Martha Landerman wrote:
>
> Replying to LO7861 --
>
> In LO7861, Maria Ivancic said:
>
> "The problem for companies... is what to do with people who display
> such an attitude.... They no longer trust management because there has
> been too long a history of management not being truthful... These
> people need to be shown (by management) that things are different. It
> may take a long time but trust is something that is very difficult to
> win back once you have thrown it away.
>
> Then Jyotsna Pattabiraman said:
>
> [ much trimmed by jr]
> A non-receptive authority figure can kill initiative and learning."
>
> From Martha Landerman
> [...]
> What was the monkey wrench? Our local management got frightened at how
> good a job we did. Over eight months, I was harassed and pestered
> because I didn't manage by the outdated, authoritarian methods so
> popular throughout the rest of the company. I was told I shouldn't
> trust my group, because they'd stab me in the back. I was told I
> shouldn't allow people to be so creative. I was told I was a
> troublemaker because I prepared my people for promotion. And on and on
> and on.
>
[ more trimmed by jr]
> To this day, I still get compliments for the way our old group worked.
> Too bad my management chain wasn't strong enough to bask in the glow
> with me.
In a prior offering I had suggested that it might be of some value to
thread our way down the communication highway. In so doing I used the
anology of a plastic bag to indicate that, while both "sides" of the
labor question are often "at odds", they (and we) co-exist in the same
yin and yang relationship, with the elasticity of the plastic as a useful
tool to conceptualize the pulling and tugging of those involved.
Martha Landerman's post on Entrepreneurship sadly and eloquently presents
the same concept in "real" everyday, concrete terms. "We can't do that.",
"We don't do that here.", etc., etc.; such a sad testimonial to the state
of hierarchical organizations, based on the military model.
I suggest anyone who is interested in alternatives review Deming's
fourteen points, many of which completely destroy the utility of
"compulsive-obsessive" controls, such as those which destroyed the golden
era of her work.
If control rests in authority, and authority chooses not to involve
itself in learning alternatives, the tree has fallen and no one has heard
it. This bodes especially ill for US enterprise.
Regards,
John Constantine
Rainbird Management Consulting
Santa Fe, NM
505.473.0331
--JOHN CONSTANTINE <rainbird@trail.com>
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>