                                 12. COMMENTARY.
        
             Supervision in the 21st Century is destined to change.  In
        the Information Age, the organizations that will survive will be
        those which emulate the VC.  Products and services will be
        customized by organizations who realize that the "customer" is
        boss.  
        
             The role of the educational establishment will be critical
        in ensuring that it produces the kinds of leaders and employees
        which will readily adapt to this new type of system and its
        philosophy, thinking, and approaches to managing information and
        human resources effectively and efficiently.  It is necessary
        that supervisors in all organizations realize the paramount
        importance of training for adults in business and industrial
        settings.  Concurrently, supervisors in education need to revamp
        the primary, secondary, and post-secondary learning environments
        to adequately prepare those who are about to enter the national
        and international work forces so they will be ready to undertake
        the challenges which lie ahead.  
        
             Educational supervision was not the primary focus of this
        paper.  In fact, no specific type of organizational supervision
        was diagnosed and evaluated.  My goal was to provide an overview
        of the entire range of behaviors, attitudes, and beliefs related
        to supervision and its role.
        
             The new millennium is rapidly approaching.  Preparing for it
        will be no small task.  The infrastructure of many of our
        industrial, educational, social service, and business
        organizations are collapsing.  The information age is forcing new
        ideas and behaviors on people everywhere.  Management without
        effective communication becomes mismanagement.  Time and space
        are no longer static, but fluid and dynamic.  Unless managers at
        all levels accept this reality and begin to work with it to
        improve those infrastructures, many organizations are doomed to
        receivership or Chapter 11 status.  
        
             In education, the same issues are present.  Many
        superintendents, principals, and head teachers still do not
        accept the concept of the information age.  Few schools are
        gearing up to meet the demands of the new social and world order. 
        There is a preference among most educational personnel to
        maintain the status quo.  When attendance drops, and students
        fail, administrators and teachers place blame on students, their
        families, the society, and many other external factors which are
        out of their control.  They avoid accepting responsibility for
        creating new educational environments which will prepare the next
        generation for assimilation into the information age.  
        
             On NBC news recently, a segment was aired on a school in
        Rockford, Michigan which accepted this challenge.  The entire
        school is organized to facilitate experiential learning and
        mastering the technology of the information age.  Students use
        all the modern communication technology to learn.  Even skills
        such as effective parenting are taught within the daily schedule. 
        The school operates a day care center in which students and
        teachers watch children and learn how to effectively care for
        them.  News reports and other daily communication activities are
        written, produced, and directed by students with faculty
        assistance.  At 4 pm the students go home, but the school is not
        vacated.  Each evening, adults utilize the same facilities to
        learn how to deal with the modern technology, and prepare for new
        jobs and careers in the information age.  The 40 million dollar
        price tag for the school seems to be well spent.  Unlike most
        schools which lie dormant for three months a year, the Rockford
        School never closes its doors.  
        
             This is just one example of the kind of innovative thinking
        which can prepare the learners of the next generation for the
        challenges of the future which is already upon us.
        
             What kinds of changes in beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors
        on the part of leaders, politicians, supervisors, managers,
        forepeople, will be necessary to effect these kinds of changes? 
        How will they facilitate such changes so that the gap between
        what is and what can be will be decreased?
        
             These are my notions regarding what needs to occur before we
        as a nation of diverse organizations, businesses, industries,
        social agencies, and educational establishments will be prepared
        for the inevitable information age future:
        
        1.   Stop denying the birth of the information age and begin to
             accept it.  Until this denial that the world is evolving
             toward another era is embraced by the top leaders in our
             nation and our organizations, whether they be businesses,
             industries, education, or human services, we will continue
             to lag behind the times and be at the effect of the waves of
             changes crashing upon our shores.  
        
        2.   Encourage the education of computer literacy from
             kindergarten to the Ph.D. level and beyond.  It amazes me
             how many top managers, educators, social service, and
             business people still are not computer literate.  As long as
             a secretary can type a memo, even if he or she uses a word
             processor, and the manager does not have to interact with
             the technology, this condition will continue to exist. 
             Secretaries are no longer just typists, but information
             managers.  The effective supervisor needs to understand and
             accept this new role.  Countless hours of top management's
             time is wasted in interacting with a secretary who is still
             perceived as a "clerk-typist."  Personal Data Assistants
             (PDA) are rapidly gaining acceptance and as the prices drop
             in the near future, the information management once
             delegated to a secretary will no longer be necessary.
        
