Parry - Repost

Just attended Tony Karrer's talk on eLearning 2.0.

He has inspired me to blog more often.

So many ideas, so little time to type them all.

I mentioned my B.I.M. (Building Intelligence Model) as a metaphor for how a simulation summarizes large amounts of fast, dynamic, ever changing information like the information in the future that's awaiting us.

An analogy I should have used to help Tony understand my perspective comes from my experience in IT. The ERP systems I've installed and maintained for manufacturing corporations gave me a unique perspective of the company, one only afforded to top executives. I see the GL, AR, AP, Inventory flow, Shipping, Receiving, and a good amount of the communication between departments. From this bird's eye view, an ERP system looks like a simulation. One where budgeting is how one "replays" the game. The company looks like a living organism with a heartbeat (monthly reporting) and circulatory system that nourishes or withers departments of the company (cash flow). It moves and changes, searching for food (markets), reacting to an ever changing environment.

Would it be easier to quickly understand what a company does and how it functions by ....
A) Reading dozens of spreadsheets representing the changing, quantifiable aspects of the company?
B) Reading assorted emails of company employees?
C) Reading brochures about the company?
D) Reading the book of policies and procedures (in their current state) generated by the company?
E) Watching a documentary about the company?
F) Walking the floor?
G) Watching a visual, animated simulation of the company with labels for appearing function and animated actor?

Which of the above helps answers all five questions of "who, what, where, when, how, and why" the best?

I suspect simulations would be best at each of these.