there is some form of hierarchy even in flat orgs. best bet is to get buy in from the seniors
No Kings: How Do You Make Good Decisions Efficiently in a Flat Organization?
61–70 of 325 posts
Re: No Kings: How Do You Make Good Decisions Efficiently in a Flat Organization?
#62Find out who can approve an invoice for payment. He's the boss.
It takes really little effort to use "they" instead of "he" to include all people.
Re: No Kings: How Do You Make Good Decisions Efficiently in a Flat Organization?
#63Our hackerspace runs in a "flat manner". In reality, there are people that are, in a Animal Farm sense, "more equal" than others. It also means there's very little responsibility for our shared space, little responsibility for operations, other than what individuals take on. It also means that avenues that we could do (work more with First Robotics, or review if what we're doing is the best for our mission) is shoute…
Would it work better if those "more equal" members were explicitly above the rest of you?
Re: No Kings: How Do You Make Good Decisions Efficiently in a Flat Organization?
#64I would like to refer to the following - The Tyranny of Structurelessness, originally meant to address the concerns regarding 'flat' organizations. "This means that to strive for a structureless group is as useful, and as deceptive, as to aim at an "objective" news story, "value-free" social science, or a "free" economy. A "laissez faire" group is about as realistic as a "laissez faire" society; the idea becomes a sm…
What about democracy? It is a clear rule (one person one vote) and yet it is not hierarchical.
Democracy is a formal system of governance - this essay isn't "anti-democratic," it is just against the absence of formal governing structures in groups (nor is it necessarily against informal structures either, but just against the idea that larger organizations should be exclusively governed in an implicit manner, and is in favor of the idea of raw accountability)
Re: No Kings: How Do You Make Good Decisions Efficiently in a Flat Organization?
#65Our hackerspace runs in a "flat manner". In reality, there are people that are, in a Animal Farm sense, "more equal" than others. It also means there's very little responsibility for our shared space, little responsibility for operations, other than what individuals take on. It also means that avenues that we could do (work more with First Robotics, or review if what we're doing is the best for our mission) is shoute…
Would it work better if those "more equal" members were explicitly above the rest of you?
Thats the rub: I don't think the rest of the org would go for that. If it was in a clear hierarchical vote, they wouldn't be the primary decision naysayers.
But because of the shadow hierarchy, they can continue with their actions. And those actions are primarily shooting ideas down or making some decisions for the whole org implicitly.
Re: No Kings: How Do You Make Good Decisions Efficiently in a Flat Organization?
#66Easy, you simply make the decisions within the confines of the shadow hierarchy that exists within all flat organizations.
In my professional experience, many fiefdoms get created in the shadow hierarchy of flat orgs.
Align/get yourself in one that works and is healthy for your development and you can thrive. If not, then leave as quickly as you can. Just MHO.
Re: No Kings: How Do You Make Good Decisions Efficiently in a Flat Organization?
#67I would like to refer to the following - The Tyranny of Structurelessness, originally meant to address the concerns regarding 'flat' organizations. "This means that to strive for a structureless group is as useful, and as deceptive, as to aim at an "objective" news story, "value-free" social science, or a "free" economy. A "laissez faire" group is about as realistic as a "laissez faire" society; the idea becomes a sm…
What about democracy? It is a clear rule (one person one vote) and yet it is not hierarchical.
A lot of people who advocate flat or structureless organizations actually have philosophical problems with even direct democracy for decision making.
The big objection is to making majority (or even supermajority) decisions binding on the minority, which is seen as coercive. Smaller objections to things like elected positions and parliamentary procedure, which are seen as too hierarchical.
Re: No Kings: How Do You Make Good Decisions Efficiently in a Flat Organization?
#68I would like to refer to the following - The Tyranny of Structurelessness, originally meant to address the concerns regarding 'flat' organizations. "This means that to strive for a structureless group is as useful, and as deceptive, as to aim at an "objective" news story, "value-free" social science, or a "free" economy. A "laissez faire" group is about as realistic as a "laissez faire" society; the idea becomes a sm…
It's not just the women's movement, any postmodern "leaderphobic" group of anti-heroes will operate under this adhocratic masking of power. It's still power, but it's the power-pill that palatable to their sensibilities, suitably masked. Marxist revolutions "of the peasants" pioneered this mass delusion of flattening. But isn't this just gaslighting people? I mean "flat" is just disempowering existing power structure…
For what it's worth, most Marxists favor some form of democracy. The libertarian wing favors direct democracy while other tendencies favor different forms of representative democracy. Democracy is favored for exactly the reason that unclear power structures are a kind of oppression and that democracies broadly speaking offer decision making power to the people. A big difference between a Marxist and a liberal is in the analysis of the economic base of power which can either support or undermine democratic structures.
Re: No Kings: How Do You Make Good Decisions Efficiently in a Flat Organization?
#69I would like to refer to the following - The Tyranny of Structurelessness, originally meant to address the concerns regarding 'flat' organizations. "This means that to strive for a structureless group is as useful, and as deceptive, as to aim at an "objective" news story, "value-free" social science, or a "free" economy. A "laissez faire" group is about as realistic as a "laissez faire" society; the idea becomes a sm…
It's not just the women's movement, any postmodern "leaderphobic" group of anti-heroes will operate under this adhocratic masking of power. It's still power, but it's the power-pill that palatable to their sensibilities, suitably masked. Marxist revolutions "of the peasants" pioneered this mass delusion of flattening. But isn't this just gaslighting people? I mean "flat" is just disempowering existing power structure…
"Marxist revolutions 'of the peasants' pioneered this mass delusion of flattening."
Ironically the Bolshevik revolution didn't really start out this way. The Bolsheviks advocated for a strict disciplined party model - if you've ever read what Lenin wrote of the Left-communists and Anarchists, it was clear that he was very much not mindlessly "against" structure. Of course, this would all eventually be liquidated by Stalin and Mao.
"Flat" organizations rarely seek to deliberately create cabals and power cliques - they do inevitably occur, sure, but the call for flatness usually comes as a result of you not getting what you really want out of the system. Ulterior motives are not really at play; rather it is just a case of organic collapse.
Re: No Kings: How Do You Make Good Decisions Efficiently in a Flat Organization?
#70I would like to refer to the following - The Tyranny of Structurelessness, originally meant to address the concerns regarding 'flat' organizations. "This means that to strive for a structureless group is as useful, and as deceptive, as to aim at an "objective" news story, "value-free" social science, or a "free" economy. A "laissez faire" group is about as realistic as a "laissez faire" society; the idea becomes a sm…
Saving this as it makes the point I've been trying to make for years much more elegantly.
Just because you don't call out the structure doesn't mean there isn't one.