Foundation Work, April 2, 2008
Harold L. Wilensky
UPDATED 28 March 2014 to add a few key points.
This gem is so valuable to me that when I could not find a copy for sale (this was way back before Amazon made it easy), I made a personal copy.
This is a foundation work for organizational intelligence, which now includes four converging streams: Open Source Intelligence (OSINT), Collective Intelligence, Peace Intelligence, and Commercial Intelligence.
I would like very much to see this re-published, and would be glad to contribute a preface from a commercial point of view while Mark Tovey, editor of the forthcoming book on Collective Intelligence: Creating a Prosperous World at Peace, does the academic preface.
This is a “must have” reference for anyone thinking about group IQ, smart mobs, smart nations, smart corporations, etcetera.
A few key points, with many others not itemized:
01 Explores how knowledge shapes (or does not shape) policy in both governent and industry
02 Information converted into intelligence integrates clear, timely, reliable, valid, adequate, and wide-ranging.
03 Intelligence failures stem in part from hierarchy (which conceals and misinterprets), specialization, rivalry, and other institutional dysfuntionalities.
04 There remains a great shortage of generalists able to select, discriminate, and integrate.
05 Information technology elevates the hard variables, represses the soft variables
06 Those at the top are out of touch; good judgment is rare, decisions are not fully informed nor deliberative.
The New Craft of Intelligence: Personal, Public, & Political–Citizen's Action Handbook for Fighting Terrorism, Genocide, Disease, Toxic Bombs, & Corruption
Business Blindspots: Replacing Your Company's Entrenched and Outdated Myths, Beliefs and Assumptions With the Realities of Today's Markets
Group Genius: The Creative Power of Collaboration
The Tao of Democracy: Using Co-Intelligence to Create a World That Works for All
The World Cafe: Shaping Our Futures Through Conversations That Matter
Society's Breakthrough!: Releasing Essential Wisdom and Virtue in All the People
One from Many: VISA and the Rise of Chaordic Organization
The Wealth of Networks: How Social Production Transforms Markets and Freedom
Collective Intelligence: Creating a Prosperous World at Peace
