CVA!

Today I got the envelope. And, inside the envelope, this:



I don't think I am able to express how happy I am!

I've always believed in AVA and in voluntary certification, to the point that I was thrilled at the idea of taking it as soon as the three year in the field requirement would apply. Right after AVA's demise, I decided to take the CVA no matter what, because associations can day, but beliefs shall not.

Today, Katie Campbell (who I thank for her tireless volunteering hours devoted to this cause!) also let me know that I am the first CVA awarded to a volunteer manager outside of North America. We need to do something about it... don't we?

I still support AVA's mission statement in full, and I wished for things to have been gone differently. I deeply believe that a brighter future cannot be born out of refusing to acknowledge mistakes and consequently changing our ways. I do not think that people involved in AVA have to be kept out of present efforts. However, I do think that, if no mistake is acknowledged on their side, they better be kept out.

Above all, AVA was designed to be international and multicultural. It was designed to be a beacon of tolerance, respect, fairness and knowledge exchange. It failed partly because - like Susan J Ellis said - those are big challenges.

But, because those are challenges that are unavoidable (impending globalization, outsourcing, bilinguism, multiculturalism) especially in light of the UN millenium development goals (read #8!), we do not need to drop them.

We need to try harder instead!

C'mooon

Long time no hear! I've been in a contemplative mood... other than that, I'm overwhelmed with work and study ;)

All these bloggers, newsletters, newsgroups literally bewilder you with TMI (too much information), which 9 times out of 10 is engineered to confuse your critical thinking till you gave up reasoning and buy whatever they say, nodding.

I want no misunderstanding here: I am ALL for freedom of speech. But being given freedom of speech doesn't necessarily mean or imply that it's fine to blurt out the first thing that crosses our mind. Freedom of speech also means freedom to shut up, and the concept isn't germane to what most people think of it.

So, there are all these opinions floating over the net. Somebody calls them folksonomies but so many could be safely defined nonsense, depending on who the user that blurts taxonomies out is and (especially) how s/he formed his/her opinion (namely logical thinking vs mere suggestion).

Information doesn't mean knowledge. Knowledge managers know it but (purposefully) forget it. That reminds me of why the GRE test baffles me so much. It's all there, written into those scripts, question AND answer, and I can't understand HOW ON EARTH it is possible to check the wrong answer. Again, information doesn't mean knowledge. And having an opinion doesn't mean there is a logic behind it.

I know I know, some would lecture me about the importance of feelings. Very very very important, I know, they guide what we learn and the way we choose. Still, they do not inform our logic. Using feelings in logical arguments is like measuring milk in kilometers.

Finally, we're all overwhelmed with the blabbers, ie institutions that should decide something and implement what they decide but get lost in speeches, talks and task forces (read the United Nations, the European Union, etc). The amount of blabbings that are needed just to get a EU grant is ludicrous.

Ah, I love America. The only rule is "make sense" vs "it doesn't". I wish the rest of the world would adopt more of this stand rather than other (questionable) ones.

Forum Moderators

If you belong more than few online fora and groups and if you have belonged to them for some time, you probably are familiar with the kind of "moderator" I'm about to describe.

Usually male, 35-55, claiming to be a professional something. Very energetic and charismatic, he pours all his enthusiasm in sharing resources and providing links and opportunities for fellow members, which of course would never dare shooting on their meal ticket *grin*

If you belong to the same groups I do, you could identify at least three persons fitting such description. In fact, this entry was thought for the three of them, after spotting their "sameness".

Saints, you might think. Not nearly so.

The "professional" moderator, turns out, either spams other fora/groups or recruits members vigorously. He can't wait for being praised for all he does. And here's the problem: what if he doesn't get all the praise he wants?

Techniques I've seen these characters using:
1) "another member" posting compliments for the mod from the same IP address;
2) "another member" arguing with the mod again from the same IP address;
3) the moderator lashing out at whoever doesn't praise him enough, and throwing suspicion on these "uncooperative" others, meanwhile praising gentleness, kindness and forgiveness (that of course don't apply to him).

The lashing out is particularly revealing: it's callous, it allows for no reply, it is a character assassination that mocks at others' ability to be a professional and is totally unexpected by most people (except from online veterans).

By this time, some members of his group (usually the ones with the longest online experience) has already checked many IP addresses and figured out how "sweet D, V, or - say - another D" are a wolf in sheep's clothes. Then these persons commit the mortal sin: they face him and ask for explanation.

He broadcasts the "attack" to his faithful friends (which, may I say, usually correspond with his co-moderators), of course without providing any explanations on what set the other persons off.

The co-moderators, usually, have a few time to spend checking the group let alone checking on whether those accusations are right or wrong. They are completely in good faith and believe in the cause of the group as well as he says, so they regretfully side with him till a person they really trust opens their eyes.

