Re: Zones and the Tribus/Langford Competency Matrix

[John Constantine <thesfg@uswest.net>]

> In my learning, I recall looking at control charts in zones;
>

And with that, TSgt Hamilton slides right into what I find to be a fascinating
"zone" chart of its own, that belonging to Dr. Myron Tribus. It can be found in
his papers in the DEN archives and goes by the name "Competency matrix", I
believe.

It has zones of its own, indicating what might be considered "levels of
development" in a person's educational process. It has two levels and three
zones, forming the foundation of "knowledge, know-how, and wisdom" to be gained
from deeply involving oneself in these overall areas. This document I have found
to be the most useful one in helping explain what it is, after all, about.

It also prompts one to mention a document from a while back having to do with
Shewhart's approach to both "being", i.e., utilizing statistical control
methods, and "seeking", in the sense of extending one's understanding by virtue
of researching. I don't have the name of the document but I'm certain that
someone keeps track of things like this and can come up with the name.

This document touches on a very thorny, very sensitive and very "modern" topic,
that of cost cutting. As has been pointed out by others, accounting-based
methodologies have their tempting side, since someone can be seen as taking
"aggressive action" (sound familiar?) and doing things like "demanding
performance" as part of the exchange for getting the job in the first place.
Gosh, doesn't this sound like politics???

It has been my experience over the past x number of years that managers don't
often have a clue as to what this performance might be, will be or should be,
but they DO very often demand a stated level of performance from a system which
doesn't have such a capability at all. Doesn't seem to bother them...

As to matter of choice, perhaps it depends on whose money is being played with,
and why. Public monies, public demand for the need for accurate data, to be
analyzed by people who are trained in the task, and for a particular purpose
which might well be debated prior to nomination of candidates.

If private monies (is there such a thing anymore?), perhaps discussion of a
ratio of being to learning might be what's called for; the danger here is that
management might well ignore the shoe they've just been asked to wear. If things
don't "look good", number wise, they'll simply change the numbers and leave the
problem for the future, which brings us back to the present.

As long as our culture demands quick fixes and tampering follows, we will
continue to be dealing with those who are not interested, because they don't
have a perceived need to be.

John Constantine
Rainbird Management Consulting
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