Middle management ouija: Difference between revisions

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The curious void whence management conviction comes.
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[[File:Ouija.jpg|450px|thumb|center|Okay, so forced ranking, then?]]
}}The curious void at the center whence the profound daftness of most management conviction comes.


It is not the CEO — she could not care a row of buttons about the federation of employees at all, much less the [[management information and statistics]] they generate, and any functional middle manager nominally charged with implementation will privately agree wholeheartedly that, for example, the 365 performance appraisal system is from its foundations up a nonce, achieving nothing but illicit patronage, resentment, rancour and demotivation — but while no single individual can be found to utter a word in is favour, all will be certain that ''someone else'', way above my pay grade, a lot of someone else's, at so great a remove that I can scarcely imagine who they are, is insistent on it, and somehow the collective unconscious pushes it on, as if willed by some inner daemon.
Who is it? Whose bright idea was it, exactly, to oblige the staff to tilt at all these windmills?


This is the middle management ouija board.
It is not the [[CEO]]’s: she floats above the fray, above the messy operational layer virtue signalling her [[Change paradox|paradoxical thoughts]] about the need for change and agility to the ravenous [[obsequitariat]]. She could care not a row of buttons about the federation of employees, much less the [[management information and statistics]] they generate, as long as they are generating enough cash or, failing that, [[Stakeholder capitalism|good works]], to justify her salary.
 
Nor will any of functionaries nominally in charge of the [[workstream]] own it.  When quizzed on the topic, every one will instantly agree that, to take a random example, the 365 [[performance appraisal]] system is from its foundations up a farago; it achieves nothing, wastes time, encourages bad behaviour and fosters resentment, rancour and demotivation. The more literate ones will even cite the passage from ''HBR'' in 1975 that established this beyond all reason.
 
But while none can be found with a single word to say for such a silly idea, all will be certain that ''someone else'' does. Someone way above their pay grade — perhaps even a ''lot'' of someone elses, all at so great a remove from the commonplace experience that one can scarcely imagine who they might be, never mind whence comes their affection for such a roundly derided trope. Not one will speak for it. Not ''one''. Yes still: as a collective, when they join hands and place them on the ''planchette'', they watch in terrible, fearful admiration as it strides about the agenda signalling for all their several doubts that as a collective they are firmly resolved upon it, and therefore it must happen.
 
This is the [[middle management ouija board]]: really just a special case of a general [[emergent]] phenomenon we will call [[ouija politics]].
 
{{sa}}
*[[Ouija politics]]
*[[Circle of diffusion]]
*[[Performance appraisal]]

Latest revision as of 14:40, 23 August 2022

Office anthropology™
Okay, so forced ranking, then?
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The curious void at the center whence the profound daftness of most management conviction comes.

Who is it? Whose bright idea was it, exactly, to oblige the staff to tilt at all these windmills?

It is not the CEO’s: she floats above the fray, above the messy operational layer virtue signalling her paradoxical thoughts about the need for change and agility to the ravenous obsequitariat. She could care not a row of buttons about the federation of employees, much less the management information and statistics they generate, as long as they are generating enough cash or, failing that, good works, to justify her salary.

Nor will any of functionaries nominally in charge of the workstream own it. When quizzed on the topic, every one will instantly agree that, to take a random example, the 365 performance appraisal system is from its foundations up a farago; it achieves nothing, wastes time, encourages bad behaviour and fosters resentment, rancour and demotivation. The more literate ones will even cite the passage from HBR in 1975 that established this beyond all reason.

But while none can be found with a single word to say for such a silly idea, all will be certain that someone else does. Someone way above their pay grade — perhaps even a lot of someone elses, all at so great a remove from the commonplace experience that one can scarcely imagine who they might be, never mind whence comes their affection for such a roundly derided trope. Not one will speak for it. Not one. Yes still: as a collective, when they join hands and place them on the planchette, they watch in terrible, fearful admiration as it strides about the agenda signalling for all their several doubts that as a collective they are firmly resolved upon it, and therefore it must happen.

This is the middle management ouija board: really just a special case of a general emergent phenomenon we will call ouija politics.

See also

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