The requirement of embracing errors (1)

多謝 Ray 的協助，借出一本名叫 "Learning to plan and planning to learn" 的書籍，小弟不材，實難參透筒中道理（因為英文字太深的關係）。然而，其中有一個 Chapter 叫 "The requirement of embracing errors"，唔錯唔錯！

Background (extracted from the book "Learning to plan and Planning to learn" by Donald Michael

In our society, we presume that an error made by a member of an organization is the consequence of miscalculation, incompetence, bad luck, stupidity, or impotence in the face of social challenge.

...or that if it (error) did occur, it was unimportant... or that if it was important, it was someone else's fault (not the organization).

We don't want to believe that our leaders are error-prone.

Leaders an members of organizations try to avoid acknowledging error, not only because it helps them sustain a view of themselves as people in control, but also because it elicits the support of members of the relevant environment, who belonging to the same tradition, evaluate persons and organizations in tthe same way.

Instead they (member becoming part of an error-embracing, future-responsive social planning) become part of the experiment, part of the error-embracing societal learning structure. This kind of participation denies them the comforts of ignorance and the satisfaction of blaming others for their exposure to turbulence and uncertainty.

WHAT

error-embracing ---> social planning ---> societal learning system

[Social Planning is the process of investigating and responding to the needs and aspirations of the people who live or work in a community] http://www.rwbsocialplanners.com.au/spt2006.htm (week 1 lecture)

[Societal Learning as "Facilitated social change based on collective learning processes, democratic participation and empowerment"] http://portals.wi.wur.nl/msp/?page=1198

WHY (extracted from "In Search of Missing Elephant" by Donald Michael)

Embracing error as a positive virtue is a requirement for effective long-range social planning because all such planning, if it is to be humane and responsive to reality, must be flexible with regard to revaluation of goals and priorities and the means for realizing them. Planning must include an explicit moral obligation to learn from what goes wrong. Such an approach, which assumes that the future is highly uncertain, runs contrary to the deep-lying optimism referred to earlier. It also runs contrary to the pragmatic definition that one can always rectify a situation and that “too little and too late” is not really a plausible outcome.

HOW (to be continued...)