Boiled Frogs and Scorpions

I love nice crunchy metaphors and powerful images. 

Take, for example, the famous boiled frog story. Put a frog in a pot of hot water and he will jump out at once. Put him in a pan of cold water,  heat it on the stove, and he will be cooked to death because he won't notice the slowly rising temperature. Moral? Let frogs (and people) get used to new things slowly; don't try to change everything all at once.

Here's another frog story. A scorpion and a frog meet on a riverbank. The scorpion, who can't swim, asks the frog for a ride. The frog demurs; "Why would I do that? You'll sting me and I'll die." Says the scorpion, "That would be stupid. I would die too." OK, says the frog and they start across. They get partway and the scorpion stings the frog, who with his dying breath, says, "Why did you do that? Now we'll both die."  The scorpion shrugs; "I'm a scorpion." Moral? Don't trust scorpions (and people) to go against their instincts.

Both of these are powerful images, and the advice they embody is worth noting. But maybe not all the time. First of all, the boiled frog story is surely untrue, simply something made up for the purpose of illustrating a point. I have not done the experiment, but I am morally certain that the frog, any live frog, would jump out of the pot long before it boiled to death. So, another moral to this story is; "Don't assume frogs (or people) will necessarily either resist sudden large changes or accept continuing small ones. 

A similar point applies to the scorpion story. Even though scorpions (and people) have a set of inherent tendencies or routines that are easily triggered, that does not necessarily happen in every case. I am not an expert on scorpions, but I know without question that people can be encouraged and led to act against what appears to be their nature, or their inclination. The real danger is actually the assumption that their behavior is always predictable and unchangeable: "If I do this, they will certainly do that." 

The best way of getting people to accept change is not to try to fool them, or to make rigid assumptions about them, but to get their support, based on their own understanding and your willingness to work with them.

Never doubt that a small group ......

"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." 

That famous quote is attributed to Margaret Mead, a pioneering anthropologist and student of traditional societies. It is widely used to encourage those wishing to change the world, but because of their perceived powerlessness, doubting their ability to make a difference. I have two problems with this quote, one trivial and the other quite central.

The trivial one is this. I can find no record of the actual source of this "quote," either in the published works of Dr. Mead, or in the record of her speeches and remarks. Virtually every compendium of quotations contains this line, with little variation in its details, so it seems likely that these many references are based on a single earlier statement asserting her authorship, but every reference I have examined lacks a documented source. Of course, that is not proof of anything, and from her reputation and perspective (I actually met her many years ago.) her authorship is not implausible. 

The more important caveat is this. The second half of the assertion itself ("Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.") is patently false. First of all, most of the genuinely transformative events in this world have arisen fron non-human sources. That is not code for a literal belief in the bible, although many do believe its account of the world's early history. I am referring instead to the very clear record of changes due to powerful and unpredictable natural events far outside of human control or intervention; asteroids, floods, earthquakes, major storms etc, to say nothing of evolution as the ultimate driver of change. 

Even the main thought, that "a small group of ... citizens" can change the world, while true, avoids recognition that most human driven change is far less deliberate than that. Even when it appears to happen, itis almost always the case that circumstances were conducive or even sufficient by themselves to account for the ultimate change. We do like to take  credit for things that happened while we were on the bridge, or at least lurking in the vicinity, but both appropriate modesty and an accurate examination of the change and its history should make us doubt our effectiveness as its agents.

I do not suggest that we are powerless. But I do mean to argue that our abilities may rest more on being able to take advantage of trends already underway or to catalyze a move ready to take place, and less on serving as the "force majeure". Indeed, it is wise to help bring about the necessary conditions and to be ready to pull the plug at the appropriate moment. What is then the precise cause? And if we wish for that outcome, does that question really need to be answered?

"People Are Our Most Valuable Resource"

The title of this post -- "People Are Our Most Valuable Resource" -- is one common version of an almost universal belief, at least in connection with businesses or other purpose-driven organizations. This is particularly true in the US, which is perhaps the most individualistic society on the planet. In the US, it is assumed that the "secret" of organizational success is no secret at all: it is simply the quality of the people associated with the organization, a belief which leads directly to the current trend to hire "talent". Since talent, by definition, will be sought out and fought over, it becomes wise to search for undeveloped or latent talent, which can be developed by and for that wise organization. 

