5 ms·

I agree. Is there any way to "inoculate" organisation to prevent this failure mode?

by Gare 3y ago

0xDEAFBEAD 3y ago
How about having a leader willing to make big bold bets? Whatever you may think about Zuck renaming Facebook to Meta, it certainly seems to demonstrate that his company hasn't fallen prey to stasis.
jltsiren 3y ago
Probably not for existing organizations. Possibly for newly formed organizations, but it's unlikely to scale. I've seen volunteer organizations founded on mild anarchistic principles thrive for a few decades while occasionally reinventing themselves. The key is a culture focusing on people working together for a common purpose. Keeping in mind that the purpose of the organization is more important than the organization itself. There may be formal stakeholders and formal power hierarchies, but their role is kept to a minimum. Some people need to be in charge for legal and practical reasons, but leadership positions are not associated with high status. Ideally, the leaders are selected through a deliberative process, and they voluntarily step down after a while. Some people inevitably acquire high status within the community, but they are expected to recognize it and avoid being too vocal.
jareklupinski 3y ago
check and balances actively encouraging structures made up of almost-competing interests that sum towards a common goal helps guide our individual competitive natures towards accomplishing larger-than-one projects picture a bunch of sticks leaning against each other; individually they'd fall, but their combined vector gives the total structure strength
AdamJacobMuller 3y ago
BDFL that recognizes that that is a problem and refuses to allow it to happen, regardless of any personal pain it causes them. Example: Guido van Rossum
- throwaway2037 3y ago
  Why was this down voted? Guido van Rossum has the magic touch. He steered Python for 20+ years, including through the 2->3 upgrade. And, you never read negative stuff about him. Many other famous open source leaders are the subject various personal attacks. Linus Torvalds famously took off time to improve his interpersonal skills.
tivert 3y ago
> I agree. Is there any way to "inoculate" organisation to prevent this failure mode? Maybe competent moderators, and a kind of rock-paper-scissors rule structure. Where you have rules, but excessive rules lawyering is a grave, bannable offense.
stjohnswarts 3y ago
one way might be to demarcate civility as important as technical knowledge and allow people to get pitched by mod vote if they become snarky. Just a guess. I wish that was a rule on reddit for sure. Essentially disallowing fiefdoms
makeitdouble 3y ago
Giving the organization very clear rules and goals from the start and making wide range correcting changes towards them even when they hurt the whole organization. For companies this usually means pushing product cannibalisation and accepting to forgo additional profit in exchange for better long term viability. I think Apple was good at this during most of Steve Jobs's second term. Didn't last long though. Perhaps too much success is the biggest issue ?
- hducy4 3y ago
  We have this at my work, need to totally gut the main product offering in order to maintain long term viability but nobody will do it because it's the cash cow even though it's slowly dying.
- rewmie 3y ago
  > Giving the organization very clear rules and goals from the start and making wide range correcting changes towards them even when they hurt the whole organization. I'm not sure you noticed it, but the people complaining about "editors" being toxic are actually those who are confronted with these "very clear rules and goals" already specified by the community , and they are calling foul once they see their edits being edited based on these established and time-tested processes. And by the way, wikipedia supports conflict resolution processes which can culminate in articles being temporarily blocked to prevent endless revertions. You just need to flag the article and ask people their opinion. It's strange how this whole debate centers around abuse, offers all kinds of solutions to perceived problems, but not only fails to acknowledge these processes are already in place in Wikipedia for over a decade but also they don't even wonder what content was added by the editors complaining their edits were reverted. I mean, think about it for a second. Do you think wikipedia achieved a notable level of quality because all edits, regardless of their content, remain untouched in place as-is?
prox 3y ago
I feel it’s basically an exponent of selfishness/greed. So for some it might be status or other incentives that make them favour a moat or developing an entrenched behavior. Countering it means to cultivate an open and egalitarian platform, where vulnerability is part of the equation as well as the associated trust that is needed. Good faith over bad faith. Selfless behavior vs “I am gonna get mine.” My sources are my experience in organisations as well as a good friend who manages such an organization.
- throwaway2037 3y ago
  Thanks for sharing your thoughts. "Good faith" is hard to put a finger on, but you know it when you see it! I will never forget reading a bug report in Python where a senior developer replied to a junior developer: (roughly) "That's a good point. I didn't think of that. Your idea is better." I had never seen that level of humbleness in other open source projects that I follow. I bet the top Wiki editors don't think there is an issue. That is the hard part. How do you get the people with the most vested interest accept change?
  - prox 3y ago
    That is a good point you raise and there are no cookie cutter answers I think personally. Changing a culture is always far harder than to start. People’s behavior is already set (think of the backwards brain bicycle TED talk) So you need a new synthesis in a dialectic system of two opposing wills. Like you say, how do you get people to accept less? Only if you can make them see what you are seeing, and if they can see different points of view. For some this is impossible I find, depending on character and circumstances. Also can you make them see that their behavior is detrimental in the long run? Or that they might have their heart in the right place (they care about the subject) but it is forced? But yeah, the ability or willingness to see through other eyes is definitely “good faith” to me. You still don’t always have to agree, you don’t have to become a hivemind. But knowing that your ideas or critiques are heard, echoed makes you feel part of the whole, just being seen or heard makes a world of difference I think.
natpalmer1776 3y ago
No, and while the nuances are pretty deep, it basically boils down to the fact that this behavior is necessary for the survival of any complex system.
- Razengan 3y ago
  "We have tried nothing and we give up."
  - natpalmer1776 3y ago
    I mean, I did say it was nuanced. You could with the right people across the entire organization succeed without and actively combat the manifestation of this effect for as long as those, or like minded, people remain… but given the fact that organizations have a bidirectional relationship with people and culture, over a long enough period of time the organization will inevitably revert to the mean. In more broad terms, I described the path of least resistance for a complex system (the default mode), while “you” are asking for a system that deviates from that path, which requires the introduction of entropy. As can be observed in many other fields, the total entropy of a system over a long enough period of time will always trend towards zero. Given the specifics of this particular model are bound by social behaviors you could in theory create a culture that has a default mode that does not have the issue described, but to do so you would have to start at a much higher level than a single organization and thus for the purposes of the point I was making it is moot. Even having said all of this, there is still a great deal more left unsaid that lead me to believe this to be true.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]

