“The beginning of freedom is the realisation that you are not “the thinker.” The moment you start watching the thinker, a higher level of consciousness becomes activated. You then begin to realise that there is a vast realm of intelligence beyond thought, that thought is only a tiny aspect of that intelligence. You also realise that all the things that truly matter – beauty, love, creativity, joy, inner peace – arise from the beyond the mind. You being to awaken”
I’ll say something about what I observe about business.
People starting out for the first time with little business history of their own or in their family believe they have to do it themselves. That they can’t trust anyone. And they are frequently trying to prove something to an often dead father, or other close relative.
Successful business – you define your own measures of success – is not like this. It’s about the exact opposite.
It’s About Freedom
Successful business builds a quality team as thoroughly and deeply as possible. Trust is given first, allowing the mistrustful go elsewhere. And they appreciate and recognize their family’s contribution to their lives and go about to lead their own. It’s a heck of a lot more fun that way too!
I came across an interesting article in my email the other morning about how higher energy taxes threaten US shale boom, and I was intrigued not really by the message, but by how the message was being delivered. Being close to the oil sector myself I know that it’s a high-profile industry and so it attracts many bright minds.
What Nathan Randazzo did with the article was sensationalize it, and he used a great deal of statistics. It is clearly, and unfortunately, a sponsored point of view. Bright minds are attracted to statistics, and can be distracted by articles like this one.
The key point he pivoted his article upon was the need to keep low-cost (i.e. subsidised energy production going because of the “rapidly expanding population in the U.S.” But this is not quite correct: slowest growth predicted in U.S. over the next 10 years since the 1930’s Great Depression. Only 7.3% growth predicted over this decade we are in now. It was only 7.25% between 1930 and 1940. In addition to this the USA has the lowest vehicle fuel efficiency profile of any country in the world (courtesy of studies produced by the Rocky Mountain Institute of Snowmass, Colorado). Hence there is scope to reduce oil demand in the USA by making vehicles more fuel efficient. Thus the price will come down. Even less need for subsidies. Also the USA is the second largest producer of global greenhouse gases, whilst having only 4% of the world’s population, hence placing great emphasis on “green” energy production methods.
These are “high tech” industries, driving entrepreneurship, smart thinking and advanced technologies. That can only be a good thing for people. My point is there is ample scope for redirecting skills, talent and resources towards better ways of producing energy without employee funded tax reductions and subsidies.
Said in June 2000, by Sheikh Zaki Yamani, former Oil Minister of Saudi Arabia (1962–86), “Thirty years from now there will be a huge amount of oil—and no buyers. Oil will be left in the ground. The Stone Age came to an end, not because we had a lack of stones, and the Oil Age will come to an end not because we have a lack of oil.” The present Saudi Oil Minister Sheikh Ali Al-Naimi recently said “We know that pumping oil out of the ground does not create many jobs. It does not foster an entrepreneurial spirit, nor does it sharpen critical faculties.” Jeremiah Josey
Ever wonder about the psychology of the Russian people?
Let’s look at where they come from.
What are some headlines about Russia as a country? (Just a few, because there are many):
Russia
Largest landmass on earth, and by population density, one of the least populated – only 8 people per square kilometer. Singapore has over 7,500 people per square kilometer.
With these large unpopulated spaces very generous reserves of gold, oil, coal, gas, iron, nickel, tungsten and so on, where most other countries have piles of dirt.
A great agricultural base – both in land and farming techniques – for production of organic food 😀
So lots of space for people, lots of space for food for the people and lots of resources for the people to work with.
And what about the people? (Also just a few points, because there are many):
Never conquered in over 1,000 years, with a contiguous culture throughout that time, layered with incredible fortitude built from a primarily serfdom society.
A recent memory war that took away 26,500,000 people concurrent with an equally recent memory regime that removed another 20,000,000 souls from the earth. Remember that present day Russian population is only 143,000,000.
Within the most recent generation an entire society literally thrown onto the street as they moved from one economic system and were thrust into another.
And what is the net result. In one word: Survivors – practical, pragmatic survivors. With a whole lot of resources to apply themselves to.
