Employees are no longer considered "workers" or "hands". We now refer to
them as "partners" or "associates". This terminology is intended to bring
knowledge workers into the organization as intrinsic members of the
organization. The problem with this consideration of "ownership" is:
What happens when what you "own is taken away from you, stolen without
your consent? During the restruction and downsizing of the early '90s,
this occurred to many talented individuals.
The human being is a learning organization. He has learned that 1) he
must develop the self to be of value to the employer and 2) once his value
has been used up (as in entropy - the amount of energy available for
useful work in a system ) - he may be "out of there". Why and how should
he feel "ownership". Even the project he worked on no longer belongs to
him once his energy has been expended.
Just thinking
Jacqueline V. Coppola
MSN student, Sonoma State University
<tveatch@softcom.net>
John W. Gunkler wrote:
> Replying to LO19581 --
> (2) in my almost 20 years' experience in business, I have found that
> most people are highly (intrinsically) motivated to do a good job.
> Giving people a sense of"ownership" in their work is one good way. As
> someone once asked me, "Have you ever been motivated to wash your
> rental car?"
--tveatch <tveatch@softcom.net>
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>