I agree. Is there any way to "inoculate" organisation to prevent this failure mode?

by Gare 3y ago

I agree. Is there any way to "inoculate" organisation to prevent this failure mode?

How about having a leader willing to make big bold bets? Whatever you may think about Zuck renaming Facebook to Meta, it certainly seems to demonstrate that his company hasn't fallen prey to stasis.

jltsiren 3y ago

Probably not for existing organizations. Possibly for newly formed organizations, but it's unlikely to scale. I've seen volunteer organizations founded on mild anarchistic principles thrive for a few decades while occasionally reinventing themselves. The key is a culture focusing on people working together for a common purpose. Keeping in mind that the purpose of the organization is more important than the organization itself. There may be formal stakeholders and formal power hierarchies, but their role is kept to a minimum. Some people need to be in charge for legal and practical reasons, but leadership positions are not associated with high status. Ideally, the leaders are selected through a deliberative process, and they voluntarily step down after a while. Some people inevitably acquire high status within the community, but they are expected to recognize it and avoid being too vocal.

jareklupinski 3y ago

check and balances actively encouraging structures made up of almost-competing interests that sum towards a common goal helps guide our individual competitive natures towards accomplishing larger-than-one projects picture a bunch of sticks leaning against each other; individually they'd fall, but their combined vector gives the total structure strength

AdamJacobMuller 3y ago

BDFL that recognizes that that is a problem and refuses to allow it to happen, regardless of any personal pain it causes them. Example: Guido van Rossum

throwaway2037 3y ago
Why was this down voted? Guido van Rossum has the magic touch. He steered Python for 20+ years, including through the 2->3 upgrade. And, you never read negative stuff about him. Many other famous open source leaders are the subject various personal attacks. Linus Torvalds famously took off time to improve his interpersonal skills.

tivert 3y ago

> I agree. Is there any way to "inoculate" organisation to prevent this failure mode? Maybe competent moderators, and a kind of rock-paper-scissors rule structure. Where you have rules, but excessive rules lawyering is a grave, bannable offense.

