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I suspect it may even be the opposite. When offices rely primarily on social networks as their source of creativity, it means that you've got to be well-integra

I suspect it may even be the opposite. When offices rely primarily on social networks as their source of creativity, it means that you've got to be well-integrated into the social network in order to successfully promote your ideas. This creates a major risk of curtailing contributions from anybody that isn't buddy-buddy with folks on the hierarchy. If, as is the case at most places I've worked, this hierarchy is dominated by upper middle class white men, this may have the effect of severely limiting the company's ability to make good use of the creativity of a large portion of its staff. I haven't worked anywhere that does this, but I strongly suspect that a company with a more organized approach to incubating ideas would be able to do so more successfully. It would put the company in a better position to mitigate this and many other ways that good ideas slip through the cracks.

visarga 5y ago
Your ideas could have stood up on their own without the jab at "upper middle class white men". When you judge groups like that, you put too much diversity into a little box guaranteeing bad conclusions.
- mumblemumble 5y ago
  It's not a jab; it's a simple statement of fact. That's what I've seen in my (entirely US-based) career so far. And I'm not personally the kind of person who's interested in euphemism and beating around the bush purely for the sake of euphemism and beating around the bush. Note that what I was suggesting was not anything like, "Ignore white dudes and only talk to everyone else." I was saying, "A less informal system may be less impenetrable to people from other social backgrounds." Presumably, in such a situation, white men would still tend to be a plurality of voices, because that's just how the workforce demographics work out in the US. But, even given that, why wouldn't you want to make sure you're also doing a good job of giving full voice to folks who come from the other 2/3 of the population? Even if we frame it in purely mercenary terms, wantonly underutilizing employees' talents is probably bad for business. And relying on invisible, socialization-based mechanisms tends to have a poor track record in that department.

visarga 5y ago

Your ideas could have stood up on their own without the jab at "upper middle class white men". When you judge groups like that, you put too much diversity into a little box guaranteeing bad conclusions.

mumblemumble 5y ago
It's not a jab; it's a simple statement of fact. That's what I've seen in my (entirely US-based) career so far. And I'm not personally the kind of person who's interested in euphemism and beating around the bush purely for the sake of euphemism and beating around the bush. Note that what I was suggesting was not anything like, "Ignore white dudes and only talk to everyone else." I was saying, "A less informal system may be less impenetrable to people from other social backgrounds." Presumably, in such a situation, white men would still tend to be a plurality of voices, because that's just how the workforce demographics work out in the US. But, even given that, why wouldn't you want to make sure you're also doing a good job of giving full voice to folks who come from the other 2/3 of the population? Even if we frame it in purely mercenary terms, wantonly underutilizing employees' talents is probably bad for business. And relying on invisible, socialization-based mechanisms tends to have a poor track record in that department.