When is an organisation ‘an organisation’?
Some further early thoughts on my proposed annual lecture 2011. To recap: the 2010 lecture suggested we need to think afresh about the core values of the Enlightenment – values which have not only shaped who we are in the West but which continue to frame public discourse. Following Todorov I focussed on the values of autonomy, universalism and humanism, which can roughly be expressed, respectively, as individual freedom, social justice and human progress.
The idea of the 2011 speech is explore these questions in the context of organisations. There are three reasons for this choice of focus:
- Organisations dominate our lives. We work in them, we consume what they produce and they shape almost every aspect of our lives. If values matter in society then will matter in organisations. Indeed it is in and through organisations that we learn and apply many of our values.
- The performance of organisations is crucial to our well-being. We need organisations to do good and to be good at what they do (although people may disagree about the balance between these two measures of success).
- My annual lecture as RSA CEO should reflect on key issues for the Society – as an organisation – and provide some pointers as to future direction and options.
I wrote the day before yesterday that the first section of the speech would be about organisations, what are they, why do they matter how are they changing? But on reflection these are big complex questions without precise (or non circular) answers.
More realistic and useful may be simply to say why organisations matter (see above) and to define what I mean by the term. For the purposes of this speech I think I can adopt a fairly narrow definition.
My focus is on formal organisations with reasonably clear boundaries marking off who is in them (as employees or members). Indeed one simple way of defining an organisation in this context is that it will publish its own accounts (or at least be a distinct unit within a larger organisation which does so). I may change my mind on this as a I go on, but I think my focus is also primarily on organisations beyond a certain size: how about – to pick a criterion from the air – an annual spend of over £1 million and a workforce of more than twenty? This is not to suggest the millions of organisations which don’t meet these criteria don’t matter but that smaller organisations may be less subject to some of the challenges I want to explore linked to hierarchy, bureaucracy and division of labour.
My hypothesis is this: the way medium to large size organisations think about autonomy, fairness and mission is both important and often problematic. I want to explore whether thinking more openly and possibly differently about these ideas might make for better organisations (in both the senses referred to in (2) above).
Before I get into exploring the values in turn I want to say something about the systematic challenges that all organisations (as I have defined them) face by dint of being organisations, and in particular to consider whether it may, for various reasons, be harder for organisations to deal with these challenges today than in the past.
If you have read this far, thank you, I know it’s not exactly scintillating stuff. I got some really useful comments and tips yesterday. Further thoughts gratefully received.
2011 annual lecture – an outline
After yesterday’s rather self indulgent cri de coeur (which received comments far more generous and thoughtful than it deserved) let me get back to the substance of my planned 2011 annual lecture, working title: ‘21st century enlightenment – what it could mean for organisations’.
Here, just for starters, is the basic layout. Given that I am an amateur when it comes to organisational theory, I am looking for ideas for key texts I should read before stating to write.
Part one – why organisations matter:
What do we mean by an organisation? What is the relationship between human evolution and organisation (some, I know, argue that our brains developed because of the size of groups we lived in). Taking a helicopter view, what is the organisational ecology of a country like ours?
Part two – the problem with organisations:
Cover here both the intrinsic problem with organisations (above a certain size?) to whit entrenched hierarchy, bureaucracy, division of labour (use here Weberian distinction between substantive and procedural [bureaucratic] rationality). Also, the modern challenge to organisations (pace of change, technology, declining deference…) with particular reference to Clay Shirky.
Part three – 21st century enlightenment:
Core of 2010 speech with particular emphasis on new thinking about autonomy (freedom), universalism (fairness) and humanism (progress/mission).
Part four – autonomy in organisations:
How do organisations approach the goal of greater employee autonomy (which is critical both to productivity/innovation and job satisfaction)? Is the idea of self-aware (self regulating) autonomy useful and how can it be acted upon?
Part five – justice in organisations:
How do we think and talk about justice within organisations ? How should we seek to inculcate a culture of collaboration and empathy?
