Learning to Listen: An Ethnographic Pilot Study of Informal Communication as an Indicator of Organizational Stress and Crisis Response

许多行业（包括医疗保健、运输、制造和金融行业）中的事故和灾难被视为组织故障——医院、航空公司、铁路、公司和金融机构未能适应竞争、技术、工作量激增或监管环境变化带来的机遇和威胁。然而，其他组织适应得非常好，在快节奏和复杂环境中的危险操作中保持高水平的可靠性。这种适应能力是通过组织灵活性、团队合作和共同目标感来实现的。然而，当组织的适应能力恶化或崩溃时，结果可能是灾难性的。本文描述了一种通过考察非正式交际中的话语要素来观察组织适应能力的研究方法和测量策略。这些语篇要素包括短语长度、语速、轮次、语速、语用助词和语调。这些是建立和维持人际关系的语言要素。通常，话语的要素存在于意识水平以下：大多数说话者并没有立即意识到他们的讲话变得更加断断续续。该提案建议，通过观察和测量话语元素，我们可以对工作组中灵活性、团队合作和焦点的变化进行微妙而敏感的监测。这些测量将在医院急诊室的创伤小组中进行，这种工作环境与许多其他高危险环境相似：本质上是危险的，非常成功，但在极少数情况下会发生灾难性的失败。通过对自适应能力的测量，希望能够预测和避免灾难性故障。

Accidents and disasters in many industries, including healthcare, transportation, manufacturing, and financial industries, are seen as organizational breakdowns - failures of hospitals, airlines, railroads, corporations, and financial institutions to adapt to opportunities and threats posed by competition, technology, surges in workload, or changes in their regulatory environment. Other organizations, however, adapt remarkably well, maintaining a high level of reliability in hazardous operations in fast-paced and complex environments. This adaptive capability is achieved through organizational flexibility, teamwork, and a sense of common purpose. However, when an organization's adaptive capability deteriorates or breaks down, the results can be catastrophic. This proposal describes a research technique and measurement strategy for observing the adaptive capability of organizations by examining elements of discourse in informal communication. These elements of discourse include phrase-length, tempo, turn-taking, latching, pragmatic particles, and intonation. These are the elements of speech through which interpersonal relationships are built and maintained. Typically the elements of discourse exist below the level of consciousness: most speakers are not immediately aware when their speech becomes more staccato. By observing and measuring discourse elements, the proposal suggests, we can achieve a subtle and sensitive monitoring of the changes in flexibility, teamwork, and focus within a work group. These measurements will be taken among a trauma team in a hospital emergency room, a work setting that is similar to many other high-hazard contexts: inherently hazardous, remarkably successful, yet on rare occasions subject to catastrophic failure. By measuring adaptive capability, it is hoped that catastrophic failures can be anticipated and avoided.