In this view, the organization is simply a container, into which (hopefully talented) people are poured ; the container in itself is not important. Thus, if a company does well, we can be confident that we have an adequate or better supply of talent. On the other hand, if things go ill, in whole or in part,  we must have a few bad apples in our barrel. It follows that we need to root out those untalented or inadequate people and either replace them (a draconian but powerful tactic) or develop them (an enlightened but uncertain tactic.) If this tactic doesn't seem to work, we must be doing it wrongly. In either case, the container has little to do with our effectiveness as an organization.

But Maybe Not. As it turns out, this is an astonishingly misleading and inaccurate assumption. Although it is certainly true that people differ greatly in their natural or distinctive strengths, these may have surprisingly little to do with the organization's ability to function effectively and smoothly. Both research and a little unblinded reflection shows that the container itself has a great and generally determinate effect on the organization's performance, success, competence and value. Think about it for a moment. Imagine what would happen when someone (anyone) is simply replaced, or gone in the morning, and her position filled with someone else that same afternoon. What is likely to happen next?

In a very short time, she will be doing almost exactly what her predecessor would have been doing, picking up on incomplete or continuing tasks almost seamlessly, and attacking problems in the in-box or the emails requiring attention. She will probably also have been given a copy of her job's description and heard a pep talk reminding her of the performance to be expected from her. (This is, in fact, a very common device used to evaluate or assess candidates for a position. It's called the in-box exercise and it confronts a new and uninformed notional new employee with the full in-box left behind by the desk's previous occupant.) 

Under these circumstances, whatever her background and potential, she will literally be forced to carry out the same tasks within the same constraints experienced by every previous sitter at that desk. Almost all the important actions will have already been either required or forbidden by command. The tasks to be done are specified, often in detail, the relationships with other people (in their organizational roles) are laid down, meetings will already be set up and scheduled, with the other members known and on board, reporting relationships and constaints are defined, their physical location is fixed, as before, and measures of performance will be clear. In short, the new person will have little flexibility, because the container itself has set the most important terms of the job.

The likelihood of producing genuinely superior results will accordingly be small. Worse yet, so are the opportunities for her to find and use innovative ways of contributing to the organization. 

Do We Need CEO's?

The uproar over "excessive" and "unearned" compensation packages for CEO's and other senior executives in AIG and other financial giants receiving federal bailout funds calls attention to the role and importance of CEO's. The underlying assumption is that a single all-powerful executive standing atop a pyramid of underlyings is an essential element in modern businesses. That being so, when there is a problem, the solution is clear; get rid of the old CEO and move in a new one. 

But Maybe Not! The main functional reason for such a CEO is that it simplifies and enables crisp decisions. But it makes no sense to expect the CEO, or any other single person, to figure out the alternatives and their implications, and also to pick the "best" one. A CEO is a tie-breaker, a discussion-shortener and a consistency-ensurer. She is a referee. Must she also have all the ideas; certainly not. Does she need to know everything that's going on in her company; in fact, can she? Of course not. Is she automatically the best judge of company direction? Not at all. 

How else can we run organizations? There are other alternatives. Many well-known and highly esteemed orchestras and ensembles have run successfully without a conductor. Corporations, after losing their CEO's, have often gone for long periods under a "caretaker" CEO, with no apparent damage. Moreover, if a famous CEO goes from great success at one company to failure at another, such as Bob Nardelli did in his transfer from GE to Home Depot, what are we to conclude? (Of course, once a CEO, always a CEO; Nardelli went on to take over Chrysler, whose epitaph is being written right now.)

There are also fairly large and very successful companies run with few executives at all. Semco, a rural Brazilian manufacturer of industrial components, has run with a nominal but almost completely inactive CEO, Ricardo Semler (who wrote about his company in "Maverick".) And Procter & Gamble has for decades run large and complex factories as stand-alone enterprises, sometimes without any identified managers at all. And, of course, the opposite is also true. Many old-fashioned CEO's have destroyed the companies they ran, and that includes not only the current financial firms, but many earlier ones. ("Chainsaw Al" Dunlap, for example, destroyed Scott Paper.) 

The bottom line is simple.  There are lots of ways to organize effectively. It may make sense to have a CEO, but her authority, her tenure, her background, her education and her age can all vary greatly. And her compensation should in those circumstances be equal to or only modestly above her usual peers. 

It's time to end the cult of the famous CEO.