Chris & John

 

Getting back to this after a delay and picking up Chris' take on "design" and John's on "managing networks" (viewpoints that seem to be related?)

 

[I'm finding having a discussion in this way hard - I don't feel free to do what I would like to do which is to ask you both to expand so that I can understand better.  Also I'm afraid that if I switch back to the stream, I'll not just lose my thread but the thread as well!  Bring back f2f!  However...]

 

I'm intrigued that people seem to be divided on whether hierarchy or network is the "natural" form - I asked a group the other day how many thought that hierarchy was "hard wired" into our ways of thinking.  Over half this group of NHS managers said "Yes" - and not just the men.  But, as Capra says, the network form is the universal one, from simple cells up.

 

So perhaps not all would agree that networks are naturally occuring John, but even if they are, what is to stop us adapting them?  To harness solar power we are going to have to change our (management) practices, but surely it can be done?  Why can't we harness network power?  The NHS Plan dependence upon networks aims to do just this - but current mindsets can't find the right way to do it and insist upon overprinting hierarchy.

 

Design, which I take to be an imaginative leap made flesh - a creative process wherely something concrete is realised, in this case - a network organisation or an organising network.   In this context, it is almost certain to be an interactive process, a conversation on the basis of which individuals act and learn within the network and seek to develop it.

 

Not sure where I'm gong now - yes, let's meet and see if there is anything solid here.

 

Cheers

 

Mike