Cravens' in her newsletter expressed her take on how to handle online criticism:

"There's no way to avoid it, but there are ways to address criticism that can actually help an organization to be perceived as even more trustworthy and worth supporting. To be successful with online activities, a nonprofit organization MUST be able to honestly and openly deal with online criticism, particularly from supporters and participants. Otherwise, the organization puts itself in a position to lose the trust of supporters and clients, and even generate negative publicity -- and, once lost, trust and credibility can be extremely difficult to win back."

To Jayne's detractors, I can respond by pointing them to Palloff and Pratt's seminal book (p. 27):

"If conflict is not such a bad thing, and if it is necessary in order to achieve group cohesiveness and intimacy, why do so many fear it and attempt to avoid it, especially in this medium?"

Blind Review???

Yesterday I had a fat laughter at some people... establishment conservation is stronger than any meritocracy whatsoever *grin*

An association I won't name (but hey it ain't that difficult to find out) has a conference and a listserv. Just recently they "upgraded" (and widely circulated) how they changed the way they choose papers for the conference, introducting blind peer-review.

Their concept of blind, however, is pretty disconcerting.

Since I saw people posting stuff like "hey who wants to do a panel on [such and such] with me?", I wrote to the ED pointing out how that behaviour (and allowing it) may compromise the blindness of their peer-review method.

To which I am replied:

"It may be that a potential reviewer will occasionally see that, but s/he can also try to be objective (still) about a proposal, even if they think they know who is behind it. Certainly I have reviewed proposal where I was pretty sure I knew who the author was, but have tried nonetheless to be objective about the content."

Still, gentleman, this is NOT blind peer-review. Let me assure you, I come from science and I know when it was invented, why, and how it has to be done. The Academy of Management knows how to do it, perfectly.

More and more often, I find people from humanities mingling with terms in the attempt to make one thing appear something else. We might discuss on whether the peer-review should be blind or not, we can't name this way of reviewing "blind".

I guess that's why the impact factor of the association's publication is low, low, low.

A Vygotskyian Nightmare

I won't make names, but...

...there are persons that claim to be professionals, but these very same persons don't behave like ones. In fact, they mix personal childhood traumas with relationships with colleagues and that's VERRRRRY unprofessional (regardless of the profession!).

So, the ones that got neglected as kids cry for attention, and scream and yell and pout and pound till they get it. Then there are the ones that were raised by some passive aggressive persons, for which passive aggressiveness is like olive oil for Italians: no matter how unhealthy it is, they keep on using it. Finally, there are the ones that live in the "whatever my impression is, it's reality" frame of mind. A Vygotskyian nightmare.

This very last category is an interesting animal in itself.

For them meaning is constructed socially, so they have to discuss (over and over) what is clear from the get-go in what you've written and said. They hold no certainties whatsoever and they confuse their legitimate conviction with a stand anybody should have. For them, there is no reality, but just an endless "I meant - you meant" dance. They'd argue with anybody and anything just not to be robbed of their illusion (re: lack of reality).

The "best" way you can get in trouble with them is to logically build an argument that robs them of the illusion of uncertainty. They don't really care of whether they are delusional or making sense. All they care is not to be stopped in believing that nothing is certain.

As sad as it is for our sense of self-importance, most arguments aren't personal.

The typical argument goes as follows. There is a person saying something (it doesn't matter whether it's right or wrong, accurate or off-base, etc) and another feeling his/her identity threatened by that statement. The latter will react trying to hit on the former's sense of identity.

At that point, if you are the person that "started" it all by your observations, all you have to do is:
1. smiling
2. looking at the other one straight into his/her eyes, and
3. saying "I'm sorry if it bothers you, but if you can't discern what is being said from your interpretation of it, this is not my problem".

Learn to laugh them away. They aren't worth your time. For all the rest, smile. Thank God there are so many things in life that are more interesting than... persons.

Beware of "Honest" People!

Yes, today I'm taking another stand of mine. Not "another" as in an opposite one, "another" as in a stand on a different issue.

