Blog like a reporter: 2011

Saturday, December 17, 2011

Final Essay Post#5

The book discusses "what meaning means", and suggests that there are three uses of the word "mean". The book suggests that meaning implies that events are all connected, that peoples' intentions are revealed through actions, and finally that meaning can connect ideas and relationships that are otherwise unconnected. I found that it is vital to find meaning in the activities and thoughts that I participate in on a daily basis. Meaning helps us to apply definition to our intentions or actions, thus providing more structure in our pursuits. The book suggests that, "Napoleon and Mother Teresa may both have achieved equal levels of inner purpose, therefore optimal experience"(374). This example shows the broad spectrum in which Flow can exist. In some point of views, Napoleon can be considered a tyrant bent on destruction and expansion, and if in fact this was his purpose he succeeded. He was successful in his military campaigns and perhaps experienced flow while doing so, because he was so focused on his purpose of expansion. In contrast, Mother Teresa was instrumental in creating hope and social welfare via the Catholic Church. Her purpose was clearly to help humanity and create a stronger world community, nearly the exact opposite of Napoleon. However, both Napoleon and Mother Teresa experienced the same feelings of fulfillment during their quests.

Whether or not we are working in an office building or selling hot dogs on the street, meaning is what motivates us to do the best we can with the task at hand. Flow does not just arrive as the result of hard work, it is the culmination of focus, meaning, effort, and joy. Perhaps we can define our meaning as the pursuit of Flow, at which point we must define each component of obtaining Flow. First we must find what interests us, and surround ourselves with instances of this interest. Then it is essential to define to meaning of these interests, are they personal pursuits, societal pursuits, or a combination of both. Once we decide the meaning of our efforts, it becomes easier to identify a path towards accomplishing our goals. Many people seem to approach their daily lives with an unenthusiastic demeanor, and this may be due to their lack of meaning or direction. We all have goals, but until we define a way to obtain them, they may always be slightly out of reach. Finally, Flow is the result of defining our efforts and placing all of our cognitive efforts in a line pointed at success.

Essay post #3 & #4

Flow continues to advocate exploring self-development. It is very clear that the key to flow is in finding our identity. As in management situations, a clear definition of goals and/or purpose is key to the development of a successful operation. Once we’ve become more aware of our personal strengths, we will be in a better position to control the outcomes of our dealings. For instance, Csikszentmihalyi suggests that socializing is an activity that often produces optimal and desired outcomes. We must use a certain skill set to interact with our acquaintances, whether it be humor, wit, or cunning, to name a few, we must employ various skills to maneuver through conversations. As we engage in these interactions and use our various skills, we often feel a sense of gratification. Through these interactions we identify opportunities and various avenues that can offer potential other positive outcomes. Looking for flow in socialization is pertinent to organizational behavior, especially when navigating relationships. For instance in the discussion of conflict resolution, we learned that communication is often a key component to both the cause and resolution for any conflict. In the article “Three Approaches to Resolving Disputes”, the author makes a clear distinction that “reconciling interests” is vital to creating organization and avoiding conflicts. This is also vital in creating flow through communication. Whether we are dealing with friends or colleagues, in the quest for flow, we must be strategic in aligning our interests in such a way that everyone reaches an ideal level of satisfaction. In a professional atmosphere, a manager must pay close attention to the interests and goals of his counterparts; once the manager is able to identify the interests, he will be in a better position to direct the abilities of each member of the organization, thus creating a higher likelihood of flow experience. As the members of the organization begin to experience success (hopefully because of their positioning) they will likely become motivated by their positive feelings, thus creating trust and the sense of community in the organization.

Similar to aligning the interests of an organization, an individual must be sure to identify his personal interests in an effort to create a clear path to personal gratification and fulfillment. Most of us enjoy a challenge. We all find challenges in different situations, for some it is physical activity and others may enjoy mental challenges. In either situation it is important to find challenges that help us perfect our skills.

