Читать книгу Evolutionary Models in Business - Evgeny Klochkov - Страница 5

To begin with, some starting point should be determined, and the idea described in the book Reinventing Organizations by F. Laloux shall serve as a basis. The book comprehends the accumulated experience of human cooperation models, which reflect the mankind development history and consciousness development level, and presents a novel idea that can describe the existing complex interrelationships in more detail than generally known concepts. Organizations as models of cooperation between people are always bound to the currently dominant people’s worldview and consciousness development stage. Each time humanity as a species changed its method of world cognition, it grew to new, more effective types of organization. At the same time, such growth did not occur evenly, evolution proceeded in leaps and bounds, like transformation of a caterpillar into a butterfly. Each rise to a new stage of self-consciousness opens up unprecedented abilities and opportunities for humanity, and each new stage of development endows a new model of organization.

Let us consider the following models of organizations in today’s business environment. The companies are divided based on the principle of the underlying organizational structure, and for the convenience of distinguishing them, each is labelled with a color in compliance with the ideas of F. Laloux.

Family Business

Business is built according to ethnicity or family ties. The management style is manual control. The decision-making body is often comprised of a family members council, with the leader serving as a chairman of the council and announcing decisions. In such a business, the role of the leader does not imply autocracy, but rather is to coordinate opinions, lead and control the wealth of the family. For these companies, healthy social relationships in the group are more important than production schedules. The leader’s life belongs to the family where he serves the clan, and not vice versa. The use of awards in the form of reward for individual achievement in such organizations is unlikely, since the reward separates good workers from the rest of the group, i.e. from the family.

Small Business, Startups (Red Organizations)

This business is characterized by the presence of strong personalities who quickly find themselves at the top of the power pyramid. Leaders in such organizations show a high level of energy, take risks, are ready to fight “for territory”, while being able to create innovations and challenge the system. Thinking in this case is formed by the opposites, creating a black and white picture of the world, and in the end everyone is divided into winners and losers. The management style is maintained at the level of manual control. Leaders show tough hegemony in decision making. There is no planning in these companies, since the stake is made on achieving immediate results. Red Organizations are well adapted to cope with chaos, but they are not fit to create complex results in a stable environment where planning and strategy development are possible.

Formal Hierarchies (Amber Organizations)

The overall structure is established in the form of a rigid pyramid with a cascade of formalized orders from bosses to subordinates. In such companies, processes and procedures are very tightly regulated, which leads to a flourishing bureaucracy. Rule-making authority is associated with a social role rather than a strong personality, thus creating stable organizational structures that are sustainable and capable of large-scale development. Notable examples of Amber Organizations are government agencies, the church, and the army. Authority is comparable to a priest in vestments or a general in uniform, and it doesn’t matter what kind of person he is – the form determines the authority. The distribution of remuneration is carried out in accordance with the position and length of service. Each element of the organization understands its exact location and has to act according to the rules of the system. The outlook on life in such structures is static, i.e. there are unshakable laws that divide things into right and wrong. If members of the organization do the right thing, they will be rewarded, and should their behavior fail to conform to the accepted norms, members of the group breaching the established code of ethics may be rejected by the community.

Companies of this level have an understanding of causation, which allows to reproduce past experience and leads to creation of a planning system. Planning and implementation of plans are strictly separated. The thinking takes place “above”, the execution is done “below”. Management is based on the principle of “give orders and follow up”. The philosophy of the Amber Organizations suggests that employees are mostly lazy, dishonest, need supervision, they need to be monitored and told exactly what is required of them. New ideas, individual achievement, critical thinking, and self-expression are not encouraged. Human resources are virtually completely interchangeable. Order and stability – subordination, formalized internal processes, and clear rules – reign in these companies.

Competitive Companies (Orange Organizations)

These companies are perceived as machines and include rigid structure and formalization of processes inherent in a formal hierarchy, though adding to this model innovation, responsibility, and meritocracy.

Innovation enables them to reach the heights of innovation unattainable for Amber Organizations, as leaders of such companies perceive initiative and changes as an opportunity rather than a threat. Responsibility shifts the management approach from “order and follow up” to “anticipate changes and control the situation”. Individual divisions of the company are empowered to think and act in accordance with the current situation and to bear responsibility for their own results. Up to a certain level, management does not care about the method of achieving the goal. Efficiency becomes the basis for decision making. There is nothing absolutely right or absolutely wrong in these companies, instead there are things that work better than others.

