Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ames!attctc!phil
From: phil@attctc.Dallas.TX.US (Phil Meyer)
Newsgroups: comp.misc
Subject: Re: Low Productivity of Knowledge Workers
Message-ID: <9716@attctc.Dallas.TX.US>
Date: 15 Oct 89 00:41:41 GMT
References: <9676@venera.isi.edu> <189@crucible.UUCP> <291@voa3.UUCP> <7971@microsoft.UUCP> <6441@ficc.uu.net> <9605@attctc.Dallas.TX.US> <3326@ur-cc.UUCP>
Reply-To: phil@attctc.Dallas.TX.US (Phil Meyer)
Organization: The Unix(R) Connection BBS, Dallas, Tx
Lines: 35

In article <3326@ur-cc.UUCP> mpip@uhura.cc.rochester.edu (Robert Annechiarico) writes:
>- Give your users the right tools.  Don't let
>- them choose their own, and bicker over the merits of each.  Most good managers
>- listen to the needs of the whole, and then dictate policy.
>
>This astonishing, authoritarian attitude is itself a good explanation of
>why so many choose personal computers.
>
You forget, or are not considering, that most of the American work force is
NOT automated, and have no desire to do so.  Talk of 'the computer will destroy
the world' is more common than you know.  I am talking about automation.  Not
the fact that a few users at a given site have or want a Pee Cee.

Name an organization.  What percentage of people at the site use a Pee Cee?
I think that everyone will agree that the Firms with total automation (if there
really is such a thing) are VERY few!  You think too small.

Of course you want a Pee Cee.  Of course you can benefit from it.  But will
your company/firm/organization reap the same benefits, or will they even
be harmed by you.  If you really do well, your peers will dislike you and
your tactics.  Your superiors will fear your success.  This is a real
situation.  It is only the 'authoritarian' policy of management that can save
your career, and help the 'rest' of the workforce come to the same level of
proficiency that you possess.  An attitude of 'everyone for himself' cannot
exist in corporate America, and is the attitude promoted by 'Personal
Productivity'.  The 'me generation' will fail, unless WE can learn to work
with others less enthused about computers and technology than we are.

End of soapbox.

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