Letters to Friends and Familiares #82: the sine qua non of indispensable sinecures

THE INVISIBLE LINE BETWEEN RISK AVERSION AND PERVERSION.

Sure, this topic may sound obtuse, esoteric and otherwise irrelevant to tech transfer.  Yet, not is it as the wise ugly guy in “Star Wars” says.  We in the tech transfer program face the challege of trying to change the way people think and the way institutions act.  The Mexican government is quite clear in its message: get going, guys and gals.  Win or lose – take a shot at the big time (Article #51 of the C.yT. law).

Truth is that CONACYT has been around for 40+ years and the I.P.N. for over half a century.  While the Republic fails to meet lofty goals of economic commitments of 1% of the G.D.P. to RD&I – duly legislated and ritually ignored – Mexico has built her knowledge base over time.  The rub is this progress has been a cost center and not an idea generator.

Now it is time to mobilize – to monetize – this inert intellectual capital; a vast pool of basic research basically doing nothing.  Now this comment by me, while dour and amply reflective of my curmudgeonly ways, really is not a criticism of Mexico or my great and gifted colleagues in CIDESI.  This thought merely reflects the difficulty of changing.  Hey! Have you ever tried to get anyone to quit smoking?

Well, keep on truckin’.  The challenge that we volunteers uniformly face is that we confront cultures of ingrained risk aversion.  Think of it: Mexican techie types get rewarded incrementally for decades.  Dust off some research from last year; jazz it up a bit; publish it; get your S.N.I. points; and, you are done for this year: kids’ schooling, house and car payments covered yet again.  Take the bonus and run, baby.

Overcoming habit is difficult enough.  Now let’s factor in the ever-present human ego.  A scientist or engineer has spent a decade or two building up a personal dominion of knowledge for which (s)he enjoys significant recognition and prestige.  This status has been earned through time and toil; in the eyes of its possessor, it is not to be squandered recklessly.

If a volunteer can not sympathize with the professional dilemma weighing down on his or her counterpart, and many do not, perhaps that individual ought to return to the world of machines rather than machinations.  For commercializing unexploited technology is all about machinations from everyday tasks getting completed to strategies playing out for a new firm entering or generating a new-fangled market.

Such maneuvers encompass arguing for price points, reaching consensus on product valuations and strategies, deciphering market opportunities or intelligence, as well as negotiating financing agreements (the big-daddy of them all); not the province of data dinks.  So these daunting challenges, plus a rewarding comfort-zone (until now, at least), almost guarantee risk aversion. 

No one wants to fritter away his or her scholarship through failed product developments and launches.  One public failure and hello, square-1, and re-building than long-acquired now squandered reputation (at least in the mind of the inventor).  Some people simply can not imagine growing beyond failure, so deep runs this false sense of shame.  And to make prospects really sobering, only one in every 200-300 revolutionary ideas turn over sustained turnover during a five year horizon.

Simply said, there is too much to lose and too many ways to lose it.  So, what to do?  El presidente Peña-Nieto is trying out electoral shock therapy, converting his discernible plurality into a broad national mandate for Mexico to take her place on the international stage, right here and right now.  So, he is serious about getting CONACYT out of neutral and Mexico into overdrive by:

1. cutting funding control of CONACYT by 15-20%;
2. pushing hard for new Centros to extend the knowledge-base into aerospace, biotechnology and automobiles;
3. aligning different power blocks into a new Science and Innovation ministry;
4. partially privatizing PEMEX and CONACYT to receive and lever the best in cutting-edge knowledge; as well as,
5. employing other measures I can not quite recall with my agèd brain.

So now the dilemma has just increased for the average, risk-averse ‘Investigador(a)’.  Thus overt risk aversion goes covert with risk perversion.  These latter behaviors are designed primarily to temporize through active inactivity, fast-motion self-promotion or powerpoint optimism.  This is not a uniquely Mexican phenomenon.  It is typical corporate politics, especially in restructuring institutions.

There are three forms of risk perversion initially to which I would alert my fellow volunteers:

• always cooking, always hungry;
• abnegation through collaboration ; and,
• selling high-flying air-rights (not gender-specific).

