Demetre Tziougras (CLONE) wrote:
> Yes organizations can be evil, they can cause all the problems of
> social exclusion and all the misery connected with it. But organizations
> are constructs for social interaction, they are the tool. Humans, at least
> from the time of recorded history, used structures to survive and make
> life more bearable. The villages, cities, markets etc., all are examples
> of organizations, that make life worth living. The humans are political
> animals, as the Aristotle's was preaching about 2300 years ago.
>
> What is wrong with structures, that make life so miserable? The
> size. The destruction of the market. The size is the culprit, the size is
> the criminal in organizations.
I would agree that organization per se is not evil, and neither is
structure- it the static forms of those structures (structure as end) that
cause problems, and not dynamic forms (structure as means)- collapsible
corporations are okay, hieracrchies are not. I also agree with you about
the importance of size- behavior can vary irrespective oif size- small
companies can have a lot of infleuce, large opporTUNEitized companies can
be very responsive, although they raraely are in practice today.
Static structure, structure as an end, is evil. Dynamic structure,
structure as a means, is inevitable and tolerable. Dynamic structure-
often shaped around electronic forces- is positive. Static, often
physical, geographical structures like offices are negative.
Static structure hinders both negative and positive transactions between
individuals. It puts barriers in the way of positive transactions such as
learning, interacting, sharing and collaborating. Because such positive
transactions tend to arise outside of formal static structures and
channels, formal structures cannot cope with and hinder rather than
facilitate such dynamic transactions.
Some people see static structures as protection- they separate us from
strangers and protect us from negative transactions such as when someone
makes an unwelcome approach. But the same static structures that cause
problems such as social exclusion (for example, inability to get a job in
an organization or lack of opportunity to meet people) also protect and
hide frustrated individuals and let them force their intentions and
presence on other people.
Structures should be just a means to an end and not ends in themselves.
Structures used to be a means when they were invented, but they have
gradually taken on a life of their own and falsely become an end such that
they deplete our energy resources if individuals choose not to comply with
those structures. You have to hustle for business opportunities- and
persuade inflexible overstructured companies to meet your non-routine
requests.
We need to recreate or better still invent organizational forms that once
again provide a vehicle for meeting individuals aims such as fulfillment,
dream and vision realization, social and economic context and so on.
Organizations as ends such as hierarchies always entail the explicitly
implicit bargain that an individual CEDES and gives up personal freedom
and compromises on their personal dreams and visions in return for
"stability". Organizations as means such as collapsible corporations are
vehicles to combine as much stability as is possible in an unorganized
world (i.e. not much) WITH dream and vision realization.
We will always have structure, because patterns will always emerge. But
the structure should be dynamic and not static. To achieve this, we need
to downstructure, opporTUNEitize and so on.
> If some of the staff
> will not go along, well, to use the jargon of the military, such people
> should be wasted, or let the bastards starve. What I am trying to say is,
> that in big corporations, where the individual was robed of his identity
> and became the equivalent of a barrel of oil, we cannot speak of learning
> organizations. In such organizations we only can speak of manipulation of
> humans to squeeze the maximum of his effort for minimum of expense.
I must admit that I sometimes think this to myself- if they don't get it,
then let em get it! Because strcuture is dinintegrating anyway as are
manipulation and static structures- their effectiveness is being
undermined in the unorganized world. On one hand, I wish I would prevent
the single european currency from happening at all (a hyperorganized
policy in an unorganized world, doomed to hemhorrage) but on the other
hand, I know that if people (voters and politicians) are too ignorant to
realize that it cannot be implemented successfully in practice, then its
inevitable collapsible will bring about the destrcution of socialism and
socialdemocratic models in Europe. So I secreyly look forward to it being
implemented! Give it away voluntarily or it will be taken away by force.
Branders never lose, because they can always exit- they can always avoid
ignorance and enter excellence.
Thanks for the post- good to hear from you.
Regards, sincerely Simon Buckingham
http://www.unorg.com/europe
Unorg is in Japan in January, Norway in February
--Simon Buckingham <go57@dial.pipex.com>
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>