3 ms·

All big companies I worked at so far suppress internal dissent. It's just the nature of the beast. Your boss doesn't want her boss look bad, and she also doesn'

by m0zg 8y ago

All big companies I worked at so far suppress internal dissent. It's just the nature of the beast. Your boss doesn't want her boss look bad, and she also doesn't want to look bad herself come review/promo time. Hundreds of thousands of dollars are at stake. So all communication upward gets massaged with that in mind. By the time it gets through 5,6,7 layers of management "shit's bad" becomes "everything is awesome" even if the initial message gets out at all.

smacktoward 8y ago
The classic (and hilarious) book The Systems Bible (https://www.amazon.com/Systems-Bible-Beginners-Guide-Large/dp/0961825170 https://www.amazon.com/Systems-Bible-Beginners-Guide-Large/d...) has some deliciously tart words on this subject: We present the Fundamental Law of Administrative Workings (F.L.A.W.): THINGS ARE WHAT THEY ARE REPORTED TO BE... The net effect of this Law is to ensure that people in Systems are never dealing with the real world that the rest of us have to live in, but instead with a filtered, distorted, and censored version which is all that can get past the sensory organisms of the System itself... This effect has been studied in detail by a small group of dedicated General Systemanticists. In an effort to introduce quantitative methodology into this important area of research they have paid particular attention to the amount of information that reaches, or fails to reach, the attention of the relevant administrative officer or corresponding Control Unit. The crucial variable, they have found, is the fraction Ro/Rs, where Ro represents the amount of Reality which fails to reach the Control Unit, and Rs equals the total amount of Reality presented to the System. The fraction Ro/Rs varies from zero (full awareness of outside reality) to unity (no reality getting through). It is known, naturally enough, as the COEFFICIENT OF FICTION.

by m0zg 8y ago

smacktoward 8y ago

The classic (and hilarious) book The Systems Bible (https://www.amazon.com/Systems-Bible-Beginners-Guide-Large/dp/0961825170 https://www.amazon.com/Systems-Bible-Beginners-Guide-Large/d...) has some deliciously tart words on this subject: We present the Fundamental Law of Administrative Workings (F.L.A.W.): THINGS ARE WHAT THEY ARE REPORTED TO BE... The net effect of this Law is to ensure that people in Systems are never dealing with the real world that the rest of us have to live in, but instead with a filtered, distorted, and censored version which is all that can get past the sensory organisms of the System itself... This effect has been studied in detail by a small group of dedicated General Systemanticists. In an effort to introduce quantitative methodology into this important area of research they have paid particular attention to the amount of information that reaches, or fails to reach, the attention of the relevant administrative officer or corresponding Control Unit. The crucial variable, they have found, is the fraction Ro/Rs, where Ro represents the amount of Reality which fails to reach the Control Unit, and Rs equals the total amount of Reality presented to the System. The fraction Ro/Rs varies from zero (full awareness of outside reality) to unity (no reality getting through). It is known, naturally enough, as the COEFFICIENT OF FICTION.