stjohnswarts 3y ago

one way might be to demarcate civility as important as technical knowledge and allow people to get pitched by mod vote if they become snarky. Just a guess. I wish that was a rule on reddit for sure. Essentially disallowing fiefdoms

makeitdouble 3y ago

Giving the organization very clear rules and goals from the start and making wide range correcting changes towards them even when they hurt the whole organization. For companies this usually means pushing product cannibalisation and accepting to forgo additional profit in exchange for better long term viability. I think Apple was good at this during most of Steve Jobs's second term. Didn't last long though. Perhaps too much success is the biggest issue ?

hducy4 3y ago
We have this at my work, need to totally gut the main product offering in order to maintain long term viability but nobody will do it because it's the cash cow even though it's slowly dying.
rewmie 3y ago
> Giving the organization very clear rules and goals from the start and making wide range correcting changes towards them even when they hurt the whole organization. I'm not sure you noticed it, but the people complaining about "editors" being toxic are actually those who are confronted with these "very clear rules and goals" already specified by the community , and they are calling foul once they see their edits being edited based on these established and time-tested processes. And by the way, wikipedia supports conflict resolution processes which can culminate in articles being temporarily blocked to prevent endless revertions. You just need to flag the article and ask people their opinion. It's strange how this whole debate centers around abuse, offers all kinds of solutions to perceived problems, but not only fails to acknowledge these processes are already in place in Wikipedia for over a decade but also they don't even wonder what content was added by the editors complaining their edits were reverted. I mean, think about it for a second. Do you think wikipedia achieved a notable level of quality because all edits, regardless of their content, remain untouched in place as-is?

prox 3y ago

I feel it’s basically an exponent of selfishness/greed. So for some it might be status or other incentives that make them favour a moat or developing an entrenched behavior. Countering it means to cultivate an open and egalitarian platform, where vulnerability is part of the equation as well as the associated trust that is needed. Good faith over bad faith. Selfless behavior vs “I am gonna get mine.” My sources are my experience in organisations as well as a good friend who manages such an organization.

throwaway2037 3y ago
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. "Good faith" is hard to put a finger on, but you know it when you see it! I will never forget reading a bug report in Python where a senior developer replied to a junior developer: (roughly) "That's a good point. I didn't think of that. Your idea is better." I had never seen that level of humbleness in other open source projects that I follow. I bet the top Wiki editors don't think there is an issue. That is the hard part. How do you get the people with the most vested interest accept change?
- prox 3y ago
  That is a good point you raise and there are no cookie cutter answers I think personally. Changing a culture is always far harder than to start. People’s behavior is already set (think of the backwards brain bicycle TED talk) So you need a new synthesis in a dialectic system of two opposing wills. Like you say, how do you get people to accept less? Only if you can make them see what you are seeing, and if they can see different points of view. For some this is impossible I find, depending on character and circumstances. Also can you make them see that their behavior is detrimental in the long run? Or that they might have their heart in the right place (they care about the subject) but it is forced? But yeah, the ability or willingness to see through other eyes is definitely “good faith” to me. You still don’t always have to agree, you don’t have to become a hivemind. But knowing that your ideas or critiques are heard, echoed makes you feel part of the whole, just being seen or heard makes a world of difference I think.

natpalmer1776 3y ago

No, and while the nuances are pretty deep, it basically boils down to the fact that this behavior is necessary for the survival of any complex system.

Razengan 3y ago
"We have tried nothing and we give up."
- natpalmer1776 3y ago
  I mean, I did say it was nuanced. You could with the right people across the entire organization succeed without and actively combat the manifestation of this effect for as long as those, or like minded, people remain… but given the fact that organizations have a bidirectional relationship with people and culture, over a long enough period of time the organization will inevitably revert to the mean. In more broad terms, I described the path of least resistance for a complex system (the default mode), while “you” are asking for a system that deviates from that path, which requires the introduction of entropy. As can be observed in many other fields, the total entropy of a system over a long enough period of time will always trend towards zero. Given the specifics of this particular model are bound by social behaviors you could in theory create a culture that has a default mode that does not have the issue described, but to do so you would have to start at a much higher level than a single organization and thus for the purposes of the point I was making it is moot. Even having said all of this, there is still a great deal more left unsaid that lead me to believe this to be true.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]