I have been quite busy lately so have little time to be involved in the
list but thought I would say what I am seeing in my clients. The people
who bring me in usually have a learning orientation but the leadership --
top leadership of the organizations are very different. I will talk about
their cultures which have been defined by past and current leadership...
One culture considers itself an "expert culture" -- what this means is
that everyone has all the answers all of the time. If you don't have the
answer, and the right one -- you are dead meat. It is very competitive
and arrogant. There is always a prove it to me attitude...
Another culture is competitive, aggressive, and punishing. At least two
divisions have exceeded last years gross sales and profits but the
Presidents were ousted because they had not met the goals set by the CEO.
They are driven by a need for stockmarket confidence...
Yet another is doing poorly and the leadership is somewhat vague and
indecisive so there is a mix in the organization of people in constant
grief and anger and those who have seen the light and have found a way to
be okay at work...
And the final example is a company where the power is top down driven --
the people will not push back at managers even if money and time are being
wasted. It is a culture of helpless victims -- one person's description
of himself.
So what are trends? There is what people talk about -- boardroom fads ---
and then there is what is actually happening. I had a talk radio show for
a while (!) -- I had a client from another company join me as a guest.
His organization was really trying to do something very different -- it is
an electric company -- if they can ever unravel the government bs they
will be deregulated which means incredible competition. So they are
trying to do business differently and were also looking at the
compensation gap. That point in the management ranks where only the best
in that culture succeed and make the really big bucks. There is actually
little justification for the gap.
The trend I see in America -- and I said on this radio show -- is that
organizations have become very cost driven -- lean and mean -- that the
do-bees are doing the jobs 3 to 5 people did in the 80's, that resource
constraints are incredible. In the midst of all this companies are
reporting higher earnings and profits for shareholders and senior
management... So what does this mean? It means that as long as the
people who control the bucks like what is happening then nothing is going
to change. We can talk all we want about learning organizations but if
the profit motive is ruling -- which it does in most companies -- then
only a threat to survivial will cause the leadership to change. Boy am I
sounding cynical today or what? Anyway -- I figure sooner or later there
will be a white collar revolution -- which I also said on the radio! A
friend told me about a month later that he heard Tom Peters say the same
thing -- he must have been listening to my radio show!
Sherri
sherri@maloufinc.com Tel:603-672-0355
LMA, Inc Fax:603-673-7120
--Sherri Malouf <sherri@maloufinc.com>
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>