One can see this in this Inglehart Value Map below. There’s Russia: high on the upper left: High Survival values and high in Secular-Rational values: “what will it/you/they do for me now, today, not tomorrow or after?”
Inglehart Values Map
Having a very high “Secular-Rational Value” means the people are very practical, very pragmatic. They are not prone to superstition (or faith without action), though many have deep devout faiths. Compare this to the USA, where a call to align with “traditional values” by any politician, Republican or Democratic – calling for God, or labour or liberalist idealism – will be swept into power with a rambunctious swearing of allegiances and oaths to serve – and die for no reason in strange far off lands – for God and country. In Russia it’s simple: “show me”.
Considering the history of the Russian people, on Survival Values they rank very high also. This makes for tenacity, perseverance, industriousness. No room for BS please.
Lots of good potential in this combination. Driven, dedicated, results focused. A little bit of entrepreneurial training and away they will go.
Have you ever heard of Maslow and the “Hierarchy of Needs”. That helps explain what is behind the Values Map. The idea is as you sort out your base, you can rise up the pyramid to, eventually, self actualisation.
A few nights ago I met up with recently elected member of Kuwait parliament the Right Honourable Nawaf Al Fuzaia. We discussed many things, one of which was about the prospect of doubling of the budget for the Government of Kuwait over the next 10 years.
That reminded me about C. Northcote Parkinson and his famous discussions around the same topic from the 1960’s – about what is now known as Parkinson’s Law.
To understand why Kuwait’s government budget will roughly double in the next 10 years, in summary, is because:
People, events, work, plants even, will expand to fill the space allocated to them. If there is no restraints on growth, then they will simply grow, and grow and grow.
Put more simply, Parkinson explains succinctly that in a world free of restraints, in government:
1. An official wants to multiply subordinates, not rivals,
2. Officials make work for each other.
To counter this one must place restraints. Free Market economics works very well because businesses are profit based, so there is a natural restraint upon spending, on expenses. Therefore a business will only grow if it is needed, if it is good. This is a vital restraint that is missing in most governments of the world: therefore a government will grow whether that growth is needed or not.
Restraints on budget (as for example, as a percentage of GDP), the number of people, limiting the value of government managed assets: these are ideas for restraints for government. The State can still own assets, however they are privately managed and therefore profit based – this is a PPP – Public Private Partnership: a concept gaining popularity in many parts of the world.
I call it the humanising style of management that I advocate and endorse. Most of my articles describe different aspects of it. The ultimate result is that we treat each other as adults, with sincerity, focus and honesty.
It is also a style of management that works.
It’s an open form of management where employees have strong decision-making roles. Participative management can be developed by owners, CEOs and management teams who strive to actively seek a strong cooperative relationship with their employees: their “co-workers” or “associates”. The advantages of participative management include increased productivity, improved quality, and reduced costs. Expansion of the groups activities and their successes is only limited by their imagination.
Beware however, as it is also a buzz word given lip service by companies appear egalitarian to their stakeholders. So if you have great work environment, and you want to shout out about it, have a third party such as WorldBlu endorse it.
Traci Fenton at WorldBlu lists the criteria in a very concise way, so I suggest heading on over to her site and checking it out. If your company is like this, then be listed by WorldBlu. Your employees will love the recognition and it will help your business in all the areas I discuss here.
Here are some companies very well engaged with participative management:
Joan Lancourt and Charles Savage studied these eight companies and their work makes for interesting reading.
There are eight core principles that two of the companies, W.L. Gore and Oticon developed, however they are in use by all companies that engage in participatory management to varying degrees.
1. The Freedom Principle encourages associates to grow in knowledge, skill, and scope of responsibility.
2. The Waterline Principle states that mistakes, which are inevitable in any dynamic organization, “above the waterline” are not a serious offence. However, mistakes “below the water line” can sink the ship. Therefore, before taking a serious risk, associates need to check with other key people.
