Conference 7.286::digital

re: .0,

	This sounds like a great idea and I plan to implement this proposal!

				     -davo

p.s.	(just as soon as I hear the rumor that this proposal has been
	entered in the anonymous and bureaucratic Personnel Policies
	and Procedures manual ;^).

This seems to be what the DIGITAL PHILOSOPHY already requires:

RESPONSIBILITY:

Plans are proposed by individuals or teams.  These plans may be rejected
until they fit corporate goals or until the Product/Market Strategy Committee
feels confidence in the plans.  But when they are accepted, they are the
responsibility of those who proposed them.

-------------

In order to implement this, any approved plan would _have_ to have the names
of the proposers on it, wouldn't it?

/john

re .2 by COVERT::COVERT 

>In order to implement this, any approved plan would _have_ to have the names
>of the proposers on it, wouldn't it?

Yes, but how often does it happen that 

        a) proposer has left Digital before the bureaucracy decides the
        idea was worth while?
        
        b) idea is passed on to someone else for implementation because
        it was too good to pass up, but proposer was not 'right' for the
        implementation?
        
        c) no single individual signs as 'the accountable
        decision-maker', but the 'committee' all 'supported' the idea?
        
Dick

re .2


> RESPONSIBILITY:
>
> Plans are proposed by individuals or teams.  These plans may be rejected
> until they fit corporate goals or until the Product/Market Strategy Committee
> feels confidence in the plans.  But when they are accepted, they are the
> responsibility of those who proposed them.

They are the responsibility of the acceptors as well. For example:

 - management board approves person for unit management responsibility

   If this person fails, Digital non-philosophical result is that sponsor
   of person is absolved of bad decision in recommending person for management
   job because board approved; management board is absolved because of the
   "rightness" of numbers, i.e., if ten people agree on a decision, then the
   decision is right; failure is due to circumstances, not incorrrect group
   decisions.

   If there is any political liability associated with failure, hang the
   person who was promoted to manager.

It doesn't matter what the decision is. Once it's group consensus, everyone
is absolved in the case of failure. In the case of success, recognition goes
to the politically most nimble to bask in the limelight.

_EVERYONE_ who says "yes" or "no" is _responsible_ and must be _accountable_.
If a hundred people had to say yes or no to something, they are _all_
responsible and accoutable for the results.

If I've said this too many times here, please point me to SOAPBOX :-)

/Peters

    I usually find the best policy to be to avoid committee approval
    wherever possible, roll up your sleeves and work midnight hours.
    If committees insist on getting in the way (as they have for me)
    work around them.  Sometimes that means scrapping the part of the project
    subject to committee control.  Sometimes that means zinging people in
    power so that they allow you to tunnel through committee requirements.  
    You have to really ask yourself whether or not the committee adds any 
    value to your project.  If not, you're wasting time and Digital's
    resources.  I feel that this is the real meaning of "propose and do".
    If you need help from a committee to do it, it's not going to happen
    fast enough and when it does you won't have much part in it.  
    
    Steve

    By the way - we should empower people to fail occasionally. Demanding
    perfection every time leads to a conservative response which eventually
    becomes complete inaction due to fear of even the slightest failure.
    
    
    /andy/

    Making sure people learn from their mistakes is one of the hallmarks
    of good management. That also means a manager has to _let_ people make
    mistakes in the first place.

    re: the last few
    
    Yup.  Tom Peters also mentions something about using failure as a
    measure of whether or not you're at the leading edge.  If you aren't
    having any failures, you're not pushing the state of the art.  And, you
    can expect you are falling behind the competition.  Management needs to
    applaud and even reward failures that we can learn from and which 
    eventually lead to the kind of successes that drive the company.  
    Punishing those who fail while trying their best to do what has not been 
    done before is counterproductive.  Committees have been known for doing 
    this kind of thing.
    
    I note that this line of thought does not contradict Six Sigma if you
    do not allow failures to promulgate out to customers.  It does,
    however, conflict with how committees tend to run when there is little
    ownership on the part of committee members.  And, it conflicts with
    management who see themselves at such high levels that they are primarily
    concerned with avoiding being seen by others as doing anything stupid.
    
    Steve
                                                        

	re .6:

>>>    By the way - we should empower people to fail occasionally.

	Absolutely. This is essential. But we have it quite the
	wrong way round.

	At the moment, ordinary employees go in fear of even a single
	identifiable mistake. Meanwhile, people at the very top are
	making monumental errors which (as Dave Barry points out in
	"Claw Your Way To The Top") put thousands of jobs at risk.
	These people never seem to suffer for their mistakes.

	For instance, for the last 5 years (since I joined EIS),
	the way to succeed has been "get away from technical".
	"Business" consultants were hired in from outside in large
	numbers, and erstwhile specialists in VMS, UNIX, databases,
	hardware etc. were urged to de-skill themselves in order to
	climb the career ladder. When I was interviewed for the job
	of "senior specialist", I was expected to declare (unprompted)
	a sincere desire to get away from programming and products and
	acquire "business skills".

	This was obviously a dumb idea all along, as Digital's fundamental
	stock in trade consists of knowhow about computers AND HOW THEY
	CAN BE USED.

	Today, we are "rightsizing" like mad, and I am seeing a continuous
	stream of well-meaning people who swallowed all this garbage, being
	shown the door. The emphasis now, it seems, is on people who
	have "specialist skills". There is no room for "generalists".

	Now this constitutes a mistake of the highest order. Somebody
	(singular or plural) has spent half a decade pushing some of
	our most import people in the wrong direction. When business
	turned around (as it was bound to sooner or later) those people
	were then lost to the company. This is nothing more nor less
	than SYSTEMATIC HUMAN RESOURCE DESTRUCTION.

	We could also look to other large-scale mistakes like the
	systematic under-valuation of UNIX, the deprecation of
	workstations until 1988, and (in my opinion, although this
	is much more controversial) the creation of IS as a separate
	department.

	Is anybody going to put on the spot for making these mistakes?
	Don't hold your breath. The people responsible will probably be
	moved "sideways" - into something new that needs a manager. How
	about the UNIX program or the reorganization to make us more
	effective?

	/Tom

    
    Specialism=guaranteed obsolescence. Nuke Managers who demand lots of
    specialists, they just don't understand the requirements of our
    marketplace in 1990.
    
    We should strive to be generalists of a very specific kind - synergists
    that can take a set of business problems and concoct the best DIGITAL
    answer for our customers.
    
    
    /andy/

re 1269.9

The Information Technology industry has become infinitely complex. Whereas the
catchphrase of the eighties was "solutions", we soon found out that what we
thought were solutions were not quite what the customer thought was a solution.

What we had, in fact, were tools to adress problems but had little idea of what 
the problems were. This is why we hired-in Business Consultants. They were 
supposed to know how to define the problems such that tool-specialists could 
formulate solutions. It is foolish to think that a technical specialists could 
become a business/industry specialist due to differing skill set requirements.
This should have never been encouraged, if it was.


Despite the current economic conjuncture, the challenge we face in the 
marketplace is still the same. Both Business and Technology Consultants are
necessary to specify  the problem and formulate a solution. If Business
consultants are being shown the door, then I shudder to think how we will
regain the market share so precious to survival. Evidently, as in the past,
we shall have to depend upon the customer to know both what the problem is
and what the technical solution  should be. Should we also expect our
customers to fill out the order form?