practices: August 2009 Archives
A common American experience is the publication of the annual high-school yearbook, complete with photos of students and documentation of the football team's victories and defeats. But yearbooks also serve a role which may go unrecognized: They preserve the "rules" surrounding a school's traditions.
Because most students spend no more than four years in high school, they barely reach the stage where they've learned a set of traditions before they graduate and move on. Four years may seem like an eternity to the student, but in a world where "The Simpsons" has been on the air for 20 seasons, it's comparably just the blink of an eye.
By depositing their memories in a yearbook, though, students contribute to the record and evolution of their school's institutional memory. The human drive to do this may be stronger than we realize: Consider the Wikipedia entry for the BBC's nightly shipping forecast or the website of the Eastern Airlines Retirees Association and its related pilots' association. These websites contain lots of ephemera and cultural memories about institutions that people have, for whatever reason, cared about. But Wikipedia shouldn't be the only place where these memories are recorded.
An institution that stays around for the long term -- like a high school -- has to note what it has done on a regular basis, and an annual cycle makes as much sense as any other. This is not to say that a company or a municipality or a school must publish a yearbook. But the basic principle of appointing an historian and charging that historian with documenting some of the important changes and some of the ephemera of that institution on a regular (presumably annual) basis makes it at least somewhat likely that the culture of the organization will be preserved, even as individuals come and go.
If the culture is healthy and worthwhile, then a yearbook (or something similar) can serve to remind the people involved about what works. If the institution is slipping, then an annual review should help to reveal that as well. An institution has to be aware of and sensitive to its signs of vitality just like a person has to be similarly aware of his or her own physical well-being. Ignoring a serious and recurring pain doesn't make the diagnosis of the problem any better -- it just means that the patient has ignored a symptom and likely made it more difficult for the doctor to help.
An institution could certainly combine its cultural "yearbook" with its annual report, although the two serve unique functions. The annual report documents measurable changes, while the yearbook is mainly a cultural record. But both are valuable -- perhaps it's better said necessary -- to a strong institutional memory.
The Internet offers lots of tools for helping to record these cultural records, though it should not be relied upon unless the institution is also committed to building and maintaining (indefinitely) its own website. Wiki-type websites can be easy to establish, and they are helpful when people are geographically dispersed -- hence, we can use a site like Wikipedia to find out how "You Can Call Me Al" has been used by college marching bands from Washington to Florida -- but when people are closer together, it's most likely better to designate an individual historian (or a small committee of historians) with a designated role.
Because most students spend no more than four years in high school, they barely reach the stage where they've learned a set of traditions before they graduate and move on. Four years may seem like an eternity to the student, but in a world where "The Simpsons" has been on the air for 20 seasons, it's comparably just the blink of an eye.
By depositing their memories in a yearbook, though, students contribute to the record and evolution of their school's institutional memory. The human drive to do this may be stronger than we realize: Consider the Wikipedia entry for the BBC's nightly shipping forecast or the website of the Eastern Airlines Retirees Association and its related pilots' association. These websites contain lots of ephemera and cultural memories about institutions that people have, for whatever reason, cared about. But Wikipedia shouldn't be the only place where these memories are recorded.
An institution that stays around for the long term -- like a high school -- has to note what it has done on a regular basis, and an annual cycle makes as much sense as any other. This is not to say that a company or a municipality or a school must publish a yearbook. But the basic principle of appointing an historian and charging that historian with documenting some of the important changes and some of the ephemera of that institution on a regular (presumably annual) basis makes it at least somewhat likely that the culture of the organization will be preserved, even as individuals come and go.
If the culture is healthy and worthwhile, then a yearbook (or something similar) can serve to remind the people involved about what works. If the institution is slipping, then an annual review should help to reveal that as well. An institution has to be aware of and sensitive to its signs of vitality just like a person has to be similarly aware of his or her own physical well-being. Ignoring a serious and recurring pain doesn't make the diagnosis of the problem any better -- it just means that the patient has ignored a symptom and likely made it more difficult for the doctor to help.
An institution could certainly combine its cultural "yearbook" with its annual report, although the two serve unique functions. The annual report documents measurable changes, while the yearbook is mainly a cultural record. But both are valuable -- perhaps it's better said necessary -- to a strong institutional memory.
The Internet offers lots of tools for helping to record these cultural records, though it should not be relied upon unless the institution is also committed to building and maintaining (indefinitely) its own website. Wiki-type websites can be easy to establish, and they are helpful when people are geographically dispersed -- hence, we can use a site like Wikipedia to find out how "You Can Call Me Al" has been used by college marching bands from Washington to Florida -- but when people are closer together, it's most likely better to designate an individual historian (or a small committee of historians) with a designated role.
Many people are familiar with annual reports issued by large companies like General Electric. They tend to be a combination of bland fiscal reporting (mandated by the SEC) and cheerleading by management at the company issuing the report. But annual reports have a significant role to play in helping to preserve institutional memory.
One might think that an annual report is too much work for a small organization. But there's no reason why an institution as small as a single person couldn't find value in producing an annual report. Nobody seems to teach a course in "How to write an annual report," but a simple set of questions provides the outline an organization needs to write its own annual report:
A charitable organization might not have "customers" in the business sense, but it has members, donors, and charitable recipients. Knowing the ebbs and flows in those interactions -- and why they occurred -- can tell future leaders what worked in the organization and what did not. Expertise isn't driven by innate genius but rather by deliberate practice and analysis of past successes and failures. The world's most-renowned investor writes legendary annual reports reporting as often on his failures as on his successes. But had these lessons gone unwritten, their long-term value would be anything but obvious.
An organization's annual report doesn't have to be long or complex -- even a single page will do. But unless year-to-year changes are documented and kept somewhere everyone can find them and refer to them, an organization easily risks losing the basic understanding of its own historical performance that it needs to remain viable.
One might think that an annual report is too much work for a small organization. But there's no reason why an institution as small as a single person couldn't find value in producing an annual report. Nobody seems to teach a course in "How to write an annual report," but a simple set of questions provides the outline an organization needs to write its own annual report:
- Who worked here over the course of the year? Who was hired? Who left?
- Who received special training or education?
- What equipment or service contracts did you add? Why?
- What equipment or service contracts did you remove or cancel? Why?
- What equipment or systems were repaired, changed, or overhauled?
- How much work did you do?
- What circumstances affected the volume of work that you did?
- What customers did you serve? Which were new? Which were repeat? Which customers were lost?
A charitable organization might not have "customers" in the business sense, but it has members, donors, and charitable recipients. Knowing the ebbs and flows in those interactions -- and why they occurred -- can tell future leaders what worked in the organization and what did not. Expertise isn't driven by innate genius but rather by deliberate practice and analysis of past successes and failures. The world's most-renowned investor writes legendary annual reports reporting as often on his failures as on his successes. But had these lessons gone unwritten, their long-term value would be anything but obvious.
An organization's annual report doesn't have to be long or complex -- even a single page will do. But unless year-to-year changes are documented and kept somewhere everyone can find them and refer to them, an organization easily risks losing the basic understanding of its own historical performance that it needs to remain viable.