3. The Commitment Principle indicates that associates are expected to keep any commitments they make.
4. The Fairness Principle mandates that associates be fair to everyone else, including suppliers and customers.
Leadership at Gore is not positional; it is expected of everyone, and a natural leader is defined by his or her followers.
Malcolm Gladwell says this in his piece The Tipping Point says this: Small group peer pressure is much more powerful than the concept of a boss (page 186).
That is why this works. We love to belong to a successful group and our peers are quite to point out when we are not pulling our weight.
(By the way, Malcolm also covers these points which further describe why participatory management can be so successful: Law of the Few, the Stickiness Factor, and the Power of Context. I won’t cover them here, suffice to say organisations that apply them do exceptionally well).
The next four principles come from Oticon, where their set of core values to guide the work of the company emerged after hundreds of hours of discussion. These values supplanted the previous formal structures and formed the framework for the four operating principles which guide the transformed organization:
5. The Choice Principle states that employees may choose their projects and are also free to determine what training they need, their vacation schedules, and their working hours.
6. The Multijob Principle requires everyone to work on a project outside his or her area of prime competence. This is based on the assumption that “a top chip designer who performs a marketing function in one project becomes a much better chip designer. . . . because he sees the world stereophonically.”
7. The Transparency Principle promises that with almost no exceptions, every piece of information is available to everyone. The agility, integration, and alignment that result from this policy far outweigh any risk associated with openness.
8. The No Controls Principle means that projects emerge based on opportunity, need, and interest. Skunk works are common and, although there is a strategic plan, it is not interpreted rigidly.
Here are some other points raised by Lancourt and Savage with their work:
In considering how to make the company a national player, Ralph Stayer of Johnsonville Foods came to realize that by keeping people dependent on him for leadership and decisions, he, not the employees, was the source of the problem. He likened the situation to that of a buffalo herd in which the herd simply follows the lead buffalo anywhere – even over a cliff. In contrast to the buffalo, in a flock of geese, each goose is responsible for getting itself to the flock’s destination. When the lead goose gets tired, another goose moves forward to take its place, assuring a fast and steady pace. To help Johnsonville Foods transform itself from a herd of unquestioning followers to a more empowered community, Stayer stopped merely delegating work and instead transferred ownership of the customer relationships to the organizational members.
At Semco, the leadership baton rotates every six months among the six “counselors” in an effort to void what other companies get stuck with -responsibility nailed down to a single man or woman. At Semco there’s no one to blame if the company goes down the drain. When financial performance is one person’s problem, then everyone else can relax. You get to pass on the baton, but it comes back again two-and-a-half years later.
Oticon and Semco have found that by openly sharing all information, including financial and salary information, with everyone, the company creates the alignment necessary to maintain order without having to impose controls from the top. This emphasis on shared values and widely available information brings us to a fourth theme: the way in which organizations have altered the language they use.
At Johnsonville Foods, the role of supervisor has been defined as that of “coordinator,” and the role of manager has become that of “coach.” At Oticon, managers are now “leaders” and “sponsors,” and “sponsorship” at W.L. Gore is also an important role. At Semco, the six senior executives have become “counselors,” and department heads are “partners.”
There you have it. A start at least anyway. Put it into practice and let your own groups’ style and community standards influence the result.
Bathing daily, eating daily, sleeping daily. Daily is the greatest gift we have to change our lives. Just by changing what we do a little each day means we can change the course of our lives over a life time. Yoga daily, meditation daily, fresh healthy foods daily, positive uplifting people, conversations, events, circumstances, daily. These steer the way to what ever life you want. Do it today.
We drive ourselves crazy when we try to comprehend things beyond our comprehension, trying to make them fit into our own existing paradigm. That’s being rigid. Avoid this crazy. Stretch your own paradigm until it breaks, then you can grab a new one. Then crazy is what you may appear to be, yet you know you are not ;o)
You won’t come across many people who have never had a boss. The thought of not having someone to answer to at work is a peculiar one for most people, however for Richard Branson it’s a natural state of affairs.”Having always worked for myself, I’ve never had to play by anyone else’s rules, and I wouldn’t want to. This attitude has shaped my approach to management since Virgin’s early days, when I decided to grant our employees many of the same freedoms that I enjoy,” wrote the Virgin Group Founder in a recent entrepreneur.com blog.
