DISQUS

Ok Todd, I'm enTwined, where do I find yours?

Thinking back on it I wish I or someone had proposed a "Truth and Reconciliation" session in the early going - a chance for everyone - including NPR staff - to confess and vent sins, injuries, misdeeds and misunderstandings, ask and give forgiveness. Perhaps the bad blood and mistrust between NPR, its competitors, and various stations and producers, needs to be exorcised or acknowledged more directly before certain breakthoughs can occur.

The goal would have been to confine the "venting, whining, blaming, talking without listening, fighting old battles, and defensiveness" into one painful but necessary purge, instead of letting it continue fester and leak into other attempts to push into the future. It would have been a messy and public display of mostly inhibited feelings that are still palpable despite honest expressions of hope for collaboration. Some of this came up throughout the process but mostly obliquely. Rob called us a dysfunctional family and he was right, and he's been very honest with NPR about the depth of mixed feelings that he's encountered along his journey into the heart of the system. But perhaps a family needs to confront their dysfunction head on first, before focusing on how to live on and prosper.

In any case, I felt there was a "holding back" dynamic on the part of some of the most thoughtful, influential, and opinionated people in the system.

Ultimately, optimistic as I am, I think significant progress was made and a new spirit of openness and trust was achieved. It's a spirit that will not last indefinitely if the lofty aspirations voiced at New Realities are not followed up with some real achievements - even small ones - that reflect those values.