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But good ideas... are not enough!!!

The world is full of superior products and processes that have failed or are yet to be achieved. Good ideas, things that work well, things that will make life better... are not enough.

The cultural and historical factors have to align with what the idea or thing can offer before the it will be widely adopted. 'Critical mass' is a nice idea but the what is 'critical' is how the 'mass' is composed.

RPS - a classic case

The reason RPS adopted a quality strategy was because 

• its existing philosophy (a prime cultural factor of the school) matched the Deming philosophy
• it had just lost almost 20% of its staff allocation between one school year and the next (a significant historical factor) and the enrolment had barely changed (another historical factor)
• the only way to cope with the reduced resources was to cut several programs, such as Music, Physical Education..., that had been outstanding 'iconic' features of the school (historical and cultural)
• the most convincing initial impressions of the quality movement was not how profound the theory... was - rather the culture of its members, their sense of well-being was the 
• the Australian Quality Council responded at the time (historical) to the school's interest by providing (cultural) models, support and encouragement  as well as insight and strategies into the methods....

It is important to note that the power and validity of Deming's system of profound knowledge would not have been sufficient by itself for RPS to make the transition - there were other historical and cultural responses that could have been made

• the school could have accepted the logical implications of the cutbacks (as most other schools did)
• it could have made a super-human effort to overcome the cutbacks (as some people did in some schools)
• neither the Education Department nor the profession expected a significant shift in school strategies

Implications

Good ideas, even Deming's good ideas, are not enough! For ideas to be adopted and acted upon they need to be recognised as feasible and desirable in the prevailing, or immanent, cultural and historical context.