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It's complicated isn't it? A business doesn't care about you. It doesn't because it can't. Business doesn't have thoughts and feelings, business is clinical. Bu

by neom 2y ago

It's complicated isn't it? A business doesn't care about you. It doesn't because it can't. Business doesn't have thoughts and feelings, business is clinical. Business is nothing more than the collection of processed and systems crafted to work together, facilitating the exchange of value between 2 parties. The problem is with the 2 parties part. The 2 parties part, that part very much does have thoughts, feelings, and emotions, those two parties are made up of humans. Bobby Sue just wants the alternator working on the car so they can go to a family funeral and mourn. Jerry in accounting at alternator inc's going through a momentous life shift, spiraling his whole world into a new framing, changing everything. Sally in design is just trying to feed her kids. And while these things matter none to the business technically, they matter deeply to the humans involved. It's complicated because business doesn't, shouldn't, and can't have feelings, however, business activity is indeed made up of people, and they most certainly do. There is always a risk of being too cold and focusing only on the bottom line, or becoming so caught up in individual needs and emotions that you lose sight of the basic structure that keeps a business functioning. Booby Sue needs to mourn, and Jerry needs stability for his life change, Sally has kids. And so, there is some empathy to be found for people deciding fundamental things for their businesses, it's not easy to know when to be clinical in look at the business, especially knowing it's comprised of a collections of humans, organized, into a company. Care too much about the outside, the business fails, care too much about the inside, the business fails. These are not easy things, the trick is to avoid hostage situations, and so rationality and intellectual honesty is key when framing these discussions. I expanded these thoughts here: https://b.h4x.zip/dei/ https://b.h4x.zip/dei/

Angostura 2y ago
I disagree with your axiom that businesses shouldn’t have feelings. There is absolutely nothing wrong with a business that feels it should treat its workforce kindly and ethically and recruit a diverse set of people.
- neom 2y ago
  How can a business feel that? You mean a founder? a ceo? the investors? The laywers? People who are running business at $500MM+ arr have 4 things to consider distinctly, with their own lenses and frames: The business- It's model, it's operations, defined processes etc, every monday this report comes in, it is read by this functional area, it's converted into this insight, the insight is used, the consumer is delighted, more money comes in, the cycle continues. The humans involved are relevant so much as they must be able to do the task, who the literally are doesn't particularly matter, it's just a resource to allow a cog to spin. The company - the people inside the business. The organizations - how the people are assemble continually. The market - customers etc. If you observe the business "feeling" - done correctly, what you're observing the outcome of an evaluation process that decided it functioned more competitively in a different mode. (The best world class employees are in Spain, lets make our HR more diverse in it's language) A business cannot, should not, and does not, have feelings. The only place ethics technically come into play are in the context of law. It's nuanced, but it's important, without being fully fleshed in your framings, things get muddy. Businesses are systems and processes that fairly and adequately serve the parties involved while hedging out individual humans.
  - Angostura 2y ago
    > How can a business feel that? You mean a founder? a ceo? the investors? The laywers? The senior leadership team, from which corporate culture is lead. This doesn't seem to be as complicatedan issue as you want it to be.

by neom 2y ago

Angostura 2y ago

I disagree with your axiom that businesses shouldn’t have feelings. There is absolutely nothing wrong with a business that feels it should treat its workforce kindly and ethically and recruit a diverse set of people.

neom 2y ago
How can a business feel that? You mean a founder? a ceo? the investors? The laywers? People who are running business at $500MM+ arr have 4 things to consider distinctly, with their own lenses and frames: The business- It's model, it's operations, defined processes etc, every monday this report comes in, it is read by this functional area, it's converted into this insight, the insight is used, the consumer is delighted, more money comes in, the cycle continues. The humans involved are relevant so much as they must be able to do the task, who the literally are doesn't particularly matter, it's just a resource to allow a cog to spin. The company - the people inside the business. The organizations - how the people are assemble continually. The market - customers etc. If you observe the business "feeling" - done correctly, what you're observing the outcome of an evaluation process that decided it functioned more competitively in a different mode. (The best world class employees are in Spain, lets make our HR more diverse in it's language) A business cannot, should not, and does not, have feelings. The only place ethics technically come into play are in the context of law. It's nuanced, but it's important, without being fully fleshed in your framings, things get muddy. Businesses are systems and processes that fairly and adequately serve the parties involved while hedging out individual humans.
- Angostura 2y ago
  > How can a business feel that? You mean a founder? a ceo? the investors? The laywers? The senior leadership team, from which corporate culture is lead. This doesn't seem to be as complicatedan issue as you want it to be.