Without a rule book to adhere to or a rigid company policy to bear in mind, Branson and his Virgin staff have managed to shake up countless industries over the years. A company defined by a ‘Screw it, let’s do it’ attitude towards tough decisions, Virgin has seen its refreshing outlook pay dividends and win the faith of consumers.
“Today the Virgin Group is made up of dozens of companies headed by CEOs and managers who have the freedom to run their businesses as they see fit. This philosophy goes against the usual rules of business and may seem unmanageable, but it has turned out to be one of the keys to our success,” explained Branson. Who went on to highlight how this played out for one of the Virgin Group’s newest companies in 2012.
“Our newest business, the global touring company Virgin Live, had a great launch for this reason. Although the Virgin brand is well respected within the music industry given our roots we had no history of promoting global tours. However, our small, enthusiastic team at Virgin Live beat competition from giants within the industry and won the right to promote The Rolling Stones’ 50 & Counting series of shows. This was a very proud moment for us: If you are going to enter this business, there really isn’t a bigger or better way to show your intentions.
“Before their show at London’s O2 Arena, I caught up with Mick Jagger to have a word and take a few photos with him and my family. After we were chatting he jokingly asked me if I was going to disappear, because ‘That’s what all the other promoters do.’ I had no intention of doing so. ‘I’ll be seeing you down the front,’ I told him.
“My family and I watched the show standing in front of our seats near the stage. It was a fantastic night – they put on a marvelous show. Why anyone would have passed up the opportunity to see it is beyond me. I thought later that Mick’s question showed why we had won the contract: Our employees love what they do and throw themselves into the work, so they achieve much more than anyone would expect.”
Men want freedom, women want security. Give it to them, and life is easy.
Focus, concentration, endeavour, planning. All of these things are needed to reach any height, obtain any position different to where you are currently.
Realize that anyone who has anything in this life has obtained it through some effort of some kind. Even in supreme creation, what I call creating from a purely meditative state, takes training, discipline and attention to obtain the necessary state of mind.
Everyone has put in some form of effort somewhere, and where they are is defined by the effort they contributed. This is a good reminder.
This is the famous 12 sided stone in Hatum Rumiyoc Street, Cusco, Peru. It is 1,000’s of years old, carved with a technology long forgotten by man, and is in fact lost to modern science. We do not know how it was done, and we do not know who did it. It wasn’t the Incas. There is simply nothing in their technology capable of achieving it.
The stone is carved from diorite which is a very hard, very rare, igneous rock. These days we cut it with diamond.
Why are there 12 sides? It’s elementary my dear Watson: the most efficient and most conservative means to cut a stone is to remove as little material as possible, just make some flat surfaces so you can get a good seal with other rocks (there is not filler or mortar used in this wall). This is only possible if the means by which you cut the rock is so easy, is so simple, that you do not mind putting in 1, 2, 3, 12 sides to get fit you want. Cutting rock almost as hard as diamond like a hot knife cuts butter – what reality is needed to achieve that?
That is another discussion, and includes the Pyramids, and Florida’s Coral Castle – a very, very recent application of a similar and related technology.
For the human population to remain steady, each woman needs to have at least two children – one to replace herself and one to replace her mate. The actual number works out to be about 2.1 – to allow for accidents and the like.
In this very good presentation by Hans Rosling, he very clearly demonstrates how much of the western world is way below 2 births per woman, in fact many countries hover around 1, and he shows how as countries “modernize” their birth rates drop rapidly.
That means the end of the human race!
With a little bit more thinking (see here), we’re talking about the year 2300 for the population to be less than 1 billion people. And then afterwards where does it end??!!!
Because of how reality works, and because of how our mind works with reality – a synthesizer of reality, of matter – what you put your attention on, what you thoughts comprise of, really, really matters. It really does.
Remember it’s like this: thoughts first, matter second: thoughts matter.
