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> (eg patients being treated by large numbers of medical staff seems to be the norm in the US). Treating knowledge workers as assembly line workers might be gr

> (eg patients being treated by large numbers of medical staff seems to be the norm in the US). Treating knowledge workers as assembly line workers might be great for the bottom line, but at the cost of making the organization impossible to adapt to changing conditions. In this case, it's practically equivalent to sending your troops marching ahead in neat lines (Napoleon style) against a bunch of machine gun nests. ...oh well, I guess I am preaching to the choir here.

hga 12y ago
Don't forget the quick firing canon. The speed of ones like the French 75 mm, ~ 15 rounds per minute, made as much of a difference in WWI, and per my current reading on that war---and in terms of near universal insufficient competence, it's totally topical, but I didn't exactly plan starting that a few weeks ago---that more than the machine guns required serious trench-works or the like. But you're going way too far in claiming that this organization found it "impossible to adapt to changing conditions". Read the accounts, they continually improved and stepped up their game, we Americans are good at that (in our warfare, Vietnam is the classic counterexample of micromanagement at all levels short circuiting that classic fantastic advantage of US soldiers). But this process wasn't fast enough when potentially fatal isolation errors started the second the EMT crew arrived at his apartment complex. But I'm certain we'll get better, just as I'm certain it'll take quite an infection and death toll to get "good enough". Assuming we don't get overwhelmed before then, this is way too path dependent to predict.
- crpatino 12y ago
  At risk of going tremendously off-topic here... yes, people learn from their mistakes, if the consequences are hard enough. This was true in war, as it's probably going to be true in this epidemic. Little consolation for the poor souls at the first lines.
  - hga 12y ago
    The thing is, that's not necessarily true in war. Little of it happened in Vietnam, to the USArmy's eternal shame, LBJ and McNamara showed little if any signs of learning, etc. etc. At this point in my detailed WWI study I think I can say little happened in the French army, which mutinied with justification after several years of horror and was then useless for offense for a long time. The Japanese in WWII didn't particularly learn in critical areas when, e.g., they used up their air power in the futile for them South Pacific campaign (the one that started with Guadalcanal). They didn't learn that disdain of non-combatant specialties is fatal in modern war. Their admirals never lost their taste for insanely complicated battle plans that depended on the other side doing what they expected, or at least that's a lesson to be learned from Midway and the much latter just about final action in the Philippines. How much learning went on in the 30 Years War? Heck, I gather it's generally accepted that the lessons of Gustavus Adolphous were not properly learned until Napoleon applied them a century and a half later (!!!). I can go on and on and on ^_^. I mention this in part because the US has a tradition, if you can call it that, of starting out very green and shaky, and then getting really good. We're seeing the "very green and shaky" in Dallas right now; I'm hoping it and the rest of the country that's not ultra prepared (i.e. everyone but those four specialist wards) will follow a similar pattern.

hga 12y ago

Don't forget the quick firing canon. The speed of ones like the French 75 mm, ~ 15 rounds per minute, made as much of a difference in WWI, and per my current reading on that war---and in terms of near universal insufficient competence, it's totally topical, but I didn't exactly plan starting that a few weeks ago---that more than the machine guns required serious trench-works or the like. But you're going way too far in claiming that this organization found it "impossible to adapt to changing conditions". Read the accounts, they continually improved and stepped up their game, we Americans are good at that (in our warfare, Vietnam is the classic counterexample of micromanagement at all levels short circuiting that classic fantastic advantage of US soldiers). But this process wasn't fast enough when potentially fatal isolation errors started the second the EMT crew arrived at his apartment complex. But I'm certain we'll get better, just as I'm certain it'll take quite an infection and death toll to get "good enough". Assuming we don't get overwhelmed before then, this is way too path dependent to predict.

crpatino 12y ago
At risk of going tremendously off-topic here... yes, people learn from their mistakes, if the consequences are hard enough. This was true in war, as it's probably going to be true in this epidemic. Little consolation for the poor souls at the first lines.
- hga 12y ago
  The thing is, that's not necessarily true in war. Little of it happened in Vietnam, to the USArmy's eternal shame, LBJ and McNamara showed little if any signs of learning, etc. etc. At this point in my detailed WWI study I think I can say little happened in the French army, which mutinied with justification after several years of horror and was then useless for offense for a long time. The Japanese in WWII didn't particularly learn in critical areas when, e.g., they used up their air power in the futile for them South Pacific campaign (the one that started with Guadalcanal). They didn't learn that disdain of non-combatant specialties is fatal in modern war. Their admirals never lost their taste for insanely complicated battle plans that depended on the other side doing what they expected, or at least that's a lesson to be learned from Midway and the much latter just about final action in the Philippines. How much learning went on in the 30 Years War? Heck, I gather it's generally accepted that the lessons of Gustavus Adolphous were not properly learned until Napoleon applied them a century and a half later (!!!). I can go on and on and on ^_^. I mention this in part because the US has a tradition, if you can call it that, of starting out very green and shaky, and then getting really good. We're seeing the "very green and shaky" in Dallas right now; I'm hoping it and the rest of the country that's not ultra prepared (i.e. everyone but those four specialist wards) will follow a similar pattern.