As the post on 18 December showed, there is a slippery slope when commercial interests and practices are allowed to contaminate the activities of those who act as guardians of the public’s interest.
Currently in the news is a US commercial security firm awarded government contracts to act as armed bodyguards for US State Department diplomats in Baghdad. Five Blackwater employees were accused of opening fire in Nisour Square, on 16 September 2007, killing 17 innocent civilians. The Iraqi government is incensed that legal charges against the bodyguards have been dropped for technical reasons concerning the manner in which prosecution evidence was obtained.
The first question behind what should remain public and what could be privatized is: ‘What is being done in the name of the state?’ A national army is a clear-cut example; mercenary armies are few compared with historical times. The criminal justice system is another example, as is the police. But, controversially, the state does let private companies run prisons. Their contracts reward them for having more prisoners, generating a clear conflict of interest. Imagine if those companies ran the courts and employed the judges who decided who should serve a prison sentence. Firefighters work for the state; though common commercial practice raised its head when New York City decided to reward firefighters for how many fires they put out – something over which the firefighters had no control. Until, that is, some of them realised that they could earn more money if they started fires! Thankfully, the firefighters knew where the fires were and all were put out!
Time and again leadership and management problems turn on matters of individual, team and corporate accountability. To whom were Blackwater bodyguards accountable? And how well equipped was that person or body to carry out the duties of holding the bodyguards to account for their performance? There is also the issue of the distinction between the bodyguards’ responsibility to, and their responsibility for, certain people and things. This is a major leadership issue and one that is much neglected; a whole chapter is devoted to it in The Search for Leadership. This blog will return to this subject in another day’s post.
Monday, 4 January 2010
Thursday, 31 December 2009
Unintended consequences go to waste
The Search for Leadership: An Organisational Perspective discusses some of the truths and traps that await powerful CEOs who don’t know what they don’t know. Lacking education in organisational behaviour, such leaders are vulnerable and may push for the wrong thing.
One such trap awaits those who decide to centralise services to save costs. It seems obvious to them that economies of scale are bound to deliver savings. Figures may show that this is so, provided that the boundary of the system being considered is defined in narrow terms. But if all types of cost are taken into account, including those passed onto others who are affected by the change – often inadvertently – then the net cost may increase. There is also the added cost of frustration, delays, more customer complaints and lowered staff morale.
Centralisation is a political game, sometimes with a small ‘p’ and sometimes large, as in the case of government ministers looking for departmental savings. This week the probation union Napo treated the public to a laughable tale of this tragi-comedy in practice. Harry Fletcher, Napo’s assistant general secretary explained that “five years ago the Home Office decided to centralise [on regions] and privatise the maintenance of the probation estate”. Previously, local probation services had sought local solutions to local problems.
The upshot was stories such as “Window cleaners travelling from Preston to Leicester and staying in a hotel overnight. An office with four staff receiving 5000 paper towels each month that had not been ordered. A three-hour drive by an electrician to change a lightbulb. A dishwasher arriving that was too large to fit the available space”. These result from a distant and impersonal service that relies on a written contract rather than a customer and a supplier who know each other. Centralisation damages relationships as much as the balance sheet. No wonder ‘motivational and inspirational consultants’ were then hired to address probation staff. Only they told them that there was no such thing as stress.
Unintended consequences of one form or another are predictable, even without knowing about the natural oscillation between centralisation and decentralisation. When the lesson of the increased cost of centralisation is ultimately learned, these leaders will rediscover the attraction of decentralisation, localism and ‘small is beautiful’. Jack Straw, Justice Secretary, has now ordered a review of the contract. It can also be predicted that apparent weaknesses in subsequent decentralisation will lead to some future leader insisting on centralisation.
The current political vogue is for centralisation, but the political rhetoric is about localism. This is another of those ‘tugs of war’ (see yesterday’s post) that challenge leaders – and these days is talked about as managing ‘polarities’.
One such trap awaits those who decide to centralise services to save costs. It seems obvious to them that economies of scale are bound to deliver savings. Figures may show that this is so, provided that the boundary of the system being considered is defined in narrow terms. But if all types of cost are taken into account, including those passed onto others who are affected by the change – often inadvertently – then the net cost may increase. There is also the added cost of frustration, delays, more customer complaints and lowered staff morale.