People see only that which they desire and they project their desire ~ OSHO
Everything arrives when you are ready for it. You will feel it arrive because you are aligned to it’s arrival, and to its having by you. That means too, that you also can feel when you are not ready for something to arrive. You just feel it. This is a knowing you have.
I remember a few years ago some very resonating training I received from Steve Covey (via a book, CD, DVD or something like that).
It’s all about prioritising your work and revolves around two key concepts: Urgency and Importance.
Importance means alignment to your strategy, your goals, your purpose. “If I do this, good things will come to me”. These are good things to get done.
Urgency means it is time critical. If it is not done quickly, something happens or does not happen, usually not something you want. Not the ideal to have, but for some reason they exist in our lives and must be delt with somehow, and quickly!
By using 4 combinations of these two concepts (with their negatives) you can categorise any task/project/activity you are working on at any point in any moment in your life. It’s pretty cool how it is so. Once you are clear with why you are here and what you are doing, then EVERYTHING can go into one of the 4 boxes.
Covey used a large square (a box) and drew up each combination into the quadrants of the large box. I think you’ll get the idea if I just type them:
The four boxes:
1. Important and NOT Urgent
2. Important and Urgent
3. Not Important and Urgent
4. Not Important and Not Urgent
Make sense?
Points on each one:
1. Do these at a nice and steady pace and life feels good. You’re on track, whatever that means for you. You achieve your goals, what ever they may be. There’s a fun light feeling to everything.
2. OK, must be done so do it, but WHY has it become urgent. What happened to make this urgent. (“Poor planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part”). Obviously these must be done, and then work out how to stop them from happening again. They cause stress and are not conducive to having fun. They interrupt healthy living. Delegate, change the rules, change the strategy, simply say NO! Do what ever you can to stop these landing in this box.
3. OK, what happened here. Can you delegate this non important task and get rid of it? Can you not do it and nothing will happen? Try to avoid doing these as much as you can and study a little how they come into your life and take steps to avoid them.
4. Why am I looking at this? This box is really a bin. Bin it. And get good at binning stuff. Most of the fluff that approaches us in life goes here.
Make more sense?
And if it gets confusing about what goes into what box, meditate on it. The answer will come from inside you, very clearly.
How do you improve human group dynamics, and allow people be more productive, business to be more profitable, groups to be more self reliant, whilst at the same time have it be more satisfying, more rewarding and straight out more enjoyable for the individuals involved?
The solution: Develop a self organising, collaborative workplace (also known as “Sociocracy“).
Many big companies have worked out how to do it: parts of GE, most of BMW, all of Semco (a Brazilian manufacturing company). Many more practicing it can be found here at Worldblu. While Worldblu calls it “democratic workplace”, it’s really more likely to be collaborative one, since when you have a flexible organisation, it is more likely that 100% consent is necessary to achieve anything, and not merely majority rules – what a democracy is. The key word here is consent.
How to achieve great success, with great results, rewards and satisfaction in a manner which is harmonious to the group, to other participants, and to the world in general? It is not through competition. It is through collaboration.
Much of the presently accepted models in many organisations are competition based, and competition is a poor use of human potential. Autocratic leadership methods necessary lead to almost total staff disconnection. Poor performance, and whip-like management mentality becomes the norm. Such a culture is easy to start, and success may be evident and easy to measure, but it soon grows into a dismal forgotten failure as any long term success measures are applied – staff turnover rates soar, production efficiency, product quality, and eventual profits plummet. It’s simply a dismal failure at humanity, at being human even. Even for those directly measured to have “succeeded” they experience high stress, poor health and eventual a short, and ultimately an unsatisfying life.
One of the most successful examples of collaboration has been documented by Ricardo Semler with his company Semco. His two books “Maverick” and “7 Day Weekend” explain everything in succinct terms. How a small family run company grew to an international corporation with its principal, Ricardo ceasing his involvement a long time ago.