Most members of groups moderated by moderators like him, are like wild cats. Unable to achieve any kind of discipline, disguising insults into polite statements, heck, even unable to read the guidelines and behave accordingly.

When you look at one of these moderators and his group, it is like looking at those women with 30 cats in a 100 squared meter apartment, claiming they would give their life for their cats, while they can't even give them discipline, and the cats dictate her life "gimme more gimme more".

I used to get mad at these moderators.

Now I've understood they are punishing themselves by giving in to the stereotype of the codependent nurturer. They can't say no for fear of being abandoned and yet they can't behave decently either because they want no rules for themselves and that's why they don't give rules to others. And when you yourself have no boundaries for how far you can go, you have no boundaries for how far others can go on you.

So when I look at a group like that all you can see is a bunch of creatures, arguing over nothing, twisting words and concepts, beating a dead horse, just to "show off", precisely like him.

And, precisely like him, to have nothing else to do than posting to this or that group.

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.

Academy of Management 2006 Conference

Some of you know that I was in Heathrow on August 10th when the mess happened. I had departed from Pisa the day before toward the Academy of Management 2006 Conference in Atlanta.

They just issued a full refund for the conference registration.

Now, that's professional!

Steve Denning

Today I was reading Steve Denning's newsletter when all of a sudden I was taken aback from what I read here.

What's wrong with it?

Aside from the various logical gaps in the case he builds, you wouldn't find anything particularly bad, unless you were a member of com-prac....

...in which case you would remember how the so-called reflections of Mr Denning did not happen in a vacuum: the link to the article he refers to was posted on that group and his several reflections were generated by an interaction among him and other persons (namely, me who originally posted the link, Roy Greenhalgh, Randall Kindley, Benoit Couture, and Miguel Cornejo Castro, in temporal order of contribution).

Mr Denning (may I say conveniently) does not say he wasn't the one who found such link to the article he is referring to and he does not say that his reflections were originated through interactions with members of the com-prac group. Isn't learning a social activity, Mr Steve? Aren't you a fan of Vygotsky? How come you don't acknowledge it?

Oh, no, wait a moment, you do cite "participants" without putting down names and places... participants to what, one of your workshops? I wonder if you asked them before including their contributions to your pamphlet!

However, the only participants you end up referring to are the ones you do have rebuttals about, because the objections you weren't able to overcome aren't even cited. Aren't you the one citing Popper and his falsification theory? How come it doesn't apply to what you write? Is it about winning an argument and demonstrate how good you are, or is it about understanding more of the environment around us?

So.... how do you generate trust? *grin*

Incidentally, Steve, in case you haven't realized it, you have just proven with your behaviour that such experiment, though conducted in a lab, is valid... just look at what you did!

In a group with no rules and especially no punishments, such as com-prac, free-riders (like you) exploit the good faith of members that freely share knowledge, therefore leading straight to knowledge hoarding.

This is not storytelling, Steve. This is telling stories.

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.

Somebody Asked Me

What I think about starting a "new AVA" or something to that extent. I took the name of the sender off and posted what I replied here.

Hello,

The biggest of my concerns are the ones I blogged about here:
http://gionnetto.blogspot.com/2006/03/beware-of-nice-people.html
http://gionnetto.blogspot.com/2006/03/beware-of-honest-people.html

Namely, that either the new AVA would be a replica of the former “nice” one, OR that it would be a creature of spiteful anger without constructive criticism. I think that the biggest reason for AVA’s demise was the *lack* of conflict management skills, in a way or in the opposite, lack of skills that is also reflected in the way some members of CyberVPM “contribute” to the forum (on *both* the “nice” and the “angry” sides).

I think the new AVA would have to preserve and take care of both the CVA program and the JoVA, but being open to anything coming from the field, *especially* when the field is open to reflect on its practice rather than just saying/thinking “that’s the way it is because *I* think so”. I wouldn’t be open to help building anything that is divisive in nature or in methods. I also don’t believe in “experts” telling the rest of people how to behave, feel, and think, so I wouldn’t support any organization that has a top-down approach. I think the best venue to organize the new AVA from is CyberVPM, because it’s the only place in which a real and large community is already present. However I stay open to any other venue having a community or forming one for this purpose.

Finally, though I think times are ripe for discussion of and about a new AVA, I don’t think the time has come for founding a new organization, because no time for reflection on our present and past practices has passed yet.

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).

Person-Centered ICT NGO Consulting

We finally have a decent model for NGO/NPO consultants in ICT that isn't keeping soft skills out of the picture!

"As a consultant, an eRider’s success depends upon the
level of trust and mutual respect exhibited in the professional
relationship with the client organization. This
relationship is of particular importance to eRiders for
two reasons. First, eRiding is a client-centered approach
in which the client is expected to play an active role.
Second, most eRider clients are not accustomed to such
a relationship."

