I've read this explanation of executive roles before, but reading through this one the following caught my eye: I hadn't considered this in the context of government before. The model doesn't...
I've read this explanation of executive roles before, but reading through this one the following caught my eye:
Governmental politics are bad exactly to the extent that we don't enforce our values by firing the people who don't encompass them.
In a democracy, this is hard because values in the first place are agreed by mass consensus rather than chosen at the top. That's why propaganda is so powerful: it changes our values, which changes who and what we tolerate.
I hadn't considered this in the context of government before. The model doesn't quite parallel in that the president absolutely does make decisions directly for some things that require specialized knowledge. They also direct policy creation with specific goals and objectives. There is also built in upheaval every 4-8 years where what happens is the equivalent of firing ALL the executives and a lot of the managers and either replacing them or making them reapply for their own job.
In the context of individual government agencies it seems like this executive model probably parallels better. Like the head of the CDC for instance. They probably have a relevant PHD, but they can't possible make all the decisions in a day.
From my experience, every organization has executives who make decisions on the basis of information that lower-tier employees aren't privy to. This is just more obvious in government. Elected...
From my experience, every organization has executives who make decisions on the basis of information that lower-tier employees aren't privy to.
This is just more obvious in government.
Elected officials, bureaucrats, and citizens may wind up operating under completely different axioms about what's important or achievable due to necessary operational secrecy, insider politicking, and corruption. But those forces also exist in any organization large enough that people aren't able to observe each other's behavior frequently.
This is a crucial omission from the analysis, and a major cause of apparent misalignment between what an organization publicly claims to value and what its actions manifest.
Footnote: My personal recent experience was of working in a medium-sized company undergoing a secret values realignment. Employees thought they were acting in accordance with the company's public values, but were suddenly being punished since the C-suite had their hair on fire about undisclosed revenue shortfalls and impending share price drops. A great deal of bad behavior ensued at all levels, and some of the apparently "worst" actors were well-rewarded while the "best" have now quit or are currently being laid-off. One unmentioned corollary of the article is that organization's actual values are manifest through what they reward and punish internally.
OOF This so much. Every organization has good values (ostensibly). Nobody is going to intentionally have bad values (eg "We love racism"), but I've seen so many organizations punish people for...
undergoing a secret values realignment.
OOF
organization's actual values are manifest through what they reward and punish internally
This so much. Every organization has good values (ostensibly). Nobody is going to intentionally have bad values (eg "We love racism"), but I've seen so many organizations punish people for behavior that really is in alignment with the stated values but gets punished either formally, informally, or socially. Sometimes that's a result of old processes not changing when values change, sometimes it's a result of people misunderstanding what upholding the stated values actually looks like in practice.
Anecdote: I worked at a software company for a few years that proclaimed and boasted how transparent and open to change they where to everyone who would listen (they gave tours). Objectively, they actually did a fairly reasonable job in contrast to some other places I've worked. However there was some nepotism and in-grouping among some of the employees that made change difficult. People will only try to change things so many times before they give up, and eventually people either just gave up or quit.
An executive with 8,000 indirect reports and 2000 hours of work in a year can afford to spend, at most, 15 minutes per year per person in their reporting hierarchy... even if they work on nothing else. That job seems impossible. How can anyone make any important decision in a company that large? They will always be the least informed person in the room, no matter what the topic.
Yeah you don't really engage with employees as individuals at that level, you're dealing with larger systems and groups or teams. You set goals for those teams and the middle managers have to sort...
Yeah you don't really engage with employees as individuals at that level, you're dealing with larger systems and groups or teams. You set goals for those teams and the middle managers have to sort those out. Part of the skill of being a senior executive is about how to set those goals in ways that are conducive to the flourishing of both the organization and the people in it.
I've read this explanation of executive roles before, but reading through this one the following caught my eye:
I hadn't considered this in the context of government before. The model doesn't quite parallel in that the president absolutely does make decisions directly for some things that require specialized knowledge. They also direct policy creation with specific goals and objectives. There is also built in upheaval every 4-8 years where what happens is the equivalent of firing ALL the executives and a lot of the managers and either replacing them or making them reapply for their own job.
In the context of individual government agencies it seems like this executive model probably parallels better. Like the head of the CDC for instance. They probably have a relevant PHD, but they can't possible make all the decisions in a day.
From my experience, every organization has executives who make decisions on the basis of information that lower-tier employees aren't privy to.
This is just more obvious in government.
Elected officials, bureaucrats, and citizens may wind up operating under completely different axioms about what's important or achievable due to necessary operational secrecy, insider politicking, and corruption. But those forces also exist in any organization large enough that people aren't able to observe each other's behavior frequently.
This is a crucial omission from the analysis, and a major cause of apparent misalignment between what an organization publicly claims to value and what its actions manifest.
Footnote: My personal recent experience was of working in a medium-sized company undergoing a secret values realignment. Employees thought they were acting in accordance with the company's public values, but were suddenly being punished since the C-suite had their hair on fire about undisclosed revenue shortfalls and impending share price drops. A great deal of bad behavior ensued at all levels, and some of the apparently "worst" actors were well-rewarded while the "best" have now quit or are currently being laid-off. One unmentioned corollary of the article is that organization's actual values are manifest through what they reward and punish internally.
OOF
This so much. Every organization has good values (ostensibly). Nobody is going to intentionally have bad values (eg "We love racism"), but I've seen so many organizations punish people for behavior that really is in alignment with the stated values but gets punished either formally, informally, or socially. Sometimes that's a result of old processes not changing when values change, sometimes it's a result of people misunderstanding what upholding the stated values actually looks like in practice.
Anecdote: I worked at a software company for a few years that proclaimed and boasted how transparent and open to change they where to everyone who would listen (they gave tours). Objectively, they actually did a fairly reasonable job in contrast to some other places I've worked. However there was some nepotism and in-grouping among some of the employees that made change difficult. People will only try to change things so many times before they give up, and eventually people either just gave up or quit.
The setup is a little silly but that's just the first paragraph. It seems like a reasonable book review after that.
Yeah you don't really engage with employees as individuals at that level, you're dealing with larger systems and groups or teams. You set goals for those teams and the middle managers have to sort those out. Part of the skill of being a senior executive is about how to set those goals in ways that are conducive to the flourishing of both the organization and the people in it.