More precisely, the stand is about those persons that call themselves professionals yet they don't know the difference between asserting their thoughts and being plain old incivil to whoever dissents. This one is a category of violent people that think to be direct, straightforward and inquisitive only when they are rude.

If there is a fight, usually between another "nice" person and a person that "nice" is not, they storm in in order to support the one that they perceive either as having more power, or more merit or as being about to give them "more" of something (read: money, position, attention, consideration, etc). NOT the one they perceive as right.

Actually, they don't even know who is right because their arguments (exactly like in the case of "nice" people) make no logic sense aside from their proposition "let's go to war". They tell you their ideas are superior, but they don't say why. They tell others are wrong, but they don't explain the reasons. Like "nice" people, all they do is covering dissent in shame, even if in a more explicit way.

They call it "telling things as they are" but the reality is that the way they use to put things betray a neglect (when not despise) for whoever thinks and feels in a different way. They take sides, willfully going for the throat of "enemies", like Crusaders, as if the other person wouldn't be human, but an animal or something like that (no no sorry, these persons would protect an animal, but not their fellow humans).

They don't explain to you what they see wrong and how to correct it, they say over and over again that you are despicable because you're not like them. But they do not say the reason for they are right because - surprise surprise - they don't know. They're all slogans, and that's about it. Try to scratch beyond the surface and all you find will be more slogans.

In case one dares bringing to their attention how rudeness changes the whole outlook that listening people have on their reasons (that sometimes, like anything else in life, are valid) and that it might be worthy to tone down and explain, so to convince them and have things their way, they revengefully say they don't like "compromises" and storm elsewhere to do damage there. They don't even care for their own "ideals", or else they would take time to explain and convince others.

It's scary to witness colleagues like that (ie: BOTH "nice" and "honest"). It's even scarier because you can't reach them, even when you want to, do your best to, and even have a glimpse of an idea of what generated those dysfunctional behaviours.

Whatever the explanation you give them, they keep on seeing things in their old reassuring way without realising their are prisoners of their own thinking.

More than scary, it's just plain old sad.

Beware of "Nice" People!

There is a category of violent people that think to be smart, accomodating and oh-so-great. I'm referring to "nice" people.

If there is a fight, usually between another "nice" person and a person that "nice" is not, they rush to support the former even when the latter is just being honest. This is NOT called "pacification" (as they usually call it), this is called taking sides (no matter how many times they might say they aren't taking sides, and scold you if you dare taking the "wrong" one). Then, from their holier-than-thou soapbox, they proceed to explain to the whole world how the "not so nice" person is rude, inconsiderate, not evolute and not deserving to belong to human race.

In case one dares bringing to their attention that anger and pissiness too are feelings and at any rate they do have their pros, this person will usually say something to the extent that you can't impose your (supposed) anger on others or something like that.

But, I wonder why, "nice" people think they can impose their "niceness" on you! That is, simply put, a violent action. Trying to force people toward appreciative inquiry by sweeping issues under the carpet is, too, a violent action. Trying to force any person to do anything s/he doesn't agree with is a violent action, period.

That speaks books on their (very much supposed) niceness (let alone the fact that they know absolutely nothing about facilitation).

The Motivation of Online Students

On ARNOVA listserv, somebody doubted about the value of "online" PhD. This was my step-by-step reply.

Intrinsic motivation, according to its definition, is the “the inherent tendency to seek out novelty and challenges, to extend and exercise one’s capacities, to explore, and to learn” (Ryan & Deci, 2000, p.70 --- to look up other material, most of which is online, go to their Center for the Self-Determination Theory). It means, in this specific case, that when a student is intrinsically motivated, the reason for which he engages into a given activity (in this case, a PhD course) is because s/he derives “something” out of it that is not an external reward.

If you scratch below the definition of what’s intrinsic motivation, you’ll realize (again as per Ryan & Deci, 2000, p.68) that intrinsic motivation has 3 components:

- Competence: that is, having/acquiring functional skills

- Relatedness: feeling that one’s work/skills have some kind of meaning/significance

- Autonomy: the individual has some recognized ability to act on his/her own will.