Centralisation is a political game, sometimes with a small ‘p’ and sometimes large, as in the case of government ministers looking for departmental savings. This week the probation union Napo treated the public to a laughable tale of this tragi-comedy in practice. Harry Fletcher, Napo’s assistant general secretary explained that “five years ago the Home Office decided to centralise [on regions] and privatise the maintenance of the probation estate”. Previously, local probation services had sought local solutions to local problems.
The upshot was stories such as “Window cleaners travelling from Preston to Leicester and staying in a hotel overnight. An office with four staff receiving 5000 paper towels each month that had not been ordered. A three-hour drive by an electrician to change a lightbulb. A dishwasher arriving that was too large to fit the available space”. These result from a distant and impersonal service that relies on a written contract rather than a customer and a supplier who know each other. Centralisation damages relationships as much as the balance sheet. No wonder ‘motivational and inspirational consultants’ were then hired to address probation staff. Only they told them that there was no such thing as stress.
Unintended consequences of one form or another are predictable, even without knowing about the natural oscillation between centralisation and decentralisation. When the lesson of the increased cost of centralisation is ultimately learned, these leaders will rediscover the attraction of decentralisation, localism and ‘small is beautiful’. Jack Straw, Justice Secretary, has now ordered a review of the contract. It can also be predicted that apparent weaknesses in subsequent decentralisation will lead to some future leader insisting on centralisation.
The current political vogue is for centralisation, but the political rhetoric is about localism. This is another of those ‘tugs of war’ (see yesterday’s post) that challenge leaders – and these days is talked about as managing ‘polarities’.
Wednesday, 30 December 2009
The Great Tug of War
The writer Beverley Naidoo recently visited Yarl’s Wood Child Detention Centre, where children are detained pending possible deportation. She was there to run a story-telling workshop for the children aged five to 16. On entering through security she passed under a sign saying ‘Serco brings service to life’. Inside she found the teachers wearing guards uniforms. They had bundles of keys dangling from their belts.
Does this remind you of another item in the news last week? By a strange coincidence we heard of a different sign over a different entrance: ‘Arbeit Macht Frei’ (‘Work sets you free’). It hung over the entrance to another detention centre - Auschwitz. Perhaps I’m cynical. Perhaps the sign is. Like 'free', the word 'life' can have more than one meaning for people in detention.
Organisations sometimes tell tales about their brand. There can be tension between rhetoric and reality. Leadership is about being authentic and attending to these gaps.
And what book did Naidoo take with her to read from? The Great Tug of War. Just so!
Does this remind you of another item in the news last week? By a strange coincidence we heard of a different sign over a different entrance: ‘Arbeit Macht Frei’ (‘Work sets you free’). It hung over the entrance to another detention centre - Auschwitz. Perhaps I’m cynical. Perhaps the sign is. Like 'free', the word 'life' can have more than one meaning for people in detention.
Organisations sometimes tell tales about their brand. There can be tension between rhetoric and reality. Leadership is about being authentic and attending to these gaps.
And what book did Naidoo take with her to read from? The Great Tug of War. Just so!
Thursday, 24 December 2009
An event, a dear boy, an event
Paraphrasing Harold Macmillan, when asked about the challenges facing leaders, he nearly said the above. Though he didn’t mean it in this particular way, an event in Bethlehem long ago made them think. And still does.
Happy Christmas!
Happy Christmas!
Wednesday, 23 December 2009
Edgar Schein’s future of culture
Does an organisation’s culture influence individuals’ behaviour? Or does it work the other way round: does the sum of how individuals behave help to define the organisation’s culture?
This question came to mind when, to my surprise, Edgar Schein proposed that we drop words such as ‘culture’, as they have become overworked, overused and misunderstood (he may have a point there) and instead start to focus on behaviours that we seek as the focus of outcomes (report on An Audience with Edgar Schein (IDeA Conference, 19 November).
One small point: I question the “focus of outcomes”, suspecting that it might mean “driver of outcomes” (otherwise it confuses means and ends). But there is something more worrying about Schein’s alternative focus. First, let’s get this post’s opening question out of the way. An organisation’s culture is rather like a fishtank is to fish; it is part of what surrounds people at work, largely taken for granted and unseen. It may contain sustenance and/or toxins, be clear and navigable or opaque. Schein may be correct that we’re confused about it, but I don’t think we should stop talking about it.