The first form of risk perversion is a trick I have discussed several times in various venues.  The idea?  Always have one prototype ready and a better one at-the-ready.  As time progresses, the ‘inventor’ (more like a science fiction writer), shifts the focus from the current prototype to the next, even more commercially profitable idea.  One shines like a star without ever having really to twinkle.

The second manifestation of risk perversion is to become a partnership patsy, while extolling trendy notions of teamwork.  These are the ‘team players’ absorbed with partnerships and other projects that transfer or develop too little or no technology. Sadly, they degenerate into scientific serfs for sale to the biggest-name lowest-bidder.  They love Shakespeare and live out ‘Much Ado about Nothing’.

The last example (of many) is a technique imported from good old America.  This risk perversion is essentially a Houdini act, not of beating impossible constraints but dancing from one extravagant claim to the next, a stutter-step ahead of inevitable complaints.  A favorite recent example is claiming experience in sales strategy based on digitalizing call-reports.  These intellectual blow-hards then use their false claims to discredit reasonable ideas of others, lest they be discovered, called out and fired.

These are merely three of many examples, some of which you all have already encountered.  What cheap perfume is not passing your smell test?  Heed those suspicions.  The ruse most often distracts others away from a dubious present toward a salubrious future to re-arrange the empty inning of baseball into NO ERRORS, NO HITS, NO RUNS therefore NOBODY LEFT. 

The moral of this cautionary tale is that moving minds may be harder than moving mountains, with or without a mustard-seed.  Patience and compassion toward human limitations sweeten the crock-pot.

Adiós, over and out.

P.S. Wupps.  The end of this essay is rather uncharitable and unconstructive.  So, I want to direct a few comments to the younger volunteers since anyone my age has learned to deal with these inter-personal gimmicks or has the emotional intelligence of a jack-hammer.  In this brief follow-up, allow me to invoke the traditional R.C. teachings on sins; not because I am religious but because these teachings can shed light on matters of human nature.

The first ruse of the ‘turkey solution’ is much like a venial sin of commission.  Often it arises from failing to pay attention to the task at hand.  Being an entrepreneur – and settling in to big-time risk-taking – is intoxicating.  The daily drudge-work of bringing that dream into the realm of possibility is difficult enough.  Taking that possibility toward plausibility is painstaking.  Adapting the plausibility into practicality entails phone-calls, meetings, memos galore.  All that occurs before going to market.

What to do? Try gently to keep the counter-part on task, stating that this current and less sexy invention may establish his or her name in the market so (s)he can go to Tahiti on the next product under development now.  If your counterpart continues this waltz with a third turkey in the oven, admire his optimism and find something else to do; take your time, however, with the disengagement in the event that (s)he may come around.

The second pitfall is more like a sin of omission.  This problem is perhaps the easiest of the three examples (among several) to address.  The counterpart may understand the necessity of mobilizing capital but may lack the knowledge and experience to negotiate the effective transfer to your Centro of needed knowledge or technology.  This business is a tricky one that frequently eludes volunteer (i.e., me) and counterparts (i.e., everyone else) alike. 

There are several volunteers, usually of the “and wiser” type, who can impart valuable advice; I am not one as all of these topics were new to me almost three years ago.  That advice may help out in aligning activities (e.g., setting up inside or external partnerships) with strategy (i.e., trading less expensive expertise for valuable knowledge).  These conversations are delicate since the counterpart may well be omitting contract terms, etc. rather than consciously avoiding his or her next right step.

The third problem is a biggie, much like a mortal sin after, usually, accumulated commissions of venial sins.  The key variable to consider is the age of the counterpart.  Under thirty, the person may well be merely insecure but, over thirty, that person may have a thoroughly compromised sense of inter-personal ethics.  One must rely on intuition here to discern whether ever-present insecurity has hardened into a full-blown defect of character.  If the latter, head for another department.

In the end, these and other strategies reflect either possible responses tothe foibles typically encountered among people or fragmenting fears of failure.  Fear is difficult to overcome through outside counsel; that conquest must come from within.  Time takes time and the two year stint is often way too short to realize the change.  But planting seeds through humility and integrity is always right on schedule…