This is Michail Tsatsanis signing in for one last time to write about my Technology Marketing Center case study on How to Balance Standards and Innovation.
This is my last blog entry on this series. I have enjoyed putting my thoughts on paper on this
topic and have appreciated the feedback. I want to thank the director of TMC for inviting
me to contribute to this topic.
I would like to close this series with a note of appreciation for the multitude of people that put an enormous amount of effort into the process that makes standards possible. Whoever has attended even a single standards meeting knows what I am talking about. This is not an easy job, and is often a thankless one. It requires an exhausting travel schedule, and a work environment that manages to be stressful and tedious at the same time. It takes a great deal of tenacity, dedication, perseverance and focus, not to mention technical ability.
I have often wondered what drives the standards contributors to endure one or sometimes two weeks of morning to night meetings, day in and day out, in some windowless room in the basement of a hotel, in a tense environment of controlled acrimony. Especially given the fact that technical people are used to working in collaborative groups with little conflict in a process of creative technical design. Standards are not always like that, (this is the understatement of the century)...
One may think of several motivating factors like love of excellence, moving technology forward, participating in global initiatives, and having some battle stories for the grand kids... While all these points are valid, I think the key answer to this question points to one word: "community".
It never ceases to fascinate me how humans always manage to create communities out of common purpose, even if everything else conspires against it. The comradeship of standards contributors is akin to that of professional soldiers who respect a worthy opponent trained in the same art of war they have. It is hard for me to explain this point; but it was captured beautifully by a satirical parody of the famous lines exchanged between Jack Nicholson and Tom Cruise in the movie "a few good men". This satire was circulating in the ITU community around 2006 and I will reproduce it here, although I do not know who the original author was.
Enjoy...
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STANDARDS GUY: "You want answers?"
PROJECT MANAGER: "I think we are entitled to them!"
STANDARDS GUY: "You want answers?"
PROJECT MANAGER: (YELLING): "I want the truth!"
STANDARDS GUY: (YELLING): "You can't handle the truth!!!"
STANDARDS GUY: (Continuing): Son, we live in a world that requires ITU Standards. And these Standards must be written by technical experts that know how modems really work. People who thrive on arguing, debating, and horse trading. Who's going to write them? You? You, Mr. Microsoft Project? We have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You scoff at our standards meetings and you curse our painful procedures, endless discussions and lack of progress. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what we know: that while our meetings seem like a ridiculous waist of time, they generate Standards.
And my very existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, generates STANDARDS! You don't want to know the truth because deep down in places you don't talk about at staff meetings......you want me at that standards meeting. You NEED me at that standards meeting.
We use phrases like “We are contributions-driven”, “I need to check back with the farm”, “We do not vote in the ITU” and “Be part of the solution not part of the problem”. We use these terms as the backbone of a life spent writing Standards. You use them as a punch line!
I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to people who rise and sleep under the very blanket of the Standards I provide and then question the manner in which I provide them. I would rather you just say "thank you" and went on your way. Otherwise I suggest you get on a plane and go spend 2 weeks in Geneva at an ITU meeting. Either way, I don't give a damn what you think you are entitled to.
PROJECT MANAGER: "Did you agree to 24Kbytes of interleaver memory?"
STANDARDS GUY: "I did the job I was hired to do."
PROJECT MANAGER: (YELLING): "Did you agree to 24Kbytes of interleaver memory?”
STANDARDS GUY: (YELLING): "You're Goddamn right I did!"
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Thank you again for reading these posts, and my thanks to the TMC for the hospitality,
Be well and do well,
Signing off...
-Michail.
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