The question of progression

He is building an inventory of waste.

“There’s four and five seater cars going past with just one person in them,” he says, wondering aloud.

“We seriously need to rethink what we are doing here,” says the man who has had this very conversation on many intersections, in many metropolises across the world.

Mr Parker speaks of using the 24-hour clock instead of 12 hours, questioning the very fundamentals of down time, not for people, but for the infrastructure people have already built that sits, lights off and locked up, for at least half of each day.

“We can use our infrastructure better to immediately improve our profit margins,” he said, with the sound of passing traffic underlining his initial rational statement.

“What we are doing without questioning these scenarios is not a sustainable use of resources, we need to start thinking about integrated businesses. What are the activities that can begin when another ends?” he said. 

As the Armidale Q&A forum progressed Mr Parker took notes of key words and recurring themes that presented themselves among both panelists and speakers from the floor.

These he will use to help forge common ground and highlight principles that people already agree on, but perhaps haven’t yet realised how in agreeance they are.

It is the same principles he uses in schools in western NSW, or among divided representatives of the international community when it comes to negotiating change and leadership to facilitate “sensitive conversations”.

Already, he said, he believed people from the forum were thinking differently about the question: Where to from here?

“This is part of a really important process.”

Already discussions are underway for some Armidale participants to regroup and continue discussion methods of helping to revitalise regional communities.

Judging from the enthusiasm and determination from a compulsive scientist, we have not heard the last from Mr Parker.