% Fall Reading 2012
% Michael Stone
% December 8, 2012

Fall reading. Mostly not finished. Some jewels: Senge, Argyris, Porter.

## The Fifth Discipline

Link: [Amazon](http://www.amazon.com/The-Fifth-Discipline-Practice-Organization/dp/0385260954)

Author: Peter Senge

Summary: Systems can be complex, complicated, or both. Complex systems feature
"dynamic" -- i.e., temporal -- complexity. Complicated systems feature
"detail" complexity. Feedback, delay, and indirect causality are three of the
critical features of complex systems. Other key terms: leverage, personal
mastery, mental models, shared vision, and team learning.

Related fun:

## Competitive Strategy

Link: [Amazon](http://www.amazon.com/Competitive-Strategy-Techniques-Industries-Competitors/dp/0684841487)

Author: Michael Porter

Summary: tbd. (up to page 50, or so): profits in any given industry are
heavily constrained by five structural forces of rivalry: "entry, threat
of substitution, bargaining power of buyers, bargaining power of suppliers,
and rivalry among current competitors". These forces often result in
industry-specific barriers to entry (and exit). There are three (mostly
mutually incompatible) extremes of competitive strategy: cost leadership,
differentiation, and focus.

Related fun:

## The Art of Design

Link: [usacac.army.mil](http://usacac.army.mil/cac2/CGSC/events/sams/ArtofDesign_v2.pdf)

Author: SAMS Student Text Design Team

Summary: tbd. (up to page 30 or so)

Selected Quotes:

  > According to the doctrine, "design is a methodology for applying critical
  > and creative thinking to understand, visualize, and describe complex,
  > ill-structured problems and develop approaches to solve them." -- FM 5-0
  > (pg. 10)

  > The five pillars of design education at SAMS are history, theory,
  > doctrine, philosophy, and practice. (pg. 28)

Related fun:

## An Unknown Future and a Doubtful Present

Link: [www.history.army.mil](http://www.history.army.mil/html/books/093/93-10/CMH_Pub_93-10.pdf)

Author: Charles E. Kirkpatrick

Summary: tbd.

Related fun:

## The Reflective Practitioner

Link: [Amazon](http://www.amazon.com/Reflective-Practitioner-Professionals-Think-Action/dp/0465068782)

Author: Donald A Schön

Summary: tbd. (The basic blurb: for most professionals, effectiveness depends
heavily on tacit knowledge and "reflection-in-action".)

See also: 

  * ["Human Error"](http://www.amazon.com/Human-Error-James-Reason/dp/0521314194), for the skill-rule-knowledge framework.

Related fun:

## Educating the Reflective Practitioner

Link: [Amazon](http://www.amazon.com/Educating-Reflective-Practitioner-Professions-Education/dp/1555422209)

Author: Donald A Schön

Summary: tbd. "Where do professionals come from?"

Related fun:

## Theory in Practice

Link: [Amazon](http://www.amazon.com/Theory-Practice-Increasing-Professional-Effectiveness/dp/1555424465)

Author: Chris Argyris and Donald A. Schön

Summary: Argyris and Schön think that many people in our society tacitly learn
theories in order to cope with their environment but that, for structural
reasons, their theories often are often "self-sealing" rather than testable and subject to incongruence (espoused theories and theories-in-use
differ), incompatibility (control objectives conflict / configuration space is
disconnected), ineffectiveness (objectives not met), and loss of value
(inappropriate objectives are met). They suggest a paradoxical but (according
to them) effective alternate path based on maximizing learning via valid
information, free and informed choice, and internal commitment.

Related fun: 

  * ["klee + microclimates"](../microclimates/)
  * [Reframing Organizations](http://mstone.info/posts/reading-20120826/#reframing-organizations)  -- (Bolman, a co-author of "Reframing Organizations", is thanked in the acknowledgments of "Theory in Practice".)

## The Emotional Brain

Link: [Amazon](http://www.amazon.com/Emotional-Brain-Mysterious-Underpinnings-Life/dp/0684836599)

Author: Joseph LeDoux

Summary: tbd.

Related fun:

## The Definitive Book of Body Language

Link: [Amazon](http://www.amazon.com/Definitive-Book-Body-Language/dp/0553804723)

Author: Barbara Pease and Allan Pease

Summary: People often express their emotional state via pose and gesture
clusters. (Note: the science writing here is mostly crap but the photos and
illustrations are, mostly, convincing.)