OIC Foreign Relations Breakthrough Project Continued....

Caution and Clarity

In our outreach the biggest problem we have frequently run into is when an official reads our letters and documents and concludes they know what the programs are. Ninety five percent of the time they are far off. The reasons for this are as follows:

1-Ontology Based Programs have been consistently successfully worldwide in the private sector for 40 years. However, since they were rarely marketed to the diplomatic community most government officials have never heard of them. 

Thus, busy officials needing to understand programs quickly will automatically equate them or categorize them with programs they are familiar with. Thus falsely believing they know what the programs are, they dismiss them as unimportant or nothing new. It is very, very easy to discount the programs without a discussion with a program expert who can give direct feedback and clarify misperceptions. 

2-Another problem is that the programs were developed specifically to support participants and their organizations in producing unprecedented breakthrough results. When some officials read that the programs can support breakthroughs in foreign affairs, instead of exploring the programs as we recommend, they cannot accept that assertion because governments overall struggled to resolve challenges and in many cases never have.  

Other Program Exploratory Pitfalls

Delegating

We do not recommend delegating discussions with program experts to staff in general. The only exception may be someone who can be characterized as a leader with serious responsibilities known to have produced very important agency results. The programs do not translate well through third parties. The following quote and comments explains the issue. 

 “While we think of ourselves as open-minded and objective, in fact our approach to ourselves, our circumstances, our challenges and others is often filtered and obscured by pre-existing notions and ideas—by our upbringing, our beliefs, our values, our training and our past experiences.

The filters are an all-pervasive influence that profoundly colors our relationships with people, circumstances, our challenges, our perceptions and even ourselves. An awareness of these filters brings to light the striking limits that the filters impose”.              -From a program on self-actualization
 
It is because of the filters that people perceive actions, words spoken and circumstances differently. Thus, when a program falls within a category unknown to those exploring the programs, it is human for busy people especially to automatically categorize the program to fit the program categories they are familiar with.

Thus inaccurate assessments are made. This is not an intentional action. It happens in seconds and the person looking into the programs will likely not even realize they are doing this. In addition someone not grounded in ontology based programs will have little or nor ability to convey the essence of the programs or answer important questions.

Sharing Written Program Information with Colleagues

It is a common practice for government officials to share documents with their colleagues for group feedback. In most cases that is practical as a first step. However, it is not at all practical with ontology based programs for the reasons stated above. Group feedback may only be useful if the colleagues have had a presentation with a program expert.

Final Comments

Few people can tell us they do not honestly want to produce major breakthroughs in their challenges. In our experience those who say that are usually those who have not properly explored what the programs are and are not. The use of these programs will save hundreds of thousands of lives if not more. They will also assist officials in increasing national and global security.