Therefore (and this is a syllogism!!!!), a student that is intrinsically motivated is a student that also is:

*competent to acquire functional skills
*feeling that his/her skills have some kind of significance
*able to act on his/her own will.

The competence/relatedness pair also is the core of what Bandura (1981, 1983, 1999) called “self-efficacy” defined, in Bandura’s own words, as “people's beliefs about their capabilities to produce designated levels of performance that exercise influence over events that affect their lives”. That is, the conviction to be able to successfully control the outcome of a situation one is presented with. So we can say (with another syllogism) that an intrinsic student also has self-efficacy.

Self-efficacy affects the ability of individuals to adapt and be flexible in spite of difficult situations, BUT ALSO affects aspirations, analytical thinking, and perseverance in the face of failure (Bandura et al. 2001). This last concept is called RESILIENCE.

But self-efficacy is also linked to the locus of control concept (Rotter, 1966): the locus of control is an individual perception that control can be exerted through his/her behaviour (internal locus of control, in this case the student’s pattern of study/research) vs at bay of external forces (luck, misfortune, the professor’s will). So a person that has intrinsic motivation, and also has self-efficacy and resilience (as per previous syllogisms) ALSO has internal locus of control.

Therefore:

A. Because of relatedness, the student with higher intrinsic motivation would tend to think his/her work is significant/meaningful
B. Because of autonomy, the student with higher intrinsic motivation would tend to act on his/her own will
C. Because of A and B and their relationship with self-efficacy, the student with higher intrinsic motivation would tend to have more resiliency
D. Because of the internal locus of control, the student with higher intrinsic motivation would have a lesser probability of being impacted by the professor’s control and supervision
E. Because of the very nature of resilience, the student with higher intrinsic motivation would have a lesser probability of being impacted by the professor’s reward/punishment system

Online students (and a student who got an online PhD IS a successful online student --- that’s another syllogism), in a variety of settings, have been shown to have:

i. higher rates of intrinsic motivation
ii. higher focus on internal locus of control

So, NOW you can understand how conditions A to E apply to successful online students.

On top of it, we can ALSO add that:

Since intrinsic motivation vanishes with the use of external, performance-contingent rewards (Deci, Kostner & Ryan, 1999), students exposed to this method are more likely to have extrinsic motivation.

And, if you allow me to end with an opinion (as opposed to facts previously gathered and exposed), faculties might not like these students because:
*they find worth in their own works
*the usual reward/punishment and control system don’t work
*they keep on going for their own path and keep on thinking that they will eventually succeed because they believe that success lays into their merit and not on somebody’s else “grace” (therefore, supervisor has to convince through hard reasoning, NOT with a "because I say so").

Moderating and Facilitating a VCoP

When you moderate and/or facilitate VCoPs composed of "professionals", the most important word is: beware. And the second one is: beware.

In particular watch out for the warning statement: "how can I get onto digest".

That might mean many things, I concede it, yet one of those meaning can be that the person that says it just wants to search for the "meat" without acknowledging the meaning and importance of negotiating meaning thorough conversation and thinks of an "online community" as a list of links, resources, repositories.

The first danger in that is, this is but first generation KM (definition coined by McElroy) with a codification approach only. The codification approach alone fails, period (see Huysman & de Wit, 2002).

The second danger I see is all in the difference between legitimate peripheral participation (ie: enjoying reading conversations, threads, and the like as well as how insights are generated and shared) and egocentric "what's in it for me, me, me" (ie: adversarial conceptualization of the reader with respect to the community, where the reader has to "bear with" ongoing conversation in order to "get something" out of it). The "proper" legitimate peripheral participant is one that enjoys reading the threads and the conversation so much that sets aside some time to delve into insights/opinions/ideas that are offered, even if s/he participates only occasionally.