The big question is what is the engine that drives the system’s success? Schein appears to take the view that it is individuals and their behaviour. That conventional stance emphasises the role of competency frameworks, personal objectives, individual performance appraisal, and skills training. More radical souls include the likes of OD specialist W Warner Burke, systems thinker Margaret Wheatley, and complexity scientist Ralph Stacey (a school of thought to which I belong). We believe that what matters more is attending to all the gaps, spaces and glue in what surrounds people, what binds them together and what keeps them apart, in their relationships with each other, with the system in which they function, with the organisation’s aims, and with their environment. Individuals are defined by their relationships; they have little organisational power when considered in isolation.
If these radicals are right, then there is a stronger future for OD’s work on the system.
This question came to mind when, to my surprise, Edgar Schein proposed that we drop words such as ‘culture’, as they have become overworked, overused and misunderstood (he may have a point there) and instead start to focus on behaviours that we seek as the focus of outcomes (report on An Audience with Edgar Schein (IDeA Conference, 19 November).
One small point: I question the “focus of outcomes”, suspecting that it might mean “driver of outcomes” (otherwise it confuses means and ends). But there is something more worrying about Schein’s alternative focus. First, let’s get this post’s opening question out of the way. An organisation’s culture is rather like a fishtank is to fish; it is part of what surrounds people at work, largely taken for granted and unseen. It may contain sustenance and/or toxins, be clear and navigable or opaque. Schein may be correct that we’re confused about it, but I don’t think we should stop talking about it.
The big question is what is the engine that drives the system’s success? Schein appears to take the view that it is individuals and their behaviour. That conventional stance emphasises the role of competency frameworks, personal objectives, individual performance appraisal, and skills training. More radical souls include the likes of OD specialist W Warner Burke, systems thinker Margaret Wheatley, and complexity scientist Ralph Stacey (a school of thought to which I belong). We believe that what matters more is attending to all the gaps, spaces and glue in what surrounds people, what binds them together and what keeps them apart, in their relationships with each other, with the system in which they function, with the organisation’s aims, and with their environment. Individuals are defined by their relationships; they have little organisational power when considered in isolation.
If these radicals are right, then there is a stronger future for OD’s work on the system.
Tuesday, 22 December 2009
Stuff happens!
When questioned about the death of Meredith Kercher, Amanda Knox responded “Shit happens!”. Her response differs little from that of Donald Rumsfeld’s “stuff happens” to the looting in Baghdad. He added that "They're also free to live their lives and do wonderful things. And that's what's going to happen here."
When something bad happens it may be an unintended consequence of some plan or event. But these things are rarely planned and predicted. Indeed, one of managers’ biggest problems is that so little can be predicted. Things come out of the blue, with a dynamic of their own. When asked what represented the greatest challenge for a statesman, Prime Minister Harold Macmillan replied: 'Events, my dear boy, events'.
As explained in The Search for Leadership, Rumsfeld is also known for saying “Reports that say that something hasn't happened are always interesting to me, because as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns – the ones we don't know we don't know.” He was right, though was widely mocked over this remark.
Given his intelligence and his awareness of the huge knowledge vacuum present when taking shocking and awful decisions about the Iraq invasion, his level of confidence in the expected outcomes seems surprising. He expected the US troops to be welcomed with open arms. And he thought that the west’s gift of democracy would be equally welcome. Given his sayings, we might have expected greater modesty and some recognition of the need for a contingency plan. We now know that he believed none was needed, so sure was he of success. ‘Stuff happens’ is not embedded in his management planning method; it is an excuse when confronted by evidence of failure. Presumably, Fred Goodwin was equally sure of the Royal Bank of Scotland’s disastrous decision to purchase ABN Amro. We can predict that hubris will play a part in leaders’ decisions more easily than we can predict a successful outcome.
The work of Margaret Wheatley, Ralph Stacey and other writers on the complexity sciences reveals and explains the Achilles Heel in management’s claimed justification for their role; i.e. very little in this life can be predicted. So even the need for contingency plans, the usefulness of their diagnosis, or likely outcome cannot be predicted.
Wheatley’s conclusion (see Leadership and the New Science) is to seek to control less, try to manage more simply, be more humble, and allow a greater role for nature to produce order out of chaos. It won’t stop death, but it may happen further from one’s own interventions.