Part six – organisational mission:
The problem with being driven entirely by the bottom line or some other reductive measure of progress (Kay, Hutton). How do organisations develop richer, more pluralistic ideas of mission, how do they stick to the mission and how do they maintain space for discussion within the organisation about whether the mission is being honoured or needs to be re-examined?
Part seven – The 21st century enlightenment organisation:
Try to bring points under four to six (above) into a single vision and relate to challenges and aspirations for the RSA.
How does this seem? What must I read before I go any further?
Blocked by the post Christmas blues
What really is the point of it all? I’m afraid that is the question preying on my mind on this grey in- between-time day. ‘But why the existential neurosis?’ I hear my imaginary reader ask.
It could be the time of year, or perhaps it’s the sapping effort of not getting depressed about another West Bromwich Albion slump in form (I have decided that it is pathetic for me, a fifty year old aspiring public intellectual, to have my mood affected by a football team, but as this has been a feature of my undistinguished emotional landscape since I was five years old I’m finding it involves a high degree of mindfulness).
But mainly it is thinking about my annual lecture. The chosen topic is ‘the 21st century enlightenment organisation’. It was, and still is, my intention to write some posts laying out a broad framework for the speech. But there are prior questions. Why am I doing an annual lecture, why on this topic and what can I hope to achieve from it for myself and, more importantly, for the RSA?
One self interested reason is to force me to do some serious thinking amidst all the more managerial and reactive duties of running the Society. Also, it may be trite, but if an organisation wants to be seen as a thought leader (whatever exactly that means) should, I guess, have a leader who gives the appearance of occasionally having thoughts. And, if it is at all successful, the annual lecture might help to frame and guide the work of the Society. This also explains the choice of topic.
Earlier this year the RSA launched the ‘21st century enlightenment’ strap line. The aim was to connect our past and future and also to have a mission which seemed distinctive while being open to a variety of interpretations. As I have written in other posts, the idea has so far been pretty successful. Active Fellows and colleagues among the Society’s staff refer to it, even, occasionally as the basis for decision making. As well as the 360,000 or so views of the ‘Animate’ lecture on line, I have been asked to speak on the idea in settings ranging from a local government conference to an independent girls’ school, and a number of people and organisations have approached the Society suggesting that 21st century enlightenment strikes a chord with their own work.
As these conversations with putative collaborators have demonstrated, the concept is open to many interpretations. This year I gave mine. In a nutshell this was to combine a practical argument for enhanced citizenship with the insights of behavioural science to provide a critique of contemporary interpretations of core enlightenment ideas. I suggested we need to think afresh about the principles of autonomy, universalism and humanism (or in their more everyday forms; ‘freedom, fairness and progress’).
The aim of next year’s lecture is more concretely to apply the idea by exploring what it might mean for the way we think about organisations. As all of us spend most of our time working in, dealing with or being affected by organisations of one kind of another, this is surely a pretty mainstream topic. There are also echoes here of something I began talking about in my first annual lecture, namely new forms of collective action. And, as the RSA is an organisation there is a reflexive element, exploring how the RSA could become ‘the kind of organisation the 21st century needs’.
So far, so good. But then, just as my mind was turning to a speech outline, I remembered a cause of dissatisfaction with previous lectures. It is what might indelicately be called the ‘who the XXXX are you?’ problem. I am genuinely pleased if those who attend the lecture enjoy it and it is gratifying that other people have wanted to watch or hear versions of last year’s speech. But, at the risk of sounding like deluded megalomaniac, I also wanted the idea to gain a wider currency so that people use it beyond the immediate context of the RSA. And here, I have to admit, 21st century enlightenment has been like a liquor discovered on a foreign holiday; fine in its context but not good at travelling.