What I always do in these settings is:

1. I remind whoever protests about "too many emails" that conversation is precious because it is in conversation that new knowledge is generated (and I add referrals and pointers to the social learning theory, if I really need to shut the dear one up);
2. I remind this very same vocal person that s/he is supposed to enjoy the conversation or else it's no place for him/her to be.

That usually weed out many persons that would later be troublesome for the proper "nucleation" of the CoP.

CoP facilitators/moderators, differently from facilitators in other settings, enforce negative rules mainly: that is, like in Carver boards, they set a rule on what has not to be done, the rest is for free experimentation of the members to find out. Occasionally, posting articles and links elicit some dialogue in case the CoP is kind of "dormant", but a healthy CoP does not need the facilitator to participate, even if s/he might want and/or like to do so.

A CoP facilitator also needs to try to resist the idea of engineering the community life. Sometimes backchannelling with members about the community helps, but it does backfire if you use it too often. A CoP faciliator does backchannel, however, in order to establish a personal relationshipwith those members you find more in tune with your moderation style. If s/he asks something, s/he does it naturally, NOT out of the blue to people s/he has never talked to, and NOT to the "old same buddies", otherwise members would have the impression of being kidded around by a clique.

In order to have a group of people helping the facilitator, complimenting with them privately for something they spontaneously said or posted feels much better, to them and to the group, than it feels to "schedule" the conversation. I am a member in a community in which the moderator often backchannels to ask members to post summaries (still the old repository/codification approach!!). The funny thing is that summaries do get posted, but without *anybody* saying "hey I thought it would be neat to post this" (aka spontaneous contribution), and the posting of the "assigned homework" sounds very artificial.

In short: depending on which kind of members you have and which kind of person you are, you will have different results, however:

1) Always be your natural self: do not play a role
2) Do not distort yourself or your community in order to follow an artificial scheme
3) Keep in mind where you want to go and let go of the controlling attitude most moderators have (enhancing/slowing email flow, having people posting requests/summaries/questions, getting afraid/p*ssed toward whoever posts "too much" or "not enough")
4) Let people be themselves with a list of basic donts.

A community is like a tissue: it will "create" and "heal" by itself whether you are there or not, but if you do your job you will make it easier (facilitation comes etymologically from the Latin word "facile" that is, in fact, EASY).

Sociopaths

The more I get all into working and networking online, the more I realise the world is full of of sociopaths. Truth be told, it's not exclusive of the online environment, it's just that you can "appreciate" jerks better if you are online *grin*

Cases of the day:

1. a professional networker, IT folk for a well-known association of professionals, online for several years, acknowledges his lack of emotional intelligence in interacting with people. Yet, he still blames others for "being fake" whenever they emote or introduce some nuances in their conversation, because - listen to this - emoticons "distort" the conversation... the dear guy still thinks we're all cavemen and cavewomen, reasoning in black-or-white terms and getting an autistic reaction out of any minuscule world complexity (ever heard of Freud's defense mechanisms, especially projection, Mr Transactional Analysis Psychobabble? On this very topic, I just blasted a person giving me all that cr*p on transitional objects... Try touching a flame without a transitional object and let's see if you get burn and call it being smart, *ssh*l*!);

2. another professional, namely a network-centric one, builds a group up in a wonderful way, like a marvellous lab experiment, just to shut it down because - I suspect - the group developed a shared vision and leadership and could go on without him... in fact, he doesn't accept to transfer the group ownership, period.

From all of this we can gather some cosmic laws:

A. whatever a person proports to be, don't believe him/her UNLESS you have some direct evidence suggesting that s/he indeed knows what s/he means;
B. no matter how intelligent an idea sounds like, the voice that reveals it to the world can still belong to the most inconsistent and unaware of the human beings (that's the beauty of life!);
C. do not confuse the message with the messenger: just because the idea is good, it doesn't mean the messenger is as well;
D. Carl Rogers was DEAD WRONG when he said that anybody could reach their full potential, some people can not, because they prefer to be a slave to their limitations and fears, which they name, respectively, "myself" and "my opinions" and treasure above anything else;
E. some people approach work as they would approach the primordial broth: shove everything that there is IN, inject some sparkles into it and hope to make a living out of it;
F. Life without the power of observation switched on is not very different from vegetative state and coma: either you shake it away, or euthanasia is an option.

