In fcUKdupcompletely the PFI's (Private Financial Initiatives) lauded as saving the country money & more efficient than State owned organisations. All have been an horrendously costly failure.
Every single privatised sector is in various stages of failure. Water, Power & Rail being the top 3 basket cases now.
So the goal is to maintain control over direction while delegating most technical decisions to the unit and expert initiative? Sounds like it should work.
Finding the correct people to work in the council is tough, however. While technical expertise, academic achievement, or previous business experience are good bases to start from, I would consider picking an insider and allowing them to pick a team.
I have an article scheduled (at the end of the month) about Communication Overhead, a concept I've developed that says large organizations always transition from richer and less portable forms of communication (face-to-face communication or speech) to less rich and more portable forms of communication (the written word), which impedes effective internal communication.
If the members of the council are not chosen just as much for fit or ability to communicate with each other and the other factory members, I fear that the existing bureaucracy will simply be maintained.
One idea threaded through the book so far is that while transitioning to such a system, there will be a need for more influence from the top. So appointing council members to begin with may be a good option, which could have the effect of creating the right corporate culture to be emulated in future. This is out of my expertise, but it would be cool to find out if there are studies of countries with experience of such councils that have identified the best practices.
Sadly it's out of my expertise too, but it would be interesting. While it would be wasteful to tear out the whole management structure root and branch, leaving too much in place may cause the old problems to simply reappear.
Naturally, that's not what you want, though simply replacing enough off the management with attentive and sensitive whip-crackers may suffice. Good management often outshines bad structure.
I'm sorry, Harrison, that I can't always find the patience to read your articles fully. I really should.
But this whole subject of state "ownership," bureaucratic control, worker control is hot right now and seems no closer to resolution than it ever has been. I have no doubt that Lobaczewski's ideas would be an improvement, as they take into account the problem of what we now call psychopathy that many other systems neglect or handle poorly.
I am immediately reminded of Looking Backwards by Edward Bellamy (1888). Bellamy was heavily influenced by Christian Socialism and Theosophy. He wanted a society that would be more respectful of the basic humanity of workers, and the poor. He also argued for the improved efficiency of a nationalized system of production, seeing competition in business as wasteful. He thought the incentives inherent in a system where wide variations of income are allowed could be replaced with social and political incentives. I worked in a group that operated vaguely on that principle, and it was not unworkable.
But Bellamy's dream depended on a spiritual rebirth among human beings that never showed up. I suppose this could still happen. But this points out where all systems of human organization tend to fall short: They tend to assume people are more rational than they really are, and they tend to neglect the problem of severe irrationality (psychopathy) that is a very real threat to ANY human system.
I might also mention the Mondragon Corporation in Spain. This corporation operates as a modern large business but is based on worker cooperatives. The cooperative movement, actually, might be a better model for America than socialism or maybe even capitalism. It has proven workable in a few places in this country.
I feel that the pressure to create more "efficient" human systems may push us in the direction of Technocracy and the expansion of technical bureaucracies. They won't necessarily look like Socialism but they might. In the end, I have to agree with Bellamy that we won't survive well until we become better-educated about ourselves and how to maintain rationality in the face of pressures to do otherwise. No system operated by irrational beings will work well.
Thanks HK. Great post.
In fcUKdupcompletely the PFI's (Private Financial Initiatives) lauded as saving the country money & more efficient than State owned organisations. All have been an horrendously costly failure.
Every single privatised sector is in various stages of failure. Water, Power & Rail being the top 3 basket cases now.
So the goal is to maintain control over direction while delegating most technical decisions to the unit and expert initiative? Sounds like it should work.
Finding the correct people to work in the council is tough, however. While technical expertise, academic achievement, or previous business experience are good bases to start from, I would consider picking an insider and allowing them to pick a team.
I have an article scheduled (at the end of the month) about Communication Overhead, a concept I've developed that says large organizations always transition from richer and less portable forms of communication (face-to-face communication or speech) to less rich and more portable forms of communication (the written word), which impedes effective internal communication.
If the members of the council are not chosen just as much for fit or ability to communicate with each other and the other factory members, I fear that the existing bureaucracy will simply be maintained.
One idea threaded through the book so far is that while transitioning to such a system, there will be a need for more influence from the top. So appointing council members to begin with may be a good option, which could have the effect of creating the right corporate culture to be emulated in future. This is out of my expertise, but it would be cool to find out if there are studies of countries with experience of such councils that have identified the best practices.
Sadly it's out of my expertise too, but it would be interesting. While it would be wasteful to tear out the whole management structure root and branch, leaving too much in place may cause the old problems to simply reappear.
Naturally, that's not what you want, though simply replacing enough off the management with attentive and sensitive whip-crackers may suffice. Good management often outshines bad structure.
I'm sorry, Harrison, that I can't always find the patience to read your articles fully. I really should.
But this whole subject of state "ownership," bureaucratic control, worker control is hot right now and seems no closer to resolution than it ever has been. I have no doubt that Lobaczewski's ideas would be an improvement, as they take into account the problem of what we now call psychopathy that many other systems neglect or handle poorly.
I am immediately reminded of Looking Backwards by Edward Bellamy (1888). Bellamy was heavily influenced by Christian Socialism and Theosophy. He wanted a society that would be more respectful of the basic humanity of workers, and the poor. He also argued for the improved efficiency of a nationalized system of production, seeing competition in business as wasteful. He thought the incentives inherent in a system where wide variations of income are allowed could be replaced with social and political incentives. I worked in a group that operated vaguely on that principle, and it was not unworkable.
But Bellamy's dream depended on a spiritual rebirth among human beings that never showed up. I suppose this could still happen. But this points out where all systems of human organization tend to fall short: They tend to assume people are more rational than they really are, and they tend to neglect the problem of severe irrationality (psychopathy) that is a very real threat to ANY human system.
I might also mention the Mondragon Corporation in Spain. This corporation operates as a modern large business but is based on worker cooperatives. The cooperative movement, actually, might be a better model for America than socialism or maybe even capitalism. It has proven workable in a few places in this country.
I feel that the pressure to create more "efficient" human systems may push us in the direction of Technocracy and the expansion of technical bureaucracies. They won't necessarily look like Socialism but they might. In the end, I have to agree with Bellamy that we won't survive well until we become better-educated about ourselves and how to maintain rationality in the face of pressures to do otherwise. No system operated by irrational beings will work well.