Collaborative Monkeys and other thoughts.

A presentation by Don McLeod to ADV1691- Professional Practice

Professor Thom Kearney

Algonquin College, January, 2012.

1

The Art of Getting up in the Morning

I need to get up in the morning.I need the transition of dark to light.I need the blue light from the sun. The light distorted as it travels through the horizon. If I don't after two weeks my body will want to sleep all day and stay up all night. That is our nature.

I need to get up in the morning. God is not going to get me up. A nagging spouse is not going to get me up. Fear of consequences is not going to get me up. It will keep me in bed. I have to get my DNA to want to get up and face the day. That means I have to convince my own DNA, that as a collaborative monkey, I am contributing. I must prove to it I have meaning and purpose. It has to be real. That is our nature.

I need to get up in the morning, to eat well, to go for a 2 hour walk for the BDNF so I can produce new brain neurons. That is our nature.

I need to get up in the morning to ask of others and learn, discuss, ask questions, be terribly wrong, listen, think, project, assume, verify, articulate and write. All that leads to production of new brain neurons. That is our nature.

I need to get up in the morning knowing that over the last week someone said something with that incredible tone of voice that means I have made other's lives better. That means it is very likely to happen again in the next week. That is our nature.

I need to get up in the morning to go to bed at night at 10 p.m. for a full night sleep with the short and long term memory shuffling that comes with dreams and restorative cell work that comes during sleep. That is our nature.

I get up in the morning because I know each day will be exceptionally wonderful and that takes my mind way beyond my physical limitations, including that broken part of my brain. As the poem I once read to my kids revealed to me; "Good morning, good morning, its time to face the day, first we'll have breakfast and then we will play."

Don McLeod Donnie_McLeod@bell.net

Don McLeodMysteries, Puzzles &Huntington's Disease

Spot the source of the colour @ 483 nm

fall

Rage Balance

ParanoiaCautionary tale from Nixon's era warning of Harper's

HD confused with

Cognition

Animal studies show that an enriching environment delays the onset of Huntington’s Disease

1/7 mice with enriched environment failed motor tests compared to 7/7 controls

van Dellen A. Blakemore C. Deacon R. et al. Delaying the onset of Huntington's in mice. Nature. 2000;404(6779):721-2.

What is an enriching environment for us, - - - mouse + + + ?

brain

mind

At 55 I could retire without a pension. I did because of HD.

I was lucky, a habit, that the people I worked for created wealth and shared it because they, unknowingly, created systemically trusting organizations.

I am working the mystery - what is a substrate for an enriched environment? I freely share what I learn. I get funding from business for programs.

That is enriching for me, what about you?

My advice for young people, wasted on far too many older people.

http://www.alfiekohn.org/books/pbr.htm

http://www.alfiekohn.org/books/pbr.htm

Know what you are inclined to do and stretch that everyday.

Alfie Kohn “No, that is not want I think! Buy my 300 page $30 book, motivation is from within!”

The lesson watching motivation speakers is that they do what they enjoy doing with others.

Work with friends that do what you are not inclined to do, about 5 or 6 in one group at any one time.

http://www.economist.com/node/9898270

http://www.economist.com/node/18678925

The traditionally taught group’s average score was 41%, compared with 74% for the experimental group—even though the experimental group did not manage to cover all the material it was supposed to, whereas the traditional group did.

Avoid people too selfish for your own good, use about 1 of every 12 as a guide.

http://douggeivett.wordpress.com/2010/02/23/review-of-snakes-in-suits/

Spot the career counsellor

Trust takes time and therefore has a cost. 5 interactions times $300 per interaction times 2 times for 66% failure rate times 20 so cost is 5% of top line revenue = minimum value of a solution customer is $ 60,000.00. Anything less should be a customer driven transactional purchase or you are loosing money on every sale.

Wait for 5 positive interactions before calling anyone a  friend, from Cahners on activity based cost to sell solutions.

Find the freedom to exchange a million little random ideas and make a million little mistakes to avoid catastrophe.

Kathleen Forsyth “If you have the humility to be wrong you have the key to learn almost anything, you will find others desperately need to correct your assumptions, all 3 trillion”.

Avoid jobs doing puzzles if not automated they be outsourced for $10 per hour.

“Underlying the notion of a simple, controllable production system was the notion of the simple, controllable employee. In the factory model of management, it was easy to monitor workers and measure their output. Because the work itself was not terribly interesting or motivating in its own right, managers intuitively relied on what Freud called “the pleasure principle,” the idea that human beings are motivated to seek pleasure and avoid pain. Thus supervisors used a combination of carrots (more pay for more tasks completed) and sticks (reprimands or the threat of job loss) to motivate employees. These behavioral strategies were very successful, but they produced an unfortunate legacy that still characterizes many workplaces today—an undercurrent of fear.”

“Those same theories would drive our invasion of Iraq forty-five years later, championed by RAND-affiliated actors such as Paul Wolfowitz, Richard Perle, Zalmay Khalilzad, and Donald Rumsfeld. But RAND’s greatest contribution might be its least known: rational choice theory, a model explaining all human behavior through self-interest.”

http://www.abellaweb.com/

The Competitive Imperative of Learning by Amy C. Edmondson

Delight in jobs of mysteries. This is where you will find quality of life.

“There's a reason millions of people try to solve crossword puzzles each day. Amid the well ordered combat between a puzzler's mind and the blank boxes waiting to be filled, there is satisfaction along with frustration. Even when you can't find the right answer, you know it exists. Puzzles can be solved; they have answers. But a mystery offers no such comfort. It poses a question that has no definitive answer because the answer is contingent; it depends on a future interaction of many factors, known and unknown. A mystery cannot be answered; it can only be framed, by identifying the critical factors and applying some sense of how they have interacted in the past and might interact in the future. A mystery is an attempt to define ambiguities. Puzzles may be more satisfying, but the world increasingly offers us mysteries. Treating them as puzzles is like trying to solve the unsolvable—an impossible challenge. But approaching them as mysteries may make us more comfortable with the uncertainties of our age.”

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/people-places/presence_puzzle.html

You can't solve a mystery alone! Aloneness leads to loneliness leads to depression a Neurological Degenerative Disease, I have one, you don't need one.

If strong, find work in a selfish culture and destroy it from inside. You will know that by observing that knowledge transfers will be at the slow rate of 12 people per meeting. Knowledge will be corrupted by self interest.

If weak, like me, work in the growing number of firms that see the advantage of a culture of fairness needed for sharing for beating competition which cannot change and vulnerable to a fearless, learning and responsive younger managed business. Firms were alignment of fit for function of collaborative monkeys appreciates the DNA of most of us, not all, can be used to create fearless organizations. You will know that by observing that knowledge transfers will be at the fast rate of less than 6 people per meeting. Knowledge will travel up in times of external threats instantly. They will be fearless firms. Investors will invest in these firms instead of fear driven firms because fearless firms will contribute towards 30% more to the bottom line.

Do more than co-operate, collaborate.

Niki Halle “I never worked so hard, had so much fun, made so many friends or was pushed beyond what I thought I was capable of doing”

Bob Broomfield “Hire those who can and want to do the job, not a task for HR. Avoid people too interested in money or advancement. The financial advantage is 30% more contribution to the bottom line relative to others. The executive advantage is upward communications in times of external threats.

Envisioning a adhocish, face to face and sufficient wealth creation machine.

Substrate

Problem – Solution – Implementation – Problem...

Could you help me? Talk about this, preferably face to face over coffee, beer etc. adocishly in groups of sixish.

If any of this helps you please donate to the Huntington’s Society of Canada .