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There are quotes from external sources offered as evidence, but they do not stand by themselves or help support the article other than reference an external sou

There are quotes from external sources offered as evidence, but they do not stand by themselves or help support the article other than reference an external source. They do not show that flat organization results in the bad outcomes they mention, only show it is possible and has happened, but that is also true for non flat organizations too. The external sources may stand well by themselves I can not tell from these quotes. > It quotes some professor who says it's related because “you’ve still got middle-aged, privileged white men making decisions at the top” due to a lack of safeguards. This does not seem to depend on whether or not you have a flat structure or not. The article also includes: > The companies may reflect the same biases as society, without safeguards to avoid them. which is as close to a justification as the article comes to, which does not seem to apply more to flat organizations than not. >> Then the article tries to apply guilt by association, by basically saying "Theranos was bad, so flat structures are bad". > It quotes another professor who says that the lack of structure is what allowed theranos to avoid having controls that would catch things. The quote from the article is: > “meant that these companies don’t have to do the difficult and tedious process of putting into place all the systems and controls you would normally find.” This is not particular to an organization being flat though. Flat does not me you do not have systems or and controls. If there is the a definition that makes it so I have not seen it used in the article or elsewhere. There are trade offs between flat and non flat organizations, but I would not recommend this article form someone looking to read up on the topic.

tbrownaw 3y ago
« The article also includes: > The companies may reflect the same biases as society, without safeguards to avoid them. which is as close to a justification as the article comes to, which does not seem to apply more to flat organizations than not. » There's been a fair bit of noise about needing HR departments in order to enforce safeguards (which depending on who you ask will look like standardized interview processes or quotas or whatever). That's hierarchy and structure. « Flat does not me you do not have systems or and controls. » Something that's nominally flat may not actually be flat in practice, yes. That's actually the main idea presented in "The Tyranny of Structurelessness".
- davorak 3y ago
  > There's been a fair bit of noise about needing HR departments in order to enforce safeguards (which depending on who you ask will look like standardized interview processes or quotas or whatever). That's hierarchy and structure. > « Flat does not me you do not have systems or and controls. » > Something that's nominally flat may not actually be flat in practice, yes. That's actually the main idea presented in "The Tyranny of Structurelessness". You seem to be assume that flat organizations have zero structure and hierarchies. I have never seen the term used that way. 'flat' as in in flat organization is a coined term/phrase as far as I know so 'flat' is not 100% literal. I have only see flat organization to mean less hierarchy relative to the standard. Often meaning there are fewer layers of managers between the ceo and the typical employee. I assume the term was coined to contrast the more pyramid like structure of managers that exist in some companies.

tbrownaw 3y ago

« The article also includes: > The companies may reflect the same biases as society, without safeguards to avoid them. which is as close to a justification as the article comes to, which does not seem to apply more to flat organizations than not. » There's been a fair bit of noise about needing HR departments in order to enforce safeguards (which depending on who you ask will look like standardized interview processes or quotas or whatever). That's hierarchy and structure. « Flat does not me you do not have systems or and controls. » Something that's nominally flat may not actually be flat in practice, yes. That's actually the main idea presented in "The Tyranny of Structurelessness".

davorak 3y ago
> There's been a fair bit of noise about needing HR departments in order to enforce safeguards (which depending on who you ask will look like standardized interview processes or quotas or whatever). That's hierarchy and structure. > « Flat does not me you do not have systems or and controls. » > Something that's nominally flat may not actually be flat in practice, yes. That's actually the main idea presented in "The Tyranny of Structurelessness". You seem to be assume that flat organizations have zero structure and hierarchies. I have never seen the term used that way. 'flat' as in in flat organization is a coined term/phrase as far as I know so 'flat' is not 100% literal. I have only see flat organization to mean less hierarchy relative to the standard. Often meaning there are fewer layers of managers between the ceo and the typical employee. I assume the term was coined to contrast the more pyramid like structure of managers that exist in some companies.