In such structures, people are driven by the desire for material success. To put it simply, while in the formal hierarchy the “stick system” only is implemented, in the conditions of competitive companies a “carrot and stick system” has been created.

Orange Organizations have adopted the idea that everyone can climb the career ladder through their abilities. People are viewed as individuals having an opportunity to escape from the stratum of society in which they were born. They can choose a profession based on their own talents and understanding of their vocation. However, their role will ultimately be limited to the function of the position they will occupy in the organization. It is this idea that contributes to the development of a wide range of HR tools: personnel performance assessment, incentive system, human resource planning, headhunting, leadership development trainings, career planning, etc. There’s no merging of the personality with the position, as in the formal hierarchy, however, in the Orange paradigm, people begin to wear professional masks. It is essential to appear competent, calm, in control, successful, and ready for new career challenges.

Management in such companies is result-oriented, focused on solving material problems, and in the end it all comes down to goals and numbers, control points and deadlines. Impassive and objective rationality is valued. At the same time, feelings and human relationships are not important, and the questions that may arise with regard to the reasonability of the goal are simply inappropriate. On the other hand, over just two centuries, this outlook has brought humanity to an unprecedented level of prosperity and technological advance.

Green Organizations

Companies of this type have a pluralistic view of the world that is incompatible with power and hierarchy. Green Companies take the approach that all points of view deserve equal respect. In such organizations, leaders are considered to serve those for whom they are leaders, so sometimes in these types of companies, managers are appointed not “from above”, but “from below.” Subordinates choose their own boss after interviewing suitable candidates, which naturally stimulates the manager to act as an assistant leader. Decision-making processes are “bottom-up”, each opinion is taken into account, and conflicting points of view are brought to a consensus. Group members seek justice, equality, and harmony.

In such companies, employees are integrated into the structure and become part of the whole, maintaining harmonious and close ties with everyone. A deeply rooted culture shared by all employees is the basis and “glue” for the entire structure. This enables granting extended powers to the supervisees. Employees are expected to be able to make the right decision on their own because they share and are guided by common values.

Most Green Organizations strive for lofty goals. For example, Southwest Airlines does not consider itself to be just an airline, but insists that their business is actually freedom. They help their customers get to places they would never have been to if it weren’t for the low prices on Southwest Airlines. Green companies are convinced that businesses bear responsibility not only towards investors, but also towards their employees, customers, suppliers, local communities, society at large, and the environment. The role of the leadership of the organization is to balance interests and keep everyone happy. Social responsibility is often reflected in the mission of Green Organizations, which provides a high level of motivation, encourages innovation and strengthens the corporate spirit of employees. Family can be a metaphor for such companies.

Teal Organizations

The most exciting breakthroughs of the 21st century will not occur because of technology but because of an expanding concept of what it means to be human.

J. Naisbitt

Teal Organizations are built upon the idea that all employees are competent and responsible persons that know how to do their job correctly on their own. The Teal Company is self-governing, the organization consisting of small teams, all employees being fully responsible and having all the rights to make all decisions. Power and responsibility are concentrated “below”. In such companies, the goals of the organization’s existence are always formulated, and they never include maximizing profits. These structures are based on three key principles:

1. Self-organization: the organization encourages initiative at the local level; the company is decentralized.

2. Integrity: The company perceives employees as living people with all inherent needs and emotions, even if they are not really needed for work.

3. Evolutionary goal: business expansion and profit making are not primary objectives, it is the project social significance that is of the highest priority.

This approach in building a model of cooperation between people opens up new opportunities. F. Laloux, the author of the idea, is convinced that such companies are seen not as families or inanimate machines, but as living beings that are endowed with their own energy, personality, creative potential, and a development vector. However, within the framework of this study, it is proposed to expand this concept and look at all the models as living organisms that are filled with living people and living relationships between them.

Another issue is that all the previous models of cooperation were not ready to consider the interests of the people in the group, and subordinated everyone to a single goal, turning either into a bureaucracy or soulless machines. The idea that each of the above organizational structures is the next step in the development of the systems of cooperation between people and, being a living organism itself, goes through the same stages of evolution as all living things on the planet is close to the author. In order to understand the logic of these structures development and their transformation of one into another, it is necessary to take a closer look at the theory of evolution, as well as at genetic algorithms. It is these processes that describe as fully as possible the direction of life development as of today and the patterns according to which this development occurs.