Sustainable competition LO1737

PeterVS1@aol.com
Thu, 22 Jun 1995 16:48:21 -0400

Replying to LO1682 --

Jack Hirschfeld says:

>I have never met a businessman who sought stability by denying growth.

Jack -- you and I have never met, but if we had, you wouldn't be able to
make this assertion.

I think that we need to look at what growth is defined as. The traditional
capitalist definition of growth (which generally means making a business
bigger) has resulted in our economic, social, technological and political
systems being severely skewed in one direction.

There are other types of growth that do not mean the samething. For
example, personal growth, spiritual growth, etc. do not mean bigger.
Rather, they mean a progression of some type occurs.

With respect to business, we tried growing our way to stability and found
that it actually lead to more instability. The increasing complexity that
occurred was a source of drag on the system (our business). Part of the
problem is that with this increased complexity within the system, we found
that shifting people (and particularly their attitudes, skills, and
performance), capital and other essential elements of the business took
longer. This was a real problem because of the rapidly changing business
environment within which our business exists.

We are now seeking stability in our business by avoiding growth in
complexity. That means limiting the number of employees, the number of
projects, the gross revenue, etc.

I think the paradigm in business needs to shift away from "grow or die" to
"evolve or die". If that paradigm shift does not occur, there will
ultimately be more "die" and less "grow".

Regards,

--
Peter von Stackelberg 
Applied Futures, Inc. 
PeterVS1@aol.com