The author suggests,” But when beating the opponent takes precedence in the mind over performing as well as possible, enjoyment tends to disappear. Competition is enjoyable only when it is a means to perfect one’s skills; when it becomes and end in itself, it ceases to be fun.”(181)

Of course, this mindset pertains to personal pursuits of enjoyment but it can be applied to group efforts as well. When my buddies and I play playstation, we tend to play FIFA. This game allows for head to head gaming or you can team up with your friends and play each other. For the longest time we were all competitive when playing, and for the first few months I noticed that we were each getting better and helping each other to learn new tricks. Around the time of our midterms, the game seemed to lose its appeal. Personally I fell into a losing streak, but felt that I hadn’t lost anything from my skill set, and nobody really got too much better. I came to the conclusion that the added stress from midterms had turned the gaming into a routine rather than a pleasure. I was no longer playing to get better, I was simply playing to defeat my friends and to procrastinate. I had been experiencing flow initially, but I lost it. I was consciously distracted by the pending exams and my usual enjoyment of FIFA was not present. As I began to make mistakes in the games, my teammates began to lose as well, and suddenly the experience of playing FIFA was no longer enjoyable for anyone. The group lost its Flow as well because of one component of the team.

Monday, October 17, 2011

report#2

In the second segment of Flow,Csikszentmihalyi explores the idea of using the developed understanding of “self” to control attention. The author says, “Attention shapes the self, and in turn is shaped by it.”(71) In the development of Flow, it becomes essential to develop an understanding of self. Self is not simply comprised of physical attributes and mannerisms; it is the complete compilation of behaviors and attitudes that we pack into our “being”. Every day, as a being, we develop our notion of self. With each experience we have, our “self” emerges evermore. As we begin to get to know our “self”, we begin to recognize our interests and our tendencies. For instance, many students experience the feeling of not knowing exactly what they want to pursue Post College. Perhaps one of these students takes a trip or has an experience with something new to them. That experience could trigger a new interest, an interest that seeds itself in our “self”. Suddenly the student begins to take classes related to this experience and the student surrounds himself with things that remind him of the experience. By integrating these new behaviors into his routines, he has allowed his “self” to direct and focus his attention on the development of this new interest. Suddenly the experience has gone from random occurrence, to life changing incident, and perhaps the student will direct a significant portion of the rest of his life towards focusing attention on the experience.

People who are fortunate enough to recognize their “self” early on in life can, in theory spend the entirety of their lives tuning and developing the self. These people will find themselves in situations that continuously benefit them, ever furthering their development of self. The author suggests that by having a defined understanding of self, people are able to obtain flow, or optimal experience in more cases than most. By understanding ourselves we are more apt to placing ourselves in fulfilling situations. Perhaps we are faced with a daunting task, a person who experiences a great relationship with his/her, “self”, will most certainly approach this task with a different focus than, a person with a limited relationship with his self. This suggests that a person with better self-identification may have a better life, but it is more important to show that a person with better self-identification will have a more fulfilling interpretation of the experiences he has.

The interpretation of life through the eyes of a developed self is described by the author as psychic energy. The author does not suggest that we have psychic abilities, in the sense of being able to predict thoughts, but we have the ability to organize our consciousness in such a way that provides optimal experience in day to day life. We have spoken about heuristics, and in a way developing an understanding of self, is the development of heuristics that explain us. Different than any heuristic though, flow and psychic energy emerge from certainly positive experiences. Flow cannot be described as prediction of events to come, or the enjoyment of predicting upcoming events based on prior knowledge; flow is dependent upon feeling, a crossroads in our thought process where we let go of conscious efforts and allow our certainty in “self” to take control and lead us to and through optimal experience.

Sunday, October 2, 2011

Flow(REPORT 1)

