The project I’ve been working on since September 2014 has ended. It didn’t end in any sort of satisfying way—just sort of fizzled out. I’ve devoted the last several weeks to maximizing the client’s ability to salvage the work.
For ethical reasons I’m still reluctant to share exactly what I was doing. Suffice it to say that the project offered me an opportunity to see the workings of the State of Illinois at close hand. What I observed was tremendous management nonfeasance. I don’t think that’s limited to government. I think it’s a factor in all large American organizations these days, public or private.
I tend to be a kind of rainmaker wherever I go and in whatever I’m involved with and this project was no exception. At times I felt as though I were dragging the entire organization behind me.
When timely management decisions are not forthcoming either of two things or both may happen. One is that you will be overcome by events—the opportunity for making an effective decision will be taken away from you by changing circumstances. The other is that policy decisions will be made by junior personnel without either your or even their being aware that’s what’s happening. It is unclear to me why managers would want policy decisions to be made by junior personnel. I won’t tolerate it and I won’t let it happen.
One of the things that I noticed in a modern workplace is that a dominant motivation appears to be fear. Fear of losing one’s job, fear of saying the wrong thing, fear of giving offense, fear of having the wrong opinions.
I’m old, I’m a decent person, I’m competent, and I’m confident so none of those things bother me. I stick out like a sore thumb.
But it’s no way to run a railroad, either for accomplishing the organization’s goals, for maintaining esprit de corps, or for the personal well-being of people.
“Suffice it to say that the project offered me an opportunity to see the workings of the State of Illinois at close hand. ”
They have therapists to help you get over that.
“One of the things that I noticed in a modern workplace…….”
I’m so removed from employment in that environment it’s hard to recall. But we see it in family owned businesses run by iron fisted owners. It’s a great opportunity to release value after we take the reigns. We don’t tolerate managers who practice what you describe. The sports analogy is the star player who can’t incorporate the strengths of the entire team.
I know that when I point this out most don’t believe it. But this is reality, apparently in Spain as well.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-07-01/5-million-unemployed-spain-still-cant-find-workers
And then thre is this, discussed often here.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-07-01/why-trump-routing-free-traders
I saw Obama extolling the virtues of free trade and cheaper goods for consumers recently. Interesting debate.
Talk about the changing workplace……
Agree there is an undercurrent of fear, of being regarded by the employer has being as easily replaced as a leaky pen. Which maybe because the quants (and technocrats in government) are ruling the roost or lazy shiftless worker drone are depends on what kaleidoscope you picked up to view the world thru today.
What I observed was tremendous management nonfeasance.
Nonfeasance! What a perfect word to describe the situation.
As I read the sentence I thought, “Welcome to 21st Century America.” But then you went exactly to that point.
The atmosphere of fear you describe is more typical of autocratic (or worse) societies, which tells much about the kind of society we now inhabit. I regularly see people have their livelihoods threatened online if they don’t toe the line on, well, everything. If you think Dr. Frank-N-Furter shouldn’t be allowed in the women’s rest room until and unless he gets his socially constructed male appendages removed, someone will start looking into your name to find your employer and complain. They will even tell you what they are doing. They remind me of Mao’s followers during the Cultural Revolution.
But what difference, at this point, does it make? One of Reagan’s judicial appointees declared the Constitution doesn’t matter anymore, and that law students and lawyers shouldn’t waste their time studying it.
In other words, the Constitution is more what you call guidelines than actual rules.
Rule of law is dead in this land. People are right to be afraid.
I suspect some of that fear might be a residual from the recent Great Recession. People were afraid of losing their jobs, and everything else.
Steve
I’ll just drop this here:
http://www.businessinsider.com/oss-manual-sabotage-productivity-2015-11
Good one, Andy! Or should I say, OSS.