That's why, in all of this, I stand firm in my preferring the humble, the marginalized, the "underserved": because there is more dignity in acknowledging the limitation that life, society and God put on you (and that we ALL have, like it or not -- despite Seligman's positive thinking BLABBING) than there is in pretending to be smarter than one is.

The Albert Ellis Affaire

I got prompted by a friend's post to dig more into what happened between Albert Ellis and the Albert Ellis Institute. Of course (and as usual) rather than siding with one of them I managed to get an opinion of my own *grin*

Let's start with the very basic notions, so to set the record straight:
1) A non-profit is a corporation: just like in any other corporation, board members are liable only if they make a mistake out of neglect or "bad intention". If the mistake was made in good faith and it was a honest mistake, board members can not be liable. This concept is known as limited liability and it is the main reason for folks incorporate. Corporation activities are disciplined by their by-laws;
2) A non-profit corporation has benefits in terms of income taxes and permission to fundraise;
3) Some non-profits are 501(c)3 bodies: that means they have some additional fiscal benefits and donations are tax-exempt. In order to gain (and keep) such status, the 501(c)3 organization can NOT: (a) lobby and (b) the earnings of such organization may not benefit any of its members;
4) Disqualified persons: this terms has nothing to do with the morality of the person that is disqualified, it is just a description of a category of persons that cannot or should not have financial ties with a non-profit corporation (such as a substantial contributor, a foundation manager, and their family members, such as spouses, descendants and their spouses, etc);
5) Board members are volunteers. As such, they might have their transportation expenses repaid and other benefits awarded, but they cannot be paid for their work, no matter how much they donated, fundraised or contributed in any way.

I am positive that, after reading these lines, many of you will understand what I'm about to say.

Apparently, Section 3 of the Albert Ellis Institute by-laws state

"Removal. Any Trustee may be removed at any time for cause by a vote of a majority of the entire Board at any special meeting of the Board called for that purpose, provided that at least one week’s notice of the proposed action shall have been given to the entire Board of Trustees then in office."

It basically means that the Albert Ellis Institute Board is allowed to remove any board member, Albert Ellis included, provided it calls a special meeting for this reason. Apparently, in the many rebuttal from AEI, nobody said the meeting was called for the specific reason of removing Albert Ellis. So, the removal per se may be not legal and Ellis could be reinstated.

The reason for Ellis was supposedly removed was the "excess benefit" transaction due to the fact the AEI paid his medical expenses. If you get a free account to GuideStar and read the AEI 990 form (2003's), you'll see how it states (verbatim):

"the organization paid for medical expenses for Albert Ellis, President. These expenses are expected to be reimbursed subsequent to year end."

Now, this might mean only two things:
(a) the Board knew Ellis had to reimburse the money but didn't tell him;
(b) Ellis knew he had to reimburse those expenses but didn't say he wouldn't, or thought he might talk them out of that.
One thing is certain: at least one of the parts knew he had to reimburse them TWO YEARS AGO (the 990 form dates back to the end of 2003).

With the incoming end of this year and Ellis not returning that money, the folks at the AEI must have freaked. From the IRS, on excess benefit correction (verbatim):

"A disqualified person [which Ellis is, as substantial contributor and foundation manager, as well as his wife, as spouse of a substantial contributor and foundation manager] corrects an excess benefit transaction by undoing the excess benefit to the extent possible, and by taking any additional measures necessary to place the organization in a financial position not worse than that in which it would be if the disqualified person were dealing under the highest fiduciary standards. The organization is not required to rescind the underlying agreement; however, the parties may need to modify an ongoing contract with respect to future payments."

In these conditions, therefore, it makes sense to kick Ellis out of the board, so that he wouldn't be a disqualified person any longer and, in that capacity, he could still have some form of financial support.