The problem is my own lack of authority. I have had some interesting and reasonably important jobs but it’s not as if I’ve got a track record of personally achieving outcomes in the real world of people’s day to day lives. Although I hope I might be making some progress with RSA, I can’t pretend that my ideas have much day to impact beyond the small – albeit expanding – orbit of the Society’s direct influence. Not am I scholar whose views can be taken to stand for what other people might think if only they had the same deep knowledge. I don’t even have any new empirical research with which to anchor my thoughts to a real world phenomenon (I guess in desperation I could commission a cheap and cheerful opinion poll but, given my generally disparaging view of such exercises this would be more than a little hypocritical).
So is my annual lecture merely the oratorical equivalent of vanity publishing? Every week or so I get sent one of those books. Sometimes the reason why the author failed to attract a commercial publisher is all too obvious but, on other occasions, a dip into the text suggests that if only I had enough time and concentration I could get something useful from spending a few hours gleaning wisdom the author has spent half a lifetime accumulating. But I don’t and in large part because of the ‘who the xxx are you?’ problem.
We listen to ideas partly so that we might repeat them. But while we are happy to remark ‘apparently new research shows…’ or ‘as Michael Heseltine said’ or ‘as Martin Rees said’ or even ‘as the bloke who invented ebay said’, we are much less likely to interject a conversation with ‘as someone you’ve never heard of, who hasn’t done anything very important, said’.
So instead of outlining the five parts of the plan for my 2011 speech I find myself wondering how I can make the whole thing be more than simply the latest, moderately informed, moderately original, not terribly relevant offering by that bloke who used to work for Blair, now runs a Royal Society (but not one of the authoritative scientific ones) and is sometimes on Radio 4.
Maybe when the booze, mince pies and sprouts (do they agree with anyone’s digestion?) have washed through my system, and perhaps if West Brom pull something out of the hat against Man United or Fulham (bugger, back to the meditation) I will perk up and find some heroic rationalisation for the importance of my thoughts. But right now, I have to admit, I feel about as motivated as the bloke I saw this morning trying to flog Christmas Trees for £2.50 each.
Raise your glasses to social division…
I have made the decision to focus some festive season blogs on early thoughts about my annual lecture 2011 (tentative topic; towards a 21st century enlightenment organisation). Of course, I may fail or renege but as my readers were so incredibly helpful with last year’s lecture I will try my best to use my brain for at least 30 minutes a day between now and January 4th.
But, before I go all serious, I wanted to talk about pubs. The topic arose over Christmas lunch with my long-suffering but always brilliant PA, Barbara. She doesn’t drink so I was surprised when she told me not only how good she was as a barmaid but how much she enjoyed it. As she described the pub in Burton with its bar full of clocking-off miners , I was whisked back to time when public houses conventionally maintained a clear divide between the public and saloon bar.
The former was ‘spit and sawdust’, the place for working men, rowdy youths, old codgers nursing a barley wine and women not too bothered about their reputation. The latter was all carpet, tasselled lampshades and flowery wall paper. The public bar might have a loud juke box, a dart board and shove ha’penny, the saloon would have piped music by Mantovani or James Last and, on special occasions, discreet bowls of cheese straws or peanuts on the counter.
In my own pub-going history the most important distinction was that the public bar had cheaper prices. My first ‘local’ was the County Arms right next to Wandsworth Prison (it’s still there doing a roaring trade). In the public bar a pint of Young’s bitter was 33 pence while in the saloon in was 34 pence. Now, given that three pints got a 17 year old merry, and that I could usually persuade my mum to let me have a quid to go down the pub, this was a deeply significant price differential. Not only could we sit outside in the summer (albeit feeling a bit guilty about parading our enjoyment before the thirsty eyes of the incarcerated), but the bar staff seemed relaxed about people buying a pint in one bar and drinking it in another. The public bar concept has a deep and warm place in my heart.
