Subject: Complexity and Values
John Woods writes:
>It is destructive and a misunderstanding of the systems
>view to think of the interests and rights of individuals as being
>separate from those of the group.
Individuals are members of more than one group. They are members of
families, of social or religious groups and often they are members of more
than one group in the work context. The interests of the individual may
often coincide with the interests of one or more of those groups, but not
every situation has a "win/win" solution. An individual may be under
pressure to "cheat" on family commitments to complete an assignment. Even
within the work system an individual may not be able simultaneously to
satisfy the needs of a customer and the requirements of a production
scheduler. Individuals who know that their personal development will in
the long run benefit their employer as well as themselves, may need to
sacrifice some aspects of necessary learning and development because "the
system" does not provide enough time. (A simple example: When asking a
branch manager to send two top sales people on a facilitators' course he
replied, "but you realise that if I take them off the road for two days we
will not hit the budget that you have set us").
There is no easy answer [except perhaps Johns suggested: "Fire them"] A
different trade-off may be appropriate in each case. Managers may
sometimes be able to eliminate of potential conflicts of interests by
redesigning the system. But genuine conflicts between the interests of
individuals and groups cannot always be resolved.
--John Farago <jfarago@cix.compulink.co.uk>
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>