“Semco has no official structure. It has no organizational chart. There’s no business plan or company strategy, no two-year or five-year plan, no goal or mission statement, no long-term budget. The company often does not have a fixed CEO. There are no vice presidents or chief officers for information technology or operations. There are no standards or practices. There’s no human resources department. There are no career plans, no job descriptions or employee contracts. No one approves reports or expense accounts. Supervision or monitoring of workers is rare indeed… Most important, success is not measured only in profit and growth.” – Ricardo Semler
Personally I have applied Semler’s processes (actually they evolved naturally from Semco employees) to great success in my own endeavors. For example I’ve taken totally disconnected and non-performing employees, and turned them into stars, “fought” over within the office for new assignments. One of the very useful Semler tools I used was upward feedback.
However amongst all of this, I’ve been searching for a methodical system to describe Semlers approach, and for a long time I called it “democratic” as he and many others have done. But I’ve never liked that, that word “democracy”. It is essentially a competitive system. Here’s why:
Demo-ns!
Dubbed “the worst form of government” by Winston Churchill, democratic environments automatically and immediately lead to the oppression of the minority. And oppression of any kind is never a good thing.
“Many forms of Government have been tried, and will be tried in this world of sin and woe. No one pretends that democracy is perfect or all-wise. Indeed, it has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time.” Sir Winston Churchill, Hansard, November 11, 1947
Democracy, by it’s very design, is an oppression regime: the oppression of a few by the many. “This is fair. It’s only natural”, I hear you say, but do you really think so? Is any oppression fair? Of anyone? It is quite plain to see that any minority oppression in a social group no matter how large or small, has an ultimately negative consequence. Suppressed negative thoughts, feelings, and emotions harboured by the minority can only grow and manifest in other forms. The costs – both social and financial, short term and long term – to control, pacify, down-right-openly-oppress increases for the majority. Then something curious happens: the majority find themselves the minority, the minority becomes the majority and the cycle is repeated. Back and forth, back and forth. Those once-were-majority of course hang onto their once-granted-power with great enthusiasm and vigor, as long as they are able. The majority learnt what to do while in power. They learnt the rules of the game. The still-ongoing Occupy Wall Street or “99% protests” (yes, still ongoing since 17 September 2011) are a good example of a majority now being controlled by a minority that has a much better understanding of the rules. Still resilience and perseverance can be a good thing.
“Consent” a better thing.
An another example is a recent US election with Obama and McCain running against each other: it was 53%/46%. Is that a “democracy” when almost half of the people have to yield their desires for the other half? This is more like a society close to reorganisation as the majority may soon become the minority. Such a shifting of power will occur either violently (like has been seen in many Arabic countries recently) or passively, as with not-even-newsworthy Iceland recently. In Iceland the people rejected the debt burden of the banks their brethren in government attempted to impose upon them. They arrested a number of bankers and changed their laws so it cannot happen again!
So, what is it? What is the magic that means a group of people will be inspired to performance, all by themselves, with little external influence, other than maybe “Go!”
This video clearly shows it is not the money. In fact the study shows that for complex, creative projects, monetary incentives actually STOPS performance! It’s not carrot and stick that works best where creative thinking is required.
Much has been done on the subject and reading Semler’s “Maverick” and “7 Day Weekend” you’ll understand that it is an evolutionary process, and it occurs by consent of the individuals of the group.
This is the important word: consent.
Work that recent came to me by the Dutch thinker Gerard Endenburg offers very substantial physical elements to this evolutionary process. A good short summary of this thinking is in “Sociocracy: The Creative Forces of Self-Organization”, by Gerard Endenburg and John A Buck. You can find this on the web in pdf.
These two resources: Semler’s dual mini-tomes and Edenburg’s principles combined results in a very harmonious outcome: the flexibility of the benefits, and the basic parameters on how to get there.
Endenburg defines four basic concepts for a self-organising group:
Four Principles of Sociocracy
1. Consent: The principle of consent governs decision-making. Consent means no argued and paramount objection. In other words, a policy decision can only be made if nobody has a reasoned and paramount objection to it. Day-to-day decisions don’t require consent, but there must be consent about the use of other forms of decision-making, for example, for day-to-day operations.