Draft 1

In Csikszentmihalyi’s book “Flow”, the concept of achieving optimal experience is discussed. Flow, what the author defines as,” the state in which people are so involved in an activity that nothing else seems to matter; the experience itself is so enjoyable that people will do it even at great cost, for the sheer sake of doing it.”(17), is what any team or organization no matter how large, is ultimately striving to find. Similarly individuals spend their lives trying to find this “flow”. However, the author suggests, that flow and its intricate components, which will be explained later, are not easily obtainable; especially for those of us who are consciously searching. In fact flow seems to come when we are least expecting it. Perhaps when we take time to look inward, and develop a comfort and understanding with ourselves, we will be better able to harness flow. By figuring ourselves out, we must make it our responsibility to gain control and respect for our intricacies. Including an understanding of our perception of what is happening around us, after all it is said that the only thing you can control 100% is yourself. Controlling perception is a difficult task, and in Flow the author outlines a few devices we can use in attempts to harness ourselves. This is no new notion, as the author suggests, philosophers and ancient rulers alike understood that control of their consciousness was the key to controlling happiness. By becoming consumed with finding an understanding of ourselves, we liberate our consciousness from the restraints of society. As the author suggests, there is much more than obtaining knowledge throughout life; knowledge is to be applied to modify our own habits and desires. We can apply this philosophy to groups and teams as well. Groups and teams could potentially take time in the beginning of their existence to examine, the groups’ entity. Just as the author suggests each of us needs to find a better understanding of ourselves, the group must think of itself as one unit. Once the unit is defined, they will have an opportunity to examine it, get to know it, and ultimately harness its potential. Just like the crew team describing the feeling of the boat lifting out of the water when they achieved synchronization, teams in business settings can also feel similarly. Teams must work to overcome themselves as obstacles, in order to find flow and produce the ultimate experience, which certainly must be the desired experience.

Saturday, October 1, 2011

Wisdom of Crowds

Institutions with vast financial means seem to be able to produce whatever results necessary to support their desired outcomes. As seen in the Wal-mart case, the prosecuting attorneys felt as though they had found statistical evidence to support discrimination in the company. To no surprise, the Wal Mart officials declared that THEIR analysts had found much different results. Point being, through manipulation and incidences of groupthink groups,statistics, and conclusions can be skewed by the "powers that be". In the case regarding Columbia and the foam debris, the narrative clearly shows a situation in which NASA's officials were not interested in hearing inconclusive results. By steering the analysts towards an outcome which supported the launch, officials deliberately deprived analysts of vital information. In this case, the negligence put lives in direct danger. The article really outlines the dilemma in creating cohesion in groups. It is clearly important to have cooperation in groups, but as this article suggests, lack of cognitive diversity can certainly limit the groups ability to consider conflicting approaches. The NASA situation was certainly caused by the pressures applies from higher ranking officials. The members wanted to have their names attached to a successful mission, so they applied that pressure to their subordinates thus allowing for nothing other than a launch. The members involved lost their will to consider anything other than positive conclusions. Their only cry for help; stating that their evidence developed from limited resources.

RACE!

Initially it seemed as though racing would be the natural decision for the team. Without any clear evidence to support not racing, other than some of the recorded data on engine failures related to temperature. Financially, there are more outcomes that warrant financial gain, while racing, than if the team doesnt race. Of course, if they were to race and fail, nearly all would be lost. Perhaps the team should do some personality testing in the near future. By determining some characteristics of the driver and the team, each member would be able to approach the decision with a different view. Not until we saw the information regarding victory's based on temperature did it become clear what the racing team should do.

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Jobs and GPA

The article regarding the correlation between college graduates' GPA and their job opportunities was reassuring and concerning. I was pleased to hear that on some levels there is a push to get to know a job applicant past their posted scores and academic achievements, but I was concerned that in fact many places will stop short at only reading posted scores. It is understandable that certain firms will be forced to review hundreds of applications and using numbers can be a great way to weed out the bad apps, but when looking for potential, I find that getting to know a person is the true test. The bottom line, get good grades and be prepared to sell yourself without credentials backing you up. Become the full package as far as potential hiring entities are concerned.

I Can Handle Failure(Class Post)

The HBR article regarding the different interpretations of failure was intriguing. By breaking the most common 11 personality types into three broad categories, impunitive, extrapunitive, and intropunitive I found it much easier to consider interactions between the few groups. Though I am not entirely sure where I fall at this point, I see an opportunity to explore the groupings and at the very least I may discover new ways to understand where my classmates and future colleagues are coming from. The article prompted me to consider that I am often times not clear when offering direction or opinions to my friends etc. I hope to find ways to be more direct in my explanations and perhaps by sharing my goals and "visions" for potential outcomes I will be able to bring groups together more efficiently.