When something bad happens it may be an unintended consequence of some plan or event. But these things are rarely planned and predicted. Indeed, one of managers’ biggest problems is that so little can be predicted. Things come out of the blue, with a dynamic of their own. When asked what represented the greatest challenge for a statesman, Prime Minister Harold Macmillan replied: 'Events, my dear boy, events'.
As explained in The Search for Leadership, Rumsfeld is also known for saying “Reports that say that something hasn't happened are always interesting to me, because as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns – the ones we don't know we don't know.” He was right, though was widely mocked over this remark.
Given his intelligence and his awareness of the huge knowledge vacuum present when taking shocking and awful decisions about the Iraq invasion, his level of confidence in the expected outcomes seems surprising. He expected the US troops to be welcomed with open arms. And he thought that the west’s gift of democracy would be equally welcome. Given his sayings, we might have expected greater modesty and some recognition of the need for a contingency plan. We now know that he believed none was needed, so sure was he of success. ‘Stuff happens’ is not embedded in his management planning method; it is an excuse when confronted by evidence of failure. Presumably, Fred Goodwin was equally sure of the Royal Bank of Scotland’s disastrous decision to purchase ABN Amro. We can predict that hubris will play a part in leaders’ decisions more easily than we can predict a successful outcome.
The work of Margaret Wheatley, Ralph Stacey and other writers on the complexity sciences reveals and explains the Achilles Heel in management’s claimed justification for their role; i.e. very little in this life can be predicted. So even the need for contingency plans, the usefulness of their diagnosis, or likely outcome cannot be predicted.
Wheatley’s conclusion (see Leadership and the New Science) is to seek to control less, try to manage more simply, be more humble, and allow a greater role for nature to produce order out of chaos. It won’t stop death, but it may happen further from one’s own interventions.
Monday, 21 December 2009
What defeated leaders leave behind
On 17 December on BBC Radio Four, the World Affairs Editor John Simpson recollected the 20th anniversary of the downfall of communist rule in Romania. Simpson had been present during the bloody overthrow of dictator Nicolae Ceausescu. The dictator had banned Christmas and even thought!
This brings to mind other sudden and dramatic downfalls of fiercely strong leaders of various shades and reputation: Robert Maxwell, Margaret Thatcher, Fred Goodwin among them – and what legacy their surprise and shocking departure leaves in its train. In referring to former communist dictators, Simpson remarks: “Getting rid of them was an ugly and highly questionable process, and it isn’t over even now”.
The day after the impromptu executions of Ceausescu and his much-feared wife Elena, Simpson bumped into a sociologist inside the communist central building in Bucharest. This person confided “We Romanians will always suffer as a result of Ceausescu. He’s inside every one of us. That’s his revenge”.
A few years ago the guest conductor Alan Tongue was invited to Romania to conduct a performance by the Bucharest Symphony Orchestra. After the rehearsal he invited any of the players who wished to come back to his hotel and practise their English. He waited, but no one came. He subsequently asked the orchestra’s leader for an explanation. Tongue was told, “No conductor has ever expressed an interest in them, or wanted to listen to them. The only model of leadership they are used to is autocratic. It’s our way: look at Romania’s dictator Nicolae Ceaucescu. Your invitation totally confused them. It was wholly outside their experience. They couldn’t relate to it.”
This brings to mind other sudden and dramatic downfalls of fiercely strong leaders of various shades and reputation: Robert Maxwell, Margaret Thatcher, Fred Goodwin among them – and what legacy their surprise and shocking departure leaves in its train. In referring to former communist dictators, Simpson remarks: “Getting rid of them was an ugly and highly questionable process, and it isn’t over even now”.
The day after the impromptu executions of Ceausescu and his much-feared wife Elena, Simpson bumped into a sociologist inside the communist central building in Bucharest. This person confided “We Romanians will always suffer as a result of Ceausescu. He’s inside every one of us. That’s his revenge”.
A few years ago the guest conductor Alan Tongue was invited to Romania to conduct a performance by the Bucharest Symphony Orchestra. After the rehearsal he invited any of the players who wished to come back to his hotel and practise their English. He waited, but no one came. He subsequently asked the orchestra’s leader for an explanation. Tongue was told, “No conductor has ever expressed an interest in them, or wanted to listen to them. The only model of leadership they are used to is autocratic. It’s our way: look at Romania’s dictator Nicolae Ceaucescu. Your invitation totally confused them. It was wholly outside their experience. They couldn’t relate to it.”
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