2. Election of Persons: Election of persons for functions and/or tasks takes place in accordance with the principle of consent and after open argumentation.
3. Circle: The organisation maintains a structure for decision making, consisting of semi-autonomous circles (i.e. groups of individuals). Each circle has it’s own aim and organises the three functions of leading, doing, and measuring/feedback. A circle makes its own policy decisions by consent, maintains it’s own memory system, and develops itself through integral research, teaching and learning. A circle makes consent decisions only in special circle meetings (also called round table meetings).
4. Double-linking: A circle is connection to the next higher circle in the organisation with a double link. This means that at least two persons, one being the functional leader of the circle and at least one delegate from the circle, are full members of the next higher circle.
With these four principles in place, more specific actions can occur. Here’s an example of a Sociocratic Circle Meeting:
Sociocratic Circle Meeting
1. Opening round: a time to tune into the members. Like an orchestra just before a concert. 2. Administrative concerns: such as announcements, time available for the meeting, consent to minutes of last meeting, date of next meeting, acceptance of the agenda. 3. Content: Agenda item, second agenda item, etc 4. Closing Round: a time to measure the meeting process. E.g. use of time, did the facilitator maintain equivalence, how could the decision-making have been more efficient, did everyone arrive prepared. Also this is a time to mention agenda items that should be on the agenda for the next meeting.
During the Circle Meeting there will be times to appoint a leader or a task or role or job to an individual. Here’s how it’s done:
Template for Sociocratic Elections
1. Task: establish the job description and the period of time the person will perform the job. 2. Ballots: Fill our ballots and hand to the election leader 3. “Public Gossip”: each person says why they made their nomination 4. Changes: Election leader asks each person if they want to change their votes based on the arguments they heard. 5. Discussion: Election leader usually proposes a name after step 4. However they may ask for discussion if the arguments are very unclear – i.e. informal consent has not been reached. 6. Consent round: Election leader asks each person if he of she consents to the proposed person, asking the person proposed last. If there is an objection, the election leader takes everyone back to step five before trying another consent round.
For making decisions by consent, a sociocratic organisation will operate in the following manner:
Template for making policy decisions by consent
1. Consent to the issue(s) to be decided. “What’s the concern, problem or challenge?”
2. Generate a proposal. “What’s our opinion?” Often a person or persons may be asked to prepare a proposal and bring it to the next meeting.
3. Consent to the proposal. “What is our decision?”
a. Present proposal – questions and discussion is for clarification only
b. Quick reactions round – quick feedback about the proposal (intended to illicit the “feeling response”, and not the “thinking response”)
c. Amendments – proposer amends proposal, if needed, based on the questions, discussions and quick reactions
d. Consent round – collect and record any objections on a flip chart. No discussion at this time
e. Discussion – improve proposal to deal with the objections if any
f. Consent round – Each person indicates their consent to the proposal, with the proposer speaking last. If there are remaining objections, they are recorded (no discussion), everyone goes back to e. Discussion, before trying another consent round.
Implementing a self-organising group requires consent from the people who exert power over the group. Simply stated this means that senior management and/or organisation owners must support Sociocracy. Full stop. No “ifs” or “buts” or even “veto rights”. Otherwise internal fractures will be created when the a circle’s “assumed power” confronts the more senior “declared power”. If that happens, growth is stymied and a slide back to pseudo-autocratic or totalitarianism will follow.
The great thing about this Sociocratic process as described by Endenburg, is that it’s an excellent way to get self-organisation into an existing organisation without changing or upsetting the existing power structure. The magic then begins to happen and once the system is running well, initiatives and improvements emerge organically and naturally. There is no revolution, only evolution.
All companies and groups that utilise such or similar systems experience better performance, better products, innovation, higher moral, lower turnover, lower loss, lower costs.
Semler advocates this because, after all, he invented the 7 day weekend!
Recent studies into the prehistoric structures in Egypt and Central and Southern Americas reveal vast spread of knowledge far beyond our own: ancient power stations and wireless power. Tesla in the 1890’s may have rediscovered what was known – and in common use – more than 12,000 years ago.
