A simple mechanism...

Neurons in our brain communicate through electro-chemical signals. Connections between neurons are called synapses. One basis of learning seems to be that neurons can influence the probability with which they receive information from another neuron via specific synapses:

...common to our daily intercourse...

If we define people at work as neurons, any channel of communication that can be modified in its likelihood to convey information, can be called a synapse.

In this sense, there are already many synapses at work in our social day-to-day routines:

• The accessability of addresses mirrors the importance we attach to the people addressed: Some addresses are pinned on a table within vision of our desk. These are most important and used all the time. Adresses in a small notebook on a shelf in our bureau come next, followed by addresses we have in a computer system. Further down the scale are addresses in company or public phone-books and last come those that we don`t have stored anywhere.

• Internet Browsers offer options to store "favourite" links, thereby making them more likely to be used.

• In companies, incoming documents are often handed from person to person according to a documented list of priority. The further up one is on that list, the more likely one is to receive the information in time, if at all.

• People considered to be important usually don`t need to wait just as long in the ante-chamber of a boss as less important people.

• Colleagues that one considers to be important for ones work are more likely to be at ones dinner table than people considered to be less important.

• The secretariat of a boss is a synapse par excellence. She envelops her boss with a perfect system of weighted informatin flow: which information should reach his attention when, how long and in what circumstances.

• The invitation list of company festivities is often arranged according to the importance attached to the invited people, thereby modulating the likelihood with which information can flow between them.

• More important, colleagues are usually equipped with better and time-saving communication tools (faster computers, better telephone systems, a secretariat of their own etc.), thereby giving them the chance to handle more information per time, thus exercising more influence.

• Defunct communication channels are usually repaired in accordance to a persons importance. A young trainee with no special duties will probably wait longer for his telephone to be repaired than a senior manager involved in production.

...could be supported by communication software,...

Any device that can modify the chance of communication between two network participants can be called "synaptic". The ability to filter and order information gains in effect as information is supplied in superabundance.

• Internet Browsers and other programmes already try to figure out which information a certain user might want at a given time. Entering some search word in a search engine, the browser, on its own accord, offers relevant advertisments or background information on the spot.

• Continuous "personlization" of a users information gathering habits reflect a users temporary preferences and therey quite explicetly the importance he attaches to certain sources of information.

• Incoming E-mails could be listed in order of the importance attached to the content. Importance could be inferred by the name of the sender, the project mentioned in the title, the date the mail was sent, the number of recipients, key-words found in its content or, preferably, any combination of these. Internet search-engines might provide good hints at good mechanisms as they, too, have to asssess the relevance of perhaps 200.000 pages found as a result of a certain search request.

...might enhance some rudimentary neural intelligence of company communication networks and...

Memory and learning in brains are usually seen in close conjunction with the formation and alteration of synapses. Imagine a toddlers brain wants to recognize its mother. Its neural network has already many subroutines at hand that might help: the visual recognition of dark lines, of round objects, of uniform patterns, of star-like shapes, the auditory recognition of certain tones of voice, perhaps of word fragments, too, the olfactory recognition of oily, sweaty or perfumed smells. Which of these possible key-senses should be used to identify the mother? The most successful combination of these will be the best answer. If the toddlers project is to identify its mother, the synapses should be so tuned as to bring exactly those subroutines into close communication that are the best team to do the trick.

Equally so in business life. Imagine a company wants to recognize its best market. The best answer will be produced if the right people and the right departments will have their optimum share in shaping the decision. Communication synapses would help in determining, for example, how often and at what times controlling or production planning departments could spawn their information and points of views on other company neurons. If experience shows, that production planning does not contribute effectively to a specific question, then the synapses around this department should lower the likelihood with which production planning information and views are transmitted to other departments and people. This would clearly be one step towards a learning company structure.

...refines the model of the neuron.

The ingoing information of a neuron must pass synapses, which are represented as double-bars. How the synapses are tuned to let information pass or not, is a matter of further refinement of the model.