•Ripeness

Ideas take off most easily when they give a shape to something that is already 'trying to get out'. 'Ideas' people are like artists—both try to express possibilities that are just under the surface in the world around them. If the technical, organisational, social and personal conditions are not 'ripe' even the best idea will need a lot of 'power' to get anywhere, and the s,vstems in which it is embedded may be severely distorted in the process. Change is much easier and less destructive when people are ready for it. If you want to row a fragile boat across a fast river you must find ways to let the current help you rather than trying to battle against it.
Flight has been around as an idea for thousands of years. But only this century have the necessary technology and resources and the needs for long distance travel come together. The vision of a democratically responsive world is also an old one. Is the time ripe?
If changes work best when conditions are ripe, they will often be small. But they don't have to be. The caterpillar, the chrysalis, the butterfly and the egg, are about as different as they could be—but each emerges from its predecessor when the conditions are ripe. If the tensions are large, they may resolve easily into a very different form. But deeper structures are often harder to change quickly, except in chaobc ways. A butterfly won’t change into a moth. Of course if you want a more radical change than the system is ready for, there is nothing to stop you trying to speed up the process of ripening!


•Timing

A complex system is a complex machine. It has all sorts of internal cycles, and sequences—committee cycles, accounting periods, academic years, projects that start and finish at certain times, contract deadlines. sequences of operations that mustn't be interrupted once started, personal career cycles of
significant members, periods of optimism or gloom, and so on.
If you want to adjust this 'machine', you have to match your movements and timing to it. If you don't, you are likely to miss the bus.
If you catch the organisers at the right points in a system of committee cycles, you may be able to get through a whole series of political stages in a fortnight. A couple of days later, and it may take months, during which all sorts of things may change. You need to have your finger on the many pulses of the organisation, and know how they inter-connect. Often there are only a handful of people who have the necessary understanding of the machinery and they will not necessarily be willing to put their skill at your disposal.
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