Intrinsic Motivation Is Scary

So... today I was mumbling on the responses I get whenever I speak of intrinsic motivation to be fostered and people with intrinsic motivation to be favored over extrinsic folks. I've never been able to understand why, for example, both volunteer managers and scholars alike have trouble with the whole (intuitive!) concept that intrinsic motivation is just better.

A person with intrinsic motivation finds joy and reward in his/her own work, has self-efficacy, is able to correct his/her own work unsupervised, keeps on going despite drawbacks. What's wrong in that???

It must be that people find it scary. I couldn't understand why, then all of a sudden, reading another reply to a post of mine (to my amusement, swinging from calling me a person with methodological gaps to "neo-scholastic") today, I got it.

Intrinsic people, intrinsic volunteers, intrinsic students can not be manipulated through rewards and punishments. They also self-determine their lives, and that means any mechanism of control isn't likely to "tame them" and that is precisely why these persons find the whole concept to be scary and something to be resisted (see Freud if you don't know what it is).

The problem arises when scholars defend the need to use rewards, punishments and control to "train" students into their replica, rather than embracing the universus of the whole possibilities of reasoning.

Ah, by the way, university means, in fact, "whole, entire" and hints at the openness that such environment was supposed to have.

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").

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.

Virtual Volunteering As-Is Can Not Fly

I presented a paper in the Research-In-Action section of ICVA2005 and it was a review on online volunteering. A polished version will be published by the Journal of Volunteer Adminstration later on in 2006, but that is not the point.

Online/Virtual Volunteering does not fly. Jayne Cravens herself wrote (in a document uploaded in UKVPM group):

"My presentation marked the first time the majority of attendees had ever heard of online volunteering (and all were shocked to learn how old the practice is)"

It is about time that we, as Volunteer Administrators/Leaders, ask ourselves how come it does not fly (yet, hopefully).

Yet, OV is a well-identified trend since 1998, but it somehow is still considered "new" and non-profits do not practice it extensively. I argue that this is not because ICT resources are lacking. In fact, many studies (Cravens, 2000,
2003; Harrison & Murray, 2002; Harrison, Murray & MacGregor, 2004; Murray & Harrison, 2002)) showed that nonprofits in North America (United States and Canada) do have access to such resources, but they don't use it...

In my review, I showed how most online volunteering manuals and info started as collections of practices on how to manage online volunteers. With the exception of the papers addressing open source developer volunteerism, those suggestions are not based on research findings, but on bona fide observations that haven't been tested in over 7 years. But that's not why people aren't using them...

The "old" fad "if you build it they will come", re-ashed in many of those guides, is a gross oversimplification of human nature in general, and of human nature of volunteers in particular. Not just it makes zero sense from a human-computer interaction perspective (concepts as sociability and usability are what determines participation in virtual environments, NO MATTER how much the "cause" is good -- and no, it's not "just me" affirming it, ask Jenny Preece for one!). As for any other human, volunteer managers do not use OV because it does not make sense to them in the way it is described, packaged, and "sold" to them.

So, what is that keeps them away from OV? They perceive it as "difficult". After my speech, I had many persons telling me:

"I have the technology but I don't know how to speak to virtual volunteers"

. And you know what? They are right, because, in those guides, NOBODY addressed, EVER, how to interact with volunteers through computer-mediated communication, aside from a long list of "donts".

Some suggestions are - I beg you pardon - laughable, like "Discourage volunteers from disclosing their home address or phone number to others.". The ones of you that are in any profession do know the value of networking. The ones of you that do not have a consulting business, still wouldn't take seriously any persons/workers/colleagues refusing to share their name, address and phone number and hiding through a NICKNAME. Would you go to your butcher if s/he called him/herself "shiningknife" rather than, say, Charles and refused to give you his/her address and phone number? N-O-P-E.

As much as some persons might be uncomfortable with it, social needs/interactions still are:
(a) one of the ways we learn (see, Bandura, 1997, and Vygotzky, 1987)
(b) one of the reasons we start volunteering (see Omoto & Snyder, 1995)

As for any technology, people adopt it at different rates in different ways. But I don't think that innovation diffusion theory is the whole issue at stake. Like with telephone, some people are afraid of whomever they can't see because, I believe, they can't adapt to subtilties (say, because they tend not to be verbal learners) or belong to cultures where everything has to be clear, explained ad nauseam, and possibly task-oriented (low context cultures, it's a fact that high context populations tend to buy and use telephone more than their low context counterparts, even if phone is a less rich medium than face-to-face communication, and that's precisely because they don't need the repetition of cues that low context folks seem to need).

From all these hints, you might understand how online volunteering, as well as online communication, aren't just about "get a power line, get a pc, get it running, get a software, put up a site, match your needs with a volunteer and vaia con Dios" kind of a thing. It's precisely because it is popularized in this way that people stay away from it.

Oh, the last thing. Here you can find some practical suggestions about OV. And yes, in case anybody was wondering, my next publication is about cultural nuances of computer-mediated communication *grin*

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!