Therefore, for all the aforementioned reasons, what happen would probably be:
1) Ellis will be reinstated, because he was fired through a procedure that was not in compliance with the by-laws;
2) Ellis will have to repay the AEI, unless he is willing to see the institute loose its tax-exempt status.

Some more thoughts on the many "rebuttals" I've seen on the web:
a) it makes ZERO sense to compare Ellis' medical expenses to Broder's salary: Ellis is the President and a volunteer, Broder was the ED and an employee!
b) it does make sense to question the practice of appointing a Board Member as the ED of a corporation, because of the conflict of interest of having a double hat.
c) the two board members supposedly on Ellis' side spoke only after the "damage" was done and they were given reassurance that they would incur in no liability for disagreeing, which does not speak for their integrity and consistency.
d) Ellis himself donated a lot to the AEI. But the AEI is no offshore corporation or retirement funds and cannot be expected to jeopardize its tax-exempt status (especially regarding the building it is located into... that would evaporate its revenue in taxes!) just to take care of him.

Remember the three irrational beliefs as Ellis stated them:
*“I absolutely must succeed in work and/or love, else I am pretty worthless!”
*“Other people must treat me kindly and fairly or else they are no damned good!
*“The conditions under which I live must provide practically anything I want, or else the world is a horrible place and I can’t stand it!”

I do hope that this affaire would get settled in a way that can satisfy both AEI (that accomplished so much good) and Ellis (that did so much for so many persons), but I think Ellis should think a little bit more about his irrational beliefs and take one little step back.

I'm amused!

Today, I am amused, folks.

It has been happening, more and more often, that I get amused at projection, that is "the defense mechanism whereby we transfer or project our feelings about one person onto another. " It can be better understood by thinking of how wrong we are when we suppose a person to feel they way we would feel in his/her same situation.

I'm a victim of projection, guys. Not that I do it, I am a victim of being called names from people that don't know the difference between themselves and the rest of the world that big that their Ego is (and they usually call it empathy, see some examples of empathy vs sympathy here).

So, we stumble in a person saying "it's impossible that non-parents understand parenting" because SHE is unable to understand perspective that are out of her point of views, and in another saying "you overwhelm people" because HE is easily overwhelmed. It's fine if they have those limitations, we all have limitations, even if not the same. What is NOT fine is to suppose that YOUR limitations are another's as well!

But the thing that really chockes me is that, when one of them wants to be right at all costs just puts him/herself in a situation in which s/he can't possibly be called wrong, like for example preaching the exact opposite of what one does. If I preach the joys of motherhood, how can you charge me to be egoist? If I preach selflessness how can you charge me of having an Ego as big as Texas?

It doesn't work. It just does not work. They think it does, but it doesn't. People are smart. People are kids. People see the Emperor doesn't have clothes on. Behaviours are revealing, no matter how many words you spread on top of them to hide their true meaning. And, sure, meaning depends on context, but you still can't claim donkeys can fly, bunny.

I have to admit it here, I am a b*tch. I am talented at getting a person to reveal him/herself and exposing him/her. If I weren't talented at it, I wouldn't be a facilitator. And, note, I am one, I don't call myself one. Big difference (again, how can you see the difference? BEHAVIOURS!).

But, when I facilitate dialogue, I coach a person above dysfunctional behaviours, while when I am just a plain old b*tch, I get them to expose themselves and... leave them in the lurch in front of everybody. Dear, old, shame. So essential, in order to grow up.

And yes, I am conscious that shame is part of my heritage as a Roman Catholic. But what can I say? It's better than being engaged full force into escaping any pain. Sounds like getting drunk, to me.

In fact, paraphrasing Gary Oldman's "someone once described alcoholics as egomaniacs with low self-esteem", wishing to be in heaven without having to live through the pain of life is, at least, a matter of addiction and, at worst, a nonsense.

That's how I get amused! I look around and see people thinking to be different while they are like any other (or so), thinking to be different, generalizing what they are to the whole world, forged on their image (sounds familiar? LOL), experiencing the pain of life mainly because... they just can't enjoy watching without driving!