Ingo Schwarze wrote: ... >> I think it *needs* to be done privately. > > I hate to say so, but that doesn't agree with my experience. Private > communication was still reasonably civil, but led to nothing. When i > went public, the part of the problem i was directly involved in got > resolved quickly. > > Yours, > Ingo
I've seen the "it should be done privately" comment on a lot of things that come up on this list. What people seem to fail to understand is the exposure on the public lists is not a FIRST attempt at problem solving, but a FINAL attempt at resolution AFTER all private attempts have been exhausted. This issue has been being dealt with privately and quietly for YEARS... The fact that YOU didn't see it (because it was PRIVATE!) doesn't mean it didn't happen. Being nice and polite and quiet is, well, nice and polite...and sometimes it does a good job of resolving problems. But it is also easy to just ignore the issue when the asker is being nice and polite and quiet. After large amounts of inaction from the nice and polite and quiet approach, things sometimes need to be escalated. First response (sometimes, the very first response!) is often a request to be "nice and polite and quiet", so the problem can be returned to the "ignore this" pile (an already solved problem). Been there, done that, didn't work, time for a new strategy. It is amazing how often people who make changes and make things happen are condemned for how they do it...totally ignoring the weeks, months, and sometimes YEARS that were spent trying to change things "Within The System". The System didn't work, The System is broke, but how dare you try to go outside The System... By definition...YOU do not know of the years of private effort that went into resolving the problem (why? because it was PRIVATE!). I happen to know, from chance conversation long ago, that this was NOT a problem that popped up last week, or even last year. Nice, polite and quiet seem to have been given their chance, and failed. Time for something different. Nick.
