The Working Knowledge Initiative is learning as it progresses: and this is learning that passes along to its participants. It wasn’t long ago, in my clinical practice, that I’d check in and out of my emails at the beginning and end of the day (listening to messages on the telephone answering machine sporadically). Like many in my field, my hesitant acquaintance with the possibilites of technology left me stranded in the age of Sputnik, as the world moved on.

Two years ago, the regional meeting of the International Society for the Psychoanalytic Study of Organizations (ISPSO) was riveted by a keynote speaker from Dublin, Annette Clancy, whose insights into the business uses of the virtual world were both thrilling and terrifying for us. Thrilling because of a potential that had developed during our professional lives, of which we were somewhat aware- but to which we were not attuned ( our professional focus was on exploring others’ internal (rather than external) worlds). Terrifying because she’d challenged us to explore the unknown— and this would require a technological learning curve including the dedication of time and effort.

At the time, Accord was developing the Working Knowledge Initiative. Our focus was on business plan development and the creation of a replicable intervention model that got the job done: succeeded both in moving working groups toward successful business creation and succeeded in negotiating the interpersonal challenges presented in the coming-together, face-to-face, of creative people. Annette’s idea of developing virtual muscle— of presenting what we had to the virtual world and learning from it— really did shake us out of  a comfortable dream; and like a good analyst, present us with the dawning of reality.

Well, the virtual is real: real people, real ideas. Ireland, for example, is hosting its “web awards” this weekend, in Dublin. Real recognitions. Real people. Blogger Damien Mulley subtitles his blog, “Invisible People Have Invisible Rights.” I would add that the cloak of invisibility also allows tremendous generosity in the exchange of thought: others’ thoughts that help our own.

Its a commonplace that the web has supercharged our capacity to communicate. Its imperative to learn how to sustain the conversation— contributing to its cascade of voices and ideas, as we draw and learn from it. Its imperative for us Baby Boomers to expand our boundaries and incorporate present-knowing into our working knowledge.

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