(August 28, 2008) Conversation is a difficult standard to achieve online in a public forum. The crossfire reciprocal shouting model in which each commentator is an advocate for a preexisting point of view is good entertainment. It’s really bad conversation.
There are not many examples of nuanced movement towards a shared understanding of a new idea. There are few, if any (the WeLL is a sometimes exception) real collaborative dialogs. Mostly it’s verbal combat more suited to a courtroom than a living room.
In my email and my personal life, I have actual conversations about actual stuff with actual people. We don’t yell at each other. We don’t take extreme points and refine our extremities. We work together to try to see a picture that can’t be seen by either of us alone.
It’s not that I don’t love the fuss and tumble. It’s just that wrestling with new ideas doesn’t always happen easily in a cauldron. The impulse to defend gets in the way of clarity.
In a good conversation, each partner works hard to make sure that the other understands. The responsibility for the communication rests entirely with each person (That’s 100% plus 100% divided by two equals 100%). Not half responsible, completely responsible.
Read the Entire Population Distribution Series
- 080825 Population I
- 080826 Population II
- 080827 Population III
- 080828 Population IV
- 080903 Population V
- 080904 HRMDirect (and an exceptional writer when he writes). Online and off, we have this great conversation. He always pokes holes in my story and my story always gets better as a result. That’s because Colin wants to learn, not fight.
This week, Colin took the time to respond to my blathering about pyramids. I can’t reprint his note for competitive reasons. To summarize, Colin believes that the Recruiting Funnel is a fact of life regardless of the state of the population. He gave a strong example from a new customer (HRMDirect is in the Applicant Tracking System business).
Here’s my response to his note:
As usual, you stretch me.
If the only problem were thin supply, I think your analysis would be perfect. What’s happening, though, is a change in the quality and depth of the supply. I’m coming to the conclusion that “shortage” is a real misnomer (at least in the US and all of the world except the other top 50 industrialized countries).
Generally, population is growing and will for another generation at least.
But, there are pockets of strangeness. Cleveland, for example, has no young people. There actually are jobs that are better done by young people (as impolitic as that is). You simply can’t do them in Cleveland.
In the steel industry, the recruiting problem boils down to retention issues…They can’t keep the few young people they can get. They have to broaden their definition of what works (just as is the case in your example).
It was probably a mistake to use the recruiting funnel as an example of the pyramid stuff. I’m reaching for an idea that is just at the edges of my thinking. It’s a struggle. Something about the “few at the top, lots at the bottom” perspective has changed. I think it’s really big. I explain it terribly. I am working on simplifying and clarifying what is a powerful but vague concept.
Maybe it’s a question of selectivity and standards. In a time of abundance and unrestrained growth, one could be strict about what was in the pyramid. Today (in some cases but not young men in China) to have a pyramid, standards have to stretch. I’m not sure that’s it either.
I really appreciate your notes. You always push me in a positive direction.
Good conversations have real give and take. It’s very hard to do that while shouting.
