Structure drives behavior, indeed. The frequent rotation of officers has
an up side and a down side. The up side is the organization gets a fresh
perspective not mired in ownership of the status quo. The down side is,
as you have discussed, the "not on my watch" mindsets. ALSO ...
Using the military as a case study is very useful for these points because
the military manifests both behaviors. However, the vast majority of
military organizations do not suffer from the "not on my watch" failures
because of organizational structures that render that behavior impossible
or implausible. Continuity planning, nesting of intent throughout
organizational hierarchies, and, at some levels, hiring long term civilian
experts (or keeping some officers on special career tracks) are only a
small sample of behavioral, institutional and procedural structures that
the military uses to build continuity. The military is very diverse, yet
efficient. The mental models many hold of those in uniform are often
based in image, not based in reality.
Tom Greco, (Major) US Army School of Advanced Military Studies
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Subject: LO and Big Layoffs LO5550
Date: Monday, February 12, 1996 12:00AM
[snip by your host...]
The problem I see with this is that what is rwarded in the
military may not be even desirable in corporations. For instance, when an
officer lands one of those short-term assignments, knowing that he or she
is on his or her way to better things, then they tend to do nothing.
[snip by your host...]
R. IVAN BLANCO, Ph.D. Voice 305 899-3515
-- Tom Greco AMSP45 <amsp45@LEAV-EMH1.ARMY.MIL>Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>