Accomplishing Work; Showing appreciation LO25833

From: Dennis Rolleston (dennisr@ps.gen.nz)
Date: 12/30/00


Replying to LO25715 --

Greetings Bill,

I share the concern you expressed in LO25715. You wrote:

"One thing I like some discussion about is along the lines of
"appreciation", and how and why we need to "appreciate" others in all
aspects of our lives. Whether facing frustrations, obstacles, or great
achievements, it seems to me a critical factor, not just one of
"acknowledging" the "employee of the month" or giving "bonuses", or a
gratuituous "pat on the back" but genuine and honest appreciation of
others. To me, not appreciating, is just setting up another barrier to
being a compassionate human, not just an "ineffective" manager. Nor is
non-appreciation an unimportant part of personal and organisational
learning".

Our more recent past in New Zealand has bought about a culture in which
the "Tall Poppy" is actively sought, machete raised. It has been my
experience that more people are willing to denigrate than to acknowledge
the endeavours, for self or society, of others . Subdued applause is
tolerated. In such a climate it is very difficult to change
organisational culture regardless of the agenda of the particular
organisation (business, educational, sporting) in so saying, I accept that
honest, open, overt appreciation generally gives wings to the spirits,
aiding awareness of "synergy" for want of a better description. As
pointed out by At in a recent posting, cell separation from the clump can
lead to the death of the individual cells, the spiritual death in human
terms.

Our education system for the past century has (in my opinion) unwittingly
been party to this spiritually oppressive unfolding, in that individualism
is encourged to the detriment of the group, the class, the school,
society. The filter appled to all is the ability to get the highest mark
in exams and until very recently group work was discouraged - looked upon
as cheating - as a technique to foster "understanding".

Pardoxically giving honest "focussed" appreciation to individuals has the
ability to bring about the understanding that individualism in the same
manner as cell separation in the laboratory can lead to the death of the
individual cells like spiritual separation of members can bring death to
the organisational atom.

At put it like this:

"It seems to be very much the same for humans on the spiritual level.
Should they not live close together, many isolated humans seem to become
destructively creative. But should they "commute closely" with each other,
many seem to become constructively creative again. Showing appreciation is
a kind of commutation which keeps us spiritually alive. Showing care is
another kind of close commutation"

So what is "honest appreciation? Well, using the "one glove fits all"
approach will I perceive, perpetuate status quo and I think At says much
about it when he wrote:

This I can understand fully. In terms of pupils it means not to say: Let
us clap hands for Susie Song because she got 100% for the test. It means
the following doing:

* Let us look at Susie's answer to the test and see what exceptional
  things she did in her answer and why.
* Let us also look at Jack's answer sheet. Although he got only 60%,
  this one answer of his is the best among all answers. Why?
* Let us look at May's answer sheet. She used to average 60%, but in
  this test she got 30% because her mother was in hospital. Despite
  this, she managed to create the following extraordinary answer. Why?

And Andrew quoted Smuts:

'Children at school should be vitalized, awakened, rendered appreciative
of values and sensitive to truth."

What better place to start giving good Mental Models to the future, yet
how many of our teachers suffer from the afflictions bestowed upon them by
the nature of the culture in which they were reared. Like Artur says:

I find that the same MM (not showing appreciation) is at work in a lot of
other cultures, especially in occidental cultures. This can be found at
schools as you expressed so clearly, but also in the work place and at
general social life.

And all the while I wrestle with this within an organisation populated by
people from many different national/cultural backgrounds therefore MM's.
An organisation with individual talent aplenty whose fight for survival is
handicapped/assisted by all I've talked about. Mine is a small part of
the exciting task of putting humpty together again (spiritually speaking).
Being a part of this LO keeps opening my eyes to possibilities, thank you
for your part in my ongoing life long learning journey, may each of you
spread and strengthen your spiritual attachments effectively in 2001

Arohanui ki a Koutou (Much love to you all)

Dennis Rolleston.

-- 

"Dennis Rolleston" <dennisr@ps.gen.nz>

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