Thinking about previous Online information occasions I came across David Weinberger on Youtube. His keynote "Everything is Miscellaneous" became a book though not reviewed in the UK. He is continuing to talk about the lost authority of print though video keynotes are an alternative. He welcomes online debate as if nothing much is ever final.
I am thinking of doing a paper for an academic conference. Lancaster IAS are looking at "experimentality". This is my way reintroduce ideas about quality and learning. The IAS is not restricted by disciplines. Somehow "learning" is associated with HR and quality with systems. So a fit withing the Management school is problematic.
At previous IAS conferences there have been some supporters of a critique take on quality, seeing it as neo-liberal rhetoric, an attack on academic liberty etc. etc. but this can be a creative tension.
One experiment could be to drop the attempt to find ways of working with quality theory and concentrate on using it for explanation. Introducing 'Making Quality Critical', Wilkinson and Wilmott describe the quality literature as "distinguished by a normative thrust". It is true that most books about quality are written for a management audience. But quality theory can explain why organisations fail, cease to exist. Printing and publishing could offer examples to observe over the next year. The Guardian is concerned that online income will not grow quickly enoughto replace lost sales of print. there is also an editorial problem of how to benefit from user contributions while the professional journalists continue knocking copy on the "bilious blogs". Haymarket are dealing with related issues as some magazine titles move online. Printweek will continue in print presumably, but balanced by the website. A recent story about Twitter was followed by extended online comments.
Also of interest are websites such as the Networked Learning conference and the webiste for Critical Management. Both sometimes mention Web2 but have less commenting etc. than the Printweek site for example. My impression is that the conference paper and eventual journal publication is still a priority. Other sites have a lot more draft content or versions for revison. Jeff Jarvis on Buzzmachine sometimes posts what looks like a book proposal. The versions of blog posts that are published in the print Guardian show the gain from comments and editing.
The description of the Experimentality project now includes a move away from "command and control" in organisations. I think this relates to Deming ideas and Plan-Do-Check/Study Act. (scroll to bottom of ISO page for a diagram). "Check2 as used by Ishikawa changed to "study2 for the USA. More detail on how words are used could emerge over the next year. Also to study, the cultural background. As if this can be easily understood.
David Hutchins repeats a quote in the September 2009 Quality World from an Ishikawa package in the '70s.
We regard each individual as the expert in his or her own job and our system is based on the idea of using collective thinking power and job knowledge of all our people to work towards making the best of our business.
Hutchins comments on this as a contrast with UK industrial relations.
More recently the ISO Survey shows Japanese support for ISO 27001, a standard on information security featuring the PDCA cycle. Some people at the IAS conference on protection regarded talk about information security as another example of neo-liberal rhetoric. But the new Learning Zone on alexanderplatz has a full section on information security. It will be interesting to see how the Learning Zone is regarded. Chris Grey has written "Against Learning", regarding the word as part of a trend with negative consequences, including changes for the position of universities. Still the Learning Zone exists and connects so some views may change.
Checking out Management Learningg I find there is an offer of free access till the end of September. Connections with practice will be reported in future posts.