        3.   Eliminate copy machines and begin to use electronic forms of
             communication which are much cheaper, more efficient, and
             environmentally sound.  Books on CD's are much easier to
             produce and reproduce, lighter to carry around and
             distribute, and once CD copy technology is affordable, this
             method of exchanging information will certainly speed up the
             learning curve.  E-mail, and FAX modems will add to the
             expeditious exchange of information between individuals, and
             among the leaders of diverse organizations.  Cellular phones
             already dot the landscape.  Driving in heavy freeway traffic
             this past week in metropolitan Pittsburgh, I observed nearly
             every other driver near me animatedly talking on a car
             phone.  As the cellular networks branch out and even rural
             areas are connected, the global village will be everywhere
             there is a phone, and not necessarily a line.  Brainstorm
             software which permits many people to share threads of
             information over networks across time and space will
             eventually eliminate the need for people to meet face to
             face.  Only the most important affairs will demand such
             meetings.
        
        4.   Begin to measure competencies rather than abstract learning
             potential.  Many talented individuals are eliminated from
             successful personal careers because they do not possess math
             and reading skills which are only two of the 206 domains of
             learning currently measurable.  The SAT scores are not the
             only measures of an individual's abilities.  Many fine
             tradespeople would fail the SAT test, but easily can program
             a computer, fix an automobile, a refrigerator or some other
             modern appliance.  We need to foster the rebuilding of the
             apprenticeship type training process to prepare for the vast
             amount of technical repair work which will arise from the
             explosion of all this high tech gear.  Blue collar workers
             will evolve into blue lab coat workers.
        
        5.   Train administrators, supervisors, and employees in the
             concepts of the Virtual Corporation.  As time and space
             expand, organizations will need to adapt to the changes
             facing them.  Smaller, mobile, efficient work groups of
             experts will replace the monolithic structures we now see
             choking on their last gasps as the information age consumes
             their air.  Organizational development concepts may need to
             be changed from OD to ORD, organizational redevelopment. 
             Too many organizations today are top heavy with management
             and the middle managers within these organizations are
             incapable or unwilling to act without permission from above. 
             As deBono described, there is a need for lateral as well as
             vertical thinking.  There is a critical need for lateral
             expansion of organizations away from the purely vertical
             structures which currently dominate our culture.  Policies
             will need to be replaced.  Fewer rewards for political
             activities and greater ones for creative endeavors need to
             be fostered.  Meshing the human factor and the computer
             factor will enhance the merging of vertical and lateral
             organizational structures until an effective matrix is
             established as described by Davidow and Malone (1991).  
        
        6.   Manage people with democratic rather than totalitarian
             principles.  Since the X-Theory management style still
             predominates, there is an immediate need to reframe this
             management style and move immediately toward a universal
             acceptance of the Y-Theory, and eventually the Z-Theory of
             management.  In the work environment, too many people
             experience little influence over a part of their lives which
             consumes fully a third of them.  This is an intolerable
             condition for most individuals.  The result is often low
             motivation, little loyalty to the organization, and turnover
             rates which cost dearly.  As employees are empowered to take
             ownership of their direct work-related responsibilities,
             this condition will improve.  However, it is supervision's
             role to not only foster but facilitate and support this
             change.  Perhaps, that is what GM meant when it advertized
             Saturn as "not just another car company."  Blue-chip GM went
             outside its organizational structure to create a creative,
             dynamic fosterchild which seems to be unique in the car
             manufacturing world.  (I just wish they would produce a
             cheaper version of their automobile like VW did back in the
             early 1960's).  
        
        7.   Reward creative, productive enterprise.  For too long,
             rewards in most organizations were based upon politics
             rather than achieving results.  This trend needs to be
             reversed if the organizations presently existing hope to
             survive in the future.  Politics as usual is destroying the
             nation-state and many of the organizations which exist
             within it today.  As long as they still maintain nepotistic,
             "good ole boy" networks and internally choke off the life
             blood of their systems, they are doomed to failure. 
             Vertical thinking is encouraged, but lateral thinking
             avoided.  Only in the most progressive organizations do
             "think tanks" exist.  The need for all types of thinking
             patterns to be fostered within organizational structures
             cannot be overemphasized.  Brainstorming is not enough.  An
             organizational culture must be established in which all
             ideas are considered.  PO (deBono, 1972) must replace the
             Yes/No mentality which governs today.  
        