Now the public/saloon bar distinction has all but disappeared. In fact, I would be fascinated to know if it continues to exist anywhere in the form I enjoyed and exploited at the County Arms. I guess the cause lies in a mixture of commercial opportunities, fashion, the appeal to youth and a general egalitarian spirit in retailing. But I miss it. Not only did it give places more character and drinkers more choice but it meant people could have two different types of night out at the same establishment: The public bar for a pint or five with the lads after work and the saloon bar for something more civilised with a date, spouse or parents.
Another memory links Christmas and pubs. On Boxing Day visits to my grandparents my dad used to take me to the pub on the way to Anfield to watch a great team of the Shankly era. The bars were full of men escaping the family Christmas. For years after – before I started going with mates – I assumed pubs were always full of men awkwardly wearing new jumpers and smoking cigars taken out of metal tubes.
The fact is I love pubs. Having a decent local is a massively important factor in my life satisfaction (where will it be in David Cameron’s wellbeing index I wonder). When I lived in the West Midlands I was the only person under sixty ordering mild: it’s so low in alcohol I could drink for hours without ever getting sloshed (mind you, I did develop a weight problem).
So, to keep my spirits up as I plough into thinking about organisational theory, please share your favourite pub recollections, and if you can’t tell me where I can still get a penny off in the public bar, how about joining my ‘time to bring back the class divide in pubs’ campaign.
Cheers and happy Christmas
Prepare for the Olympics – buy a new couch
I try in this blog to be reasonably dispassionate about issues. But I’m afraid when it comes to London, the Olympics and sporting participation, I find it hard to keep my cool. Let me try to explain why.
Long term readers of this blog may recall that nearly two years ago I tried to get a new Big Society style initiative going. Despite the excellent management of the Olympic project in terms both of preparation for the Games themselves and regeneration, I had started to worry that there was no plan in place to boost sporting participation. Apart from the basic commitment to participation as a good thing for individuals and communities, I felt it was vital that London citizens did something to deliver on the core promise of inclusion made when our city won the bid.
In typical RSA ‘don’t just complain, do something’ style, we worked with a number of public, third sector and private organisations to develop an idea (the development work was kindly subsidised by RSA London Region). This was for an independent campaign (working title ‘Let the games begin’) which would mobilise and organise so that London would be seen by the world to have used the Olympics to boost sporting participation. As well as public marketing campaigns for people to take up sport, ‘Let the Games Begin’ was also going to try to tap ‘hidden assets’ for participation such as making down time in commercial gyms available to school kids or opening up private sector playing fields. We also had plans for a sporting time bank.
There was a great deal of enthusiasm for the idea and even some tentative funding commitments from large corporates. But the idea could not have succeeded without endorsement from the Mayor, who had at the time commissioned Labour MP Kate Hoey to write a sports strategy for London. Unfortunately, despite my attempts to persuade Boris’ policy advisor and Kate, the Mayor’s office refused to back the proposals and we had to abandon it. Kate Hoey assured me that the RSA idea was unnecessary as her local authority-based plan would deliver higher participation.
So I have been saddened by the regular, and now overwhelming, evidence not only that sporting participation rates are falling, not onlythat is there a growing social divide in sporting activity, but also – perhaps most embarrassing for London – rates are particularly poor in some of the Olympic Boroughs. There is yet more evidence today.
As David Goldblatt writes in a piece in this month’s RSA Journal, between state and market there is huge scope for sport to be part of the Big Society vision. If only we had made 2012 participation a public crusade for the whole of London we could, despite major cuts to community sports budgets, have delivered on the promise made back in 2005.
Maybe even now it’s not too late, especially if London media like the flourishing Evening Standard get behind the idea, but it would take a change of heart from Boris and Kate, something which, I’m afraid, is beyond me.
RSA Animate
RSA Mobile
RSA Comment- RSA Projects Blogs
- Twitter @RSAMatthew
RSA Bookshop
The RSA Bookshop, in partnership with Blackwell's the UK's leading academic bookseller, offers Fellows and friends an opportunity to purchase books and to explore our speakers’ ideas in greater detail. Visit the RSA Bookshop.