Just to let y’all know: the GO Society has finally put up the books by Wilfred Lord Brown, Minister of Health and CEO of Glacier Metals. Lord Brown had a different take on the work that Jaques did for him, and it’s interesting to read an owner’s accounts of how to run a business. The books now online include some …
Vanderburg on Galbraith on Technostructure
Some notes from Living In The Labyrinth of Technology by Willem H. Vanderburg. (University of Toronto Press, 2005). Citing Galbraith’s earlier work, to argue for Ellul’s rise of technique. The argument is that the corporation has to create a technostructure, a group of committees of technical expertise, because the endeavour is so complex that no one person understands it. The …
What Were the Americas Really Like Before Columbus?
What were the Americas really like before Columbus, prior to the European exploration and invasion? Charles C. Mann’s very readable 1491 (Second Edition): New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus describes some current research and controversies, uncovering some surprising ground. (Mann wrote a very interesting article for The Atlantic in 2002 based on the book. The article, also entitled “1491“, …
John C. Maxwell on Requisite Leadership (Requisite Organization)
John C. Maxwell provides a great explanation, albeit unknowingly, of what we call “The Theory of Real Boss” in “The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership”.
War and Peace and Organizations
It’s interesting to read Tolstoy on organizations. I’ve not gotten this far in War and Peace yet but I saw this mentioned in Senge’s The Fifth Discipline. Tolstoy has a amazing insight into things: you have to regret the loss of him leaving his art later in life.
Emotions as the Foundation of Intellect
‘…a baby first learns “causality” … through the exchange of emotional signals (I smile and you smile back).’ [pp. 51]
The Rise and Fall of Strategic Planning… and project planning, too
Mintzberg makes some scathing remarks about the Strategic Planning industry. A lot of it seems to come down that the planners are (A) taking the power away from managers and (B) it doesn’t work in practice. I’m wondering if a similar argument can’t be made about software project management.
Ulysses S. Grant and the Pettiness of Small Bosses
Military organizational experts point out that the war-fighting armies are almost always organized “requisitely” — that is, according to a natural order of hierarchical needs. But it often takes armies that aren’t continually at war to get to that state. An interesting case is that of Ulysses S. Grant. From Ulysses S. Grant:: Soldier & President, in regards to Grant’s …
The South’s Insular Death Wish
From Ulysses S. Grant: Soldier & President, an interestingly balanced if slightly dull biography of the General who became President of the American States. The unthinkable had become thinkable. The South, unable to manage either transition to a postslavery economy or irrevocable economic decline, was now talking only to itself as it sought to defend the indefensible, slavery, and deny …
Bought Jaques’s A GENERAL THEORY OF BUREAUCRACY
I got the Red Cover edition of Elliott Jaques’s book today. I could have saved some cash and ordered it from Australia, but I figured that the Friends To The North would ship more quickly. And they did: it arrive a week and a half after my ABEBooks order. I have no idea what the Red Cover edition comes from. …