        8.   Realize that Time and Space are diminishing. There is time
             to wait, but only if the time is not important.   The global
             village is rapidly approaching.  From my home in the most
             rural part of Pennsylvania, with my computer and phone line,
             I am connected with the world.  Five years ago, the
             connection cost was prohibitive.  In just one year, the
             modem which I purchased for $100 (2400 Baud) is outdated. 
             For a few dollars more, I can now own a 14,400 Baud FAX
             modem which is six times faster and performs more functions
             at less cost.  Organizations which avoid the use of this
             technology are doomed.  In organizations where the
             technology is embraced but supervisors refuse to use it,
             they will slowly destroy their organizations from within. 
             Hard copy memos, which cost from $5-20 to produce and
             distribute to all employees need to be replaced by e-mail
             messages which can be sent for micro-pennies.  
        
        9.   Foster lifelong learning at all levels of the organization,
             beginning with supervision.  We must accept that what worked
             today probably will not work tomorrow.  This is a most
             painful lesson.  Not many supervisors are prepared to
             entertain a program of life long learning.  Yet without such
             activity on the part of supervisors in business, industry,
             education, and human services, the future for these
             individuals is murky.  There is too much to learn about the
             future to be caught unaware.  Management training is not
             enough.  Each individual supervisor must accept
             responsibility for undertaking a personal program of
             lifelong learning to enhance his or her growth and
             development.   
        
        10.  Learn how to learn.  Learning how to learn is the key. 
             Memorizing information is not necessary.  Let the PDA keep
             track of phone numbers, memos, and other data.  Access
             information needed with the touch of a pen.  Learn how to
             use the technology to do a much better, more efficient, and
             less costly job.  With the information explosion, it is
             impossible to learn everything about even the most
             microscopic facets of any one subject.  What is most
             important is learning how to learn, how to think, and how to
             solve problems practically, swiftly, and efficiently.  One
             of my favorite quotes is "You don't have a problem if you
             have a solution."  If the problem is getting information,
             the solution is using the technology to speed up the search
             process.  Knowing where to find something is more important
             than being able to memorize what the information is. 
             Computers permit this process to happen expeditiously.  All
             sorts of databases exist which make this a reality and not
             just a "what if."  Dialogue, Compuserve, IQuest, NASA, ERIC,
             Psychlit, and numerous corporate and private BBS's are
             readily available to individuals who are willing to use them
             to enhance their learning.  
        
        11.  Find an acceptable, personal balance of body, mind, and
             spirit.  In times which are turbulent such as this
             transitional generation from the industrial to the
             information age, balancing body, mind, and spirit becomes a
             necessity and not a luxury.  Demands upon supervisors,
             employees, all people are sometimes extreme.  Problems
             abound.  Decisions are made at a whirlwind pace.  Processing
             the necessary information to conduct even the minimal amount
             of business is perplexing.  It is at these times that the
             supervisor who finds the necessary balance in his or her
             work, personal, and spiritual life will succeed.  The
             problems a supervisor faces can often be ameliorated by
             finding this balance.  What is exciting about this endeavor
             is that the end product produces for the supervisor a
             measure of equanimity in his or her life that makes the work
             life more productive and the personal life far more
             exciting.  
        
             Supervision is the 21st Century will be exciting,
        challenging, and fulfilling.  As time and space shrink,
        possibilities will expand.  The shrewd supervisor will expand
        with them.  He or she will begin to see the "What If's" as
        diamonds in the rough.  No longer will the quantum leap in
        communication technology frighten him or her.  Instead, it will
        prompt new thinking, new awarenesses, new creations which will
        make organizations roar with power, turbocharged by an
        overwhelming desire to expand beyond Yes/No and escape the "land
        of pretend" and enter the family of man living in a global
        village connected by invisible threads of fiber optics and laser
        beams from satellites floating silently hundreds of miles above
        the planet, Earth.
        
             Forward!
        
        
