A Philosophical Meditation on Process v. People

I keep thinking about how systems can or should change in order to create better results. This is why my head hurts a little. Some people believe in people – you find the right people, fuck the purpose, and you can move mountains. Other people think in terms of systems, as in, we need to create systems in which people’s best instincts thrive. In some ways, if you wanted, a person could argue that “systems” people have more sympathy and empathy with people than “people” people. Systems people – some of us anyway – recognize that the human creature is varied. As Hamlet said, In form, reason, and faculty. . . how like a god (bad paraphrase) but also petty and horrible. Creating systems for people to maximum their divine instincts and minimize their darker instincts is a people-focused endeavor. “People” people are the first ones to be disappointed by failure and move on to other, better people fast. Of course, other “systems” people simply want to create a system in which people can’t fuck it up but I think those people have psychological issues they need to work through so I’m discounting them.

I’m talking about two equally valid perspectives – rather than whether these perspectives are more or less motivated by a adherents’ childhood experience. Assuming you don’t cross in to crazy, I don’t think it matters in many circumstances what made you who are. It only matters who you are. And what you do therefore.

Other people might say – in that incredible cop-out way that seems to be the refuge of everyone who doesn’t believe in the power of thought – that “of course the truth lies somewhere in the middle” Which means so much of everything that it means nothing. Yes, of course the truth lies somewhere in the middle if for no other reason than that the infamous “middle” occupies so much real estate that simple odds suggest that the truth has at least vacationed there at some point or another.

I would argue that both “people” people and “systems” people are arguing over the middle. The sane ones at least. Yes, you need to have both the right system and the right people. All sane people know that. But “people” people think that, with the right people, you will naturally, organically, find the system that works best. And “systems” people believe that the correct system creates an environment where people can be at their best.

If the truth lies somewhere in the middle of that, then it doesn’t really matter since I’m talking about the way people involuntarily think rather than what specifically they do.

I must be a “systems” person, yet I’ve traveled and seen enough of the world to know that its really people that do matter. “Systems” are too seductive though. They can be explained. They can be applied broadly. They can effect more people. They are utopian. Dissecting and reinventing systems is noisy and attention-grabbing and, for some us, fun. But the reality of the world as I’ve experienced it is that people effect other people, on a much smaller scale, in a way that is hard to describe and quantify. Yet it’s the only real effect that actually exists.

Maybe. . . I live for doubt and questions. . . I think its because I’m a “systems” person.

I am moved to consider this stuff – and enlightened about why my head hurts – because I had a conversation with a charming young guy who runs a theater company in town. I kept talking about mission statements and vision – in large part to help him understand what the foundations who might fund his work want – and he not only resisted the talk but clearly didn’t understand what I was talking about. He understood. He’s a very smart guy. He didn’t understand WHY I was talking about it. Why I would want to talk about it.

When I told my lovely wife about this later, she said, “He’s the entrepreneurial type. He believes in “Trust me. Trust the team I put together. What else is there?”

Because I do trust him, it made me see more clearly an entirely alternative way of thinking.

Then last night, Leah and I were flipping television stations just looking for something to eat up our mind and time after a long and hard week. The only actual narrative show on Friday night was something called “Numbers” starring that guy who used to be in “Northern Exposure” and a bunch of other vaguely familiar actors including an incredible actor from “The Wire.” With that kind of cast, and a crime drama formula that can be somewhat successful in certain circumstances, you really can’t blame anyone for the total and complete execrableness of the show but the writers.

How could this show be this bad? Seriously. These writers should have stayed on strike, gone in to a different career, anything, something. Even with our entirely lowered standards at that moment, neither of us could stand to watch the entire thing. Even though there was some kind of desperate and supposed suspense and mystery to the whole proceeding, neither of us where motivated by even the slightest curiosity to see how it resolved.

And I know very many great writers in this country. Lots of them. People who can do exceptional plots or amazing dialogue or whatever. How can this show – and so many other television shows – be so unbelievably bad?

