process vs. results?
While puffing our Quintero panetelas in my office (yes, it is still possible in – well, at least some parts of – Germany to smoke cigars in your office!) we discussed today with my friend M. the difference between the process and the results approach to the world.
M. said that the two attitudes/approaches/orientations are diametrically opposed, some people/cultures having a preference for one and others for the other of them. Taoism or Epicureanism for instance were process oriented. For them the Way was the Goal. Modern Western societies are, by contrast, results oriented. This is at the root of their obsession with “success”, “winning”,” competitive”, “top notch”. This is a typically German-American attitude towards the world, she opined, with greed as a motivation at its base.
I countered that within the reference framework of project management e.g. processes and results are not mutually exclusive notions, since the results are usually milestones or deliverables in the course of the project process towards a well defined objective. And even within the framework of Epicurean communal education the students or their educators must have fixed some recognizable milestones on their progress towards ataraxia (stress-FREEDOM). The hierarchical structure of the philosophy schools indicates clearly that some members of these learning communities had made more progress than others and they were accordingly licensed to deliver teachings and give feedback to groups (like modern communication trainers) or to individuals (like modern coaches.) Moreover: even in utterly results-oriented activities, like profit maximization, processes are designed and “re-engineered” to optimize the cost-effectiveness.
M. said that in this case the process was subordinated to the result, whereas e.g. in learning and practicing wisdom the results are subordinated to the process. The process has a higher value in this case.
I wonder what the readers of this blog think about the compatibility of these notions.
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