Performance is a hot topic in some circles more than others. For example, in professional sports, High Performance is the minimally accepted standard of individual and team performance. Every coach and every team member have defined their personal standards of performance that are sacred goals for themselves, and perhaps also for their teams.
In Business, Acceptable Performance means success. Low performance is not the acceptable standard. It is the mark of failure. In the process to Attain a Type I Civilization Status, ATICS, Performance means so much more than merely winning or losing. It means either making it into a more stable and an improved future or continuously struggling for the resources of survivability, and ultimately failing. We live on a finite planet with finite resources. A successful ATICS Program can overcome these finite limitations that are natural to Mother Earth. This is so because we inhabit a finite planet with finite resources that circles a nearly limitless source of Solar energy that we can harness for all Humanity by successfully implementing the ATICS Program. Interesting, right!
The dangers inherent in the ATICS Program make Continuous Performance Management a non-negotiable necessity. ATICS Program Managers will have to plan broadly and deeply. They will have to become expert designers of a large range of systems and solutions. People talk about establishing communities on the moon and even the planet Mars. They speak of exploring the Solar System and beyond. These are not the mere ideas of young dreamers. These are serious people who are very capable and extremely resourceful. They share their dreams, visions, and plans. They are not imaginative children playing kick-the-ball. This all sounds so full of excitement does it not? To "make it so" as Picard would order, our plans will have to adequately address the following threats to the people who engage in the ATICS Program so that we can adequately protect the health and life of those of us working "Out There".
In the first place, our bodies have evolved to exists and even thrive on Mother Earth. The climates, oxygen levels, water supply, natural gravity ratios, seasonal shifts, and natural planetary conditions support the emergence, evolution, development, and maintenance of human life. However, once we move Off-Planet, everything changes. Off-Planet conditions are deadly for a range of reasons including:
Human Beings are earth-bound creatures who survive and prosper on our Home Planet. We have not evolved to prosper "out there" in the space between the planets and the stars. We have the intelligence to develop the protective equipment that can make work and exploration out there safer. However, there is limits to this also. It is a fact of human bodily constraints that working "out there" is never going to be a "friendly walk in the park". Nevertheless, with the right equipment and safety precautions, proper training, severe discipline. We can do some work "out there" among the moons, planets, and stars. And, this is important, we can indeed eventually and cautiously Attain a Type I Civilization Status.
Our ATICS Program Managers must master a cautionary process to keep everyone health and safe when working "out there". The central problem that we must solve is the lack of gravity and the effect of this lack on the Human Body, and perhaps the mind. To become a master of our fate "out there," Humanity must learn to develop a gravitational field that offers a healthy substitute to the gravity of Mother Earth.