Of course I start to think of the system. I know the people are good. Or I assume the people are good. Follow me: I know great writers. I assume that great writers are easy to hire because I know they want to be hired. Therefore there must be some other explanation for the horribleness of most television writing besides a lack of ability to write well.

Maybe the concept of a “writing room” is dangerous? Maybe the structure of television writing – where someone has a concept and others try to write characters for the concept someone else created – is the problem. Maybe the peculiarities of the Hollywood system are to blame - where I have heard that 12 different executives who have no writing skill but think they know what to write give notes – is the problem?

I expect all of these theories have some truth to them. And so I think, what would a workable system look like and, I think, if someone could articulate it, wouldn’t other people want to adopt it?

Here’s where reality hits me in the face and my headhurtsalittle. 1. I assume the goal of television shows is to write good television. Or at least, I assume that writing good television doesn’t adversely effect some additional, more salient purpose, like filling time between commercials. You can fill time between commercials with better television, can’t you? All the most successful television shows in television history have done it with panache. . . Of course, my assumptions – the assumptions you need to make if you’re a “systems” person – are nonsense. For all I know – and I know nothing about Hollywood regardless of how many celebrity stories exist on the internet – every person who works there has sixty different goals and the most salient one at any given moment may simply be to have a business card that will get you fucked later that evening. Who the hell knows? Just because one goal sounds better, more noble, more desirable, than another goal doesn’t give it any more credence in the universe.

And 2. – and here is where things get even more confusing. . . I mean, I’ve been following my own train of thought, at least, up to this point but then. . . There is a reason why a system exists the way that it exists and for a systems person that reason is systemic. So, the writing of television occurs in a way that doesn’t create good television, therefore we need to change the system that supports the typical writing for television. Yet, the system for writing for television exists within a larger system of creating television shows. That system is what creates the smaller system. So if you want to improve the way television is written you have to change the way television is created. If you want to change the way television is created, you have to change the society in which television-making is important. This can go on forever and explains why education reform efforts can get so confusing. If you want to change the way kids learn about math, you have to change the way they think about math. If you want to change the way they think about math, you have to change the way they think. If you want to change the way they think, you have to change the way they live. That's why poverty is an education issue, and why improving education feels at times so much more undoable than perhaps it should.

Either everything truly is connected and some really brilliant philosopher who we should then call God can figure out where to start in order to have the appropriate domino effect on all systems.

Or, the young artistic director who I talked to a few nights ago is correct. And we should just find the right people to work with and hope for the best.

I think he’s right.

Yet “systemic” thinking is too seductive to resist. And the weird thing is that no amount of experience can entirely change the way your brain is wired to think. . .

Unless. . . I knew we’d find our way back to therapy. Wait a second – changing the way we think? Isn’t that just “systems” thinking again. . . It goes on forever. My head hurts.

Or this is entirely wrong-headed. . . Also, why my head hurts. I wish I had a laboratory to test my theories so I could rule them out or in one way or another rather than simply contemplate them. But the things I want to test are so broadly-defined that I wouldn’t know what subject area at a university, for example, my laboratory would be housed in. . . Ah, delusions. . .

One more thought now that I'm a-thinkin': My wife is a systems person who isn’t interested in theory. She creates environments in which people can work at their best simply by being very active when she is the person at the top of the food chain. Yet, she slavishly adheres to concepts like vision and mission in the way in which she works. She’s a systems person with a “people” persons approach. I think its what makes her so good at what she does.

How does her mind or my mind or anyone's mind wind up working in this way? I’ve read the basic psychology books, but they don’t address the specifics of day to day accomplishment. . . At least not what I read. Perspective has always fascinated me. . . I wrote a play entirely about it. I think its brilliant. No one else seemed to care about the main idea. They enjoyed the play, but the kernal for writing it appears to escape most people. . . The thing about day-to-day perspective and how that effects the larger world in ways we can't even imagine. . . The truth of that idea. . . No one cared. . . o well. . . They enjoyed the play anyway. That's something.

Enough. Good morning.