The distinction between business and busyness

Maybe you have noticed, that organizations have a way of perpetuating themselves, as if they were organisms, primarily concerned with their own survival. Anyone who has been involved in organizational change – and who has not, these days – will have noticed that organizations have a way of perpetuating themselves for their own sake.

Slightly less noticeable is that people within organizations tend to adjust to that, as a way of surviving the system, perhaps. Members of organizations adjust, consciously and unconsciously, to this self-perpetuation of the organization through the social dimension of the organization. The organization is also a club and people want to ‘belong’, ‘fit in’, and ‘do well’ according to the norms of the group (which are not necessarily the official norms of the organization)

You can compare the organization to a boat in rowing. When you are in a one-person boat, this boat is typically rather small and therefore vulnerable to winds and waves. You can do very well in this one-person boat, but you have only your personal abilities to fall back on. You can also notice that some boats with more persons go faster. However, if you join a boat with more rowers, you do not necessarily go faster; it happens only if the rowers add value (concentration, balance, strength, stamina) to each other. But some boats give the impression that the crew does not necessarily want to go forward; it mainly is in the boat because it is less fragile to wind and waves, and for ‘social’ reasons. People in those boats are busy, but they do not mean business.

One can see the distinction between business and busyness as the distinction between organizations where the people have a clear focus and commitment to that focus, and organizations where the people lack focus and commitment. As an aid in such a lack of focus, Occam invented his criterion: Occam’s Razor: “in a line of reasoning, you use only those elements which lead to a valid conclusion”. This rule – standard practice in scientific discovery nowadays – may seem straightforward, but it appears to be far from everyday practice. An organization that does not apply Occam’s Razor does all sorts of things in the hope that the right things are somehow in there. This approach does not make you a good company; it makes you a tired and confused company.

Fear

Some say organizations are there to channel fear. Well, one can take into consideration that a channel does not just manage what it contains; it also preserves it. And sometimes someone drowns in what the channel contains.

Aspirations

Another way of looking at organizations is to see them as structures of aspirations. The members of organizations have many aspirations, often more than they realize.

In certain exercises it is possible to mobilize the aspirations within the organization. This will create more cohesion. It does not necessarily mean that there is consensus regarding aspirations, nor does there have to be; merely knowing each others aspirations does a lot towards creating more cohesion and allowing for better communication.

Typically, in workshops the members of organization will first mention the aspirations that they think will bring them appreciation from the others (unless they are rebels and look for aspirations that will shock the others). But you can tell that this is only the surface. Or are we to believe that their dream as a 12 year old was to "improve market share"? Later in the exercise, they will mention more personal aspiorations. These are valuable, although not everything may be attainable (but then that may also be the case with "improve market share"). Will it not make them more aware of their motivation in being members of the organization?

Aristotle once made the distinction between primary and secondary goals one can have in life, and stated that for a succesful life one at least needs to be aware of one's primary goals (secundary goals were considered by him to have value only as supporting primary goals). Would this also mean that in order to be succesful in the organization one has to be aware of one's primary goals? And perhaps that, in order to be a leader, one has to be able to communicate one's primary goals well.