Propagator

My first experience in an organization where no one knows anything has been terrible. I have always worked with small groups where communication is easily achieved with limited resources and though problems arises, they are easily overcome by face-to-face resolution. Having said that, I am entirely ignorant of the fact that huge organizations can barely achieve that level of democracy in information. Bureaucracy is resorted as a solution against chaos in these organizations and inefficiency prevails. The ultimate question that everyone asks is, ‘What’s going to happen next?’ in this organization of ours. Yet the fact is no one knows.

The highest level only knows the goal and those slightly lower will handle the practical aspects of achieving the goal. This means goals that are broken down are passed to the lower hierarchy and while some are translated into actions, others are further broken into bits and pushed downwards. The result is the accomplishment of ‘big things’ without anyone actually knowing what each of them are doing. It sounds amazing, but the problem with this system is that it assumes the entire organization follows the single agenda of the one right on the top. If we account for the tiny little agendas that exists within the little components of the hierarchy, then things gets complicated; delays sets in, inertia to accomplishment builds up, things becomes left undone, mistakes occur and the system may collapse.

This organization I am with circumvent the problem of ‘Little Agenda’ through force, through what they claim to be ‘discipline’, a series of threats ranging from informal punishments to legal coercion. This disincentive framework props up the organizational agenda as top in priority. That results in severe inefficiencies within the grander system where the organization lies in – the society. ‘Little Agendas’ that may be more important within the grander system would not be able to supersede those insignificant ones set by the organization because they are encapsulated by the organization I am in.

There’s a need to give freedom a chance, to integrate the ‘Little Agendas’ with what the organization is setting out to do. Efficiency is important in an organization where people only remain for a limited time and this time is pre-determined. This is because people do not have incentive to help push for improvements in an organization where they would never get the chance to enjoy the fruits of their labour. Having no incentive doesn’t mean people won’t try and improve but it does mean motivation for improvement is severely reduced. Inefficiency will prevail if there exist no incentive for improvement; speed of accomplishing stuff is not a physical limitation like what many in the organization claim to be, it is a limitation that arises out of the structure of the organization. If we want to respect the ‘traditions’, the residue of our influences, then we must leave them in the museum; ‘regiment’ have no place in an organization that requires talents to be put in the right place. Image follows from efficiency, from accomplishing the task one sets out to do, and not arbitrarily defined to be ‘looking smart’ or mere superficial nonsense we have become all too capable of.

Our structure have to be re-thought, the old guys got to go, let the new guys replace them. There must be an overhaul, gradual changes to be made through synchronized re-inventing, not testing the different boundaries slowly.

There was a time when I was much younger and I wonder why adults behave the way they do. They sometimes say things like ‘the world is always like that’ or tell us to ‘mind our own business’. They think being concerned about other’s matters is being ‘busybody’ and that a kid who keeps asking question is not being ‘smart’. As I grow up, I discovered why; it is the nature of workplaces, perhaps asian workplaces and work ethics. The apathy that adults demonstrate, their interest in knowing the stuff in the newspaper and not exactly what reality is all stems from the work culture.

Saying ‘the world is always like that’ is a generalization that results from their observations of patterns in the society, due to the routine nature of most of their work. Routine in work makes things easier because those people who does something are ‘specialized’ in doing that but they are also ‘specialized’ because they know how to make things look like they are done and they know how to pretend they are doing that particular work. In other words they may not only have mastered the technique involved in their work but also that of pretending that they are busy with that work. At the same time the line reflects their apathy; in their haste to generalize the world, they fail to appreciate subtle changes that improves their lives. Being positive in this sad reality is some sort of a taboo.

Apathy or a lack of concern for things around them as a general feature of adults is caused by the fact that they are always given extra work when they show concern for someone else’s undone work or when they complain about something, they fear that they’d be asked to make changes to the status quo. As we all go into all sorts of work, we see strange behaviors at play: doing and undoing stuff to pretend we are busy so that we don’t get new work to do, or pretending to do work when boss comes around instead of spending time fruitfully by working on something that you have to do next but can submit much later. There are logical explanations for all these phenomena and they all stem from rationality but they are results of poor principles and work attitudes. This is especially typical of the civil service or public sector.

There’s perhaps a need to design newer reward systems for work and review work culture at these places somehow – though I don’t have ideas to propose yet at the moment.