As I conducted experiments for the Chair of Organization & Planning, I could not come to the today's coaching session with Martina Hartner. All the three subgroups - Decision Map, Storyboard and Experiment - presented their ideas. Oksana reported to me the following:
At first, Martina asked many questions, but at the end she suggested to incorporate somehow the experiment and the story board into our decision map. She was mostly concerned with the fact, that our prototype should bring something new to life. The objective is to show that our KCT came up with something we had not known before.
After the coaching session the KCT team members briefly discussed the project with each other. Okasana mentioned our idea of having a role play, which was supported by all of the others. She also wrote a short summary of the project idea and downloaded it on our homepage. The next steps are to make some new drafts of the decision map. Anway, I am still working on it in Visio :-).
I have heard rumours of other PhD students who participated the course semesters before that there is a special session in Philosophy of Science, which is supposed to be like walking in the woods close to Vienna. I heard it also through the grapevine that some professors at BWZ are not amused about that kind of teaching in a PhD course. Anyway, I said to myself it is better to get my own ideas about this Lobau session.
According to Wikipedia the most interesting facts about Lobau are that: • It is a floodplain on the northern side of the Danube and most of it located in Lower Austria but has borders to the Vienna Danube Island • It was the site of the Battle of Aspern-Essling in 1809, the first major defeat suffered by Napoleon • There is an oil harbour, which was bombed in the year 1944 during the Oil Champaign of World War II • It a part of the Danube-Auen National Park and a protected area since 1978 • It is used as a recreational area and is known as a site of nudism • The area is used by the Austrian Army as training ground By all means, it took me more than a half an hour for driving from Vienna to Großenzersdorf. I really expected a silent area but I made the experience that the airport Vienna-Schwechat is quite close to this territory by hearing several planes taking off or landing. However, a very nice camp is located within the woods, which is a starting point for walks. A children group was also there, camping in tents. In this camp the whole Philosophy of Science group met in an attractive seminar room with a nice view into the wild. In particular we focused presencing phase of Otto Scharmer's Theory U. The objective was letting-go and entering the field of emerging new knowledge. For that reason we got the task to go outside into the woods and expose yourselves to the silence by finding a place in the nature that fits your present situation. It seems very interesting letting things come. Professor Peschl explained that we should try to get into contact with our inner self and get into a mode of deep listening.
At first I walked with a group of some people but with the time more and more people disappeared and turned off on the road. I stopped at a bench which is situated along the path. It seems that I am risk-averse and that I did not want to get lost in the woods. After calming myself down and coming to a situation which is comparable to meditation, I also thought about the thematic field of our KCT. The guiding questions were what is the fascinating point that really absorbs me in the “homo oeconomicus” model and what is my personal relationship to this field. For me the most interesting point was finding out how people really make decisions and what really drives them to take a respective decision.
After coming back of this letting-go phase the KCT group shared its experiences. Every group-member came back with different impressions and ideas. In order to continue on our common knowledge and experience we agreed to use the common understanding of our thematic field. More or less we are interested not only in stretching the surface but also in looking on details of decision-making. The next steps were to go a step further, into the prototyping phase. We agreed to emphasize the topic how people make decisions. The core idea is to stress the question what drives people in decision-making. The intention is to categorize daily decisions like such which are done automatically, emotionally or need negotiations. We came to the conclusion to use a decision map as guideline for structuring decisions, a role play to present different decision-making scenarios and an experiment of an ethical paradoxon in order to manipulate our class mates' decisions.
The goal of our focus interview was to get a new perspective on the homo oeconomicus. Therefore we invited businesspeople from different industries in order to obtain a holistic picture from different view points. The heterogeneous group was formed by two female and five male participants. Moreover the interview was conducted by a female and male moderator. Our interview partners are working in financial services, media, advertisement companies, pharmaceutical industry, lobbying organizations, and university. We presented our understanding of homo oeconomicus with the following statement of Adam Smith “It is not the goodness and benevolence of the butcher, the brewer or the backer that we our food, but their own selfish interest.”
In order to get into the topic we decided to follow the strategy to ask first some personal questions and then after a warm-up phase to come into more general questions. Thus, we confronted the interview partners with their current job situation. They were asked to describe some motivation factors why they like their respective jobs or not. One the one hand, it was mentioned that own responsibility (e.g. to take own decisions) is a driver for personal motivation in job, but on the other hand several interview partners came to the conclusion that their activities should shape future and contribute to the progress of society. Nobody indicated that money is an important motivation factor. There was a common sense that money is a foundation of stability (e.g. for paying invoices), but they did not think that money makes people happy. One interview partner used the picture of the diminishing marginal utility of money and happiness.
Concerning decision-making we faced the discussion group with the question whether they take decisions in business rationally or emotionally. While someone in a recruiting position trust his/her gut feeling, other ones (e.g. in media planning) trust more numbers. However, it was stressed that rationality can only be a basis for decision-making, but more or less everybody is always driven by emotions. It seems that emotions are always involved. We presented in that context one result of our online-questionnaire. Almost one half of the respondents partly agreed that a person act rationally in order to be successful. Some interview partners said that people are biased regarding the combination rationality and success. For being a successful manager the group agreed that both parts – rationality and emotions – are essential. It was argued that Bernard Madoff, who ran the biggest ponzi scheme ever known, acted also both rationally and emotionally. The irrationality of people could be seen as a cause of the financial crisis. People seem to follow their emotions and consumed financial products, because others did it as well. It can be attributed to a herd-instinct.
A central question was whether people think that the homo oeconomicus still exists, since according to some scholars capitalism is no longer the ideal economic model. Some discussion participants explained that economists need something to assume because simplification is an elementary part of every model. People gave answers like that homo oeconomicus is a framework but an adaption or extension would be necessary. In an alternative model it seems to be important to incorporate more social responsibility. A majority of the interview partners stressed the missing social aspect in the homo oeconomicus model. More or less a social concept would fit the current situation of globalization.
Summing up, the main points of the focus interview from my point of view are the following: It was mentioned that visions and long-term perspective thinking are crucial, since we asked what kind of message or what advice would you formulate to our government. In regard of homo oeconomicus it seems that the dimension of emotions and the social contribution to society are missing links. For me it was interesting that people took part in this interview and really used the opportunity here to exchange their opinions. I would not expect it that people are highly motivated more by intrinsic than extrinsic factors in their jobs. The discussion group argued for contribution to society, which seems to reinvent them.
As I conducted experiments for the Chair of Organization & Planning, I could not come to the today's coaching session with Martina Hartner. All the three subgroups - Decision Map, Storyboard and Experiment - presented their ideas. Oksana reported to me the following:
