THE 25TH ANNIVERSARY OF DR. FISHER'S CAREER CHANGING SPEECH -- PART ONE

THE TWENTY-FIFTH (25TH) ANNIVERSARY OF DR. JAMES R. FISHER, JR.’S

CAREER CHANGING SPEECH

1984 DCAS FORUM

FRIDAY, MARCH 30, 1984

CARIBBEAN GULF RESORT

CLEARWATER BEACH, FLORIDA 33515

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PARTICIPATIVE MANAGEMENT

AN ADVERSARY POINT OF VIEW

BY

DR. JAMES R. FISHER, JR., Ph.D.

MANAGEMENT & ORGANIZATIONAL
DEVELOPMENT PSYCHOLOGIST


HONEYWELL, AVIONICS SYSTEMS GROUP

HUMAN RESOURCE DEVELOPMENT DEPARTMENT

CLEARWATER, FLORIDA 33546

©
March 1984 Dr. James R. Fisher, Jr., Ph.D.

No part of this paper may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the author.

© James R. Fisher, Jr., Ph.D.
March 30, 2009

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REFERENCE:

My plan was to publish this speech on the 25th anniversary of my giving it, which would be March 30, 2009, but since it is so long, having talked well over an hour, and since the transcript of the speech is 53 two-sided pages (double spaced), I didn't think that practical.

I was the keynote speaker of a forum on "participative management" of some 200 senior managers from high tech defense contracting companies along with senior military officers of the four military branches, and elected and appointed government officials in the Department of Contract Administrative Services (DCAS).

It is a seminal speech in that it was given into the teeth of the hysteria of the time, when the automotive and steel industries were in a deep slump, when the cost-to-produce of military equipment were on a sharp incline, and when Japan, Inc. was pulling off a miracle with Quality Circles (QC) to take the competitive edge from the US in automobile and steel production, home appliances, electronics and glass manufacturing. Japan was bombing and buying up US real estate, while also assuming much of the US debt in its investments.

Looking for a miracle, American management latched on to QCs and participative management in desperation. It didn't work. No one would say it. I did. Everyone was celebrating workers as participants in management, but nobody was registering the consequence of this in terms of actual behavior or performance.

Those who have read WORK WITHOUT MANAGERS (1990) and SIX SILENT KILLERS(1998) will see seeds of those works evident here, but in an immature state. I apologize for the mixed metaphors but not for the ideas.

Given the current state of the complex organization, references were made to what should have been understood if not assuaged in some manner a quarter century ago. Seminal concepts here you might note in this "part one":

(1) The rise of the non-doer doers.
(2) The introduction of Quality Circles on how they focused on the
"trivial many" or 15 percent of the problems while the "vital few" (85%)
were not addressed because management was not sincere about sharing its
problem solving much less its decision-making.
(3) The justification of serial careers of professionals in the complex
organization.
(4) How blue-collar and white-collar workers came to be bottom line
disinterested.
(5) History of the rise of the complex organization.
(6) How senior management and guild workers were identical in function
and purpose.

As I've said elsewhere, I was nearly fired for this speech, put on house arrest having to sign a paper that I would give no speeches, write no articles, while having my pay frozen and having to turn in my notebooks every week. These conditions were to be enforced for the next 18 months. They were.
JRF

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INTRODUCTION

Man is a pragmatic animal. He does what he does because he thinks it is the best way to do it. He may listen to a contrary way of doing it; even say he will “give it a go.” But if his heart and mind are not in it, there is a good chance he will fall back to a behavior that feels comfortable, that fits his disposition.

During the past several years, in fact long before the notion of participative management became part of our jargon, I was a trained changed agent employed to facilitate the shift from paternalistic to participative management, from centrally located decision-making to autonomous work groups. This work, I might add, was conducted in an ideal environment. For one, the team concept had been actively employed among the hourly workforce since 1972. For another, all of the operations of this 4,000-employee facility were on one beautiful campus in the Sunbelt. For yet another, management had been educated to Quality Circle concepts, had authorized countless organizational development (OD) interventions, and had listened to its people conscientiously implementing a significant number of their desired changes. These changes varied from more parking spaces to more cross training, from compensation to performance appraisal.

The result is that this facility has perhaps the most sophisticated and certainly the longest sustained participative working climate in the continental United States. At this writing, moreover, there are 110 Quality Circle teams with more than 1,000 of the workforce participating in the process. Additionally, there is a pilot program of some 200 professional workers and their managers totally immersed in what is called “Shared Management.” This is touted as a “step beyond Quality Circles.” Whether it is or not has yet to be proven.

In any case, virtually everything management could reasonably be expected to do has been done for the workforce. Are they happy? Reasonably so. Are they productive? Relatively speaking, yes. Are they doing as much as they are capable of doing? No. Do they have the entrepreneur spirit? Not on a bet.

Aside: THE FISHER MATRIX, a schematic, was presented at this point which charted processes relative to outcomes in a trajectory to one’s objective. For example, go to school (process)/education (outcome); assess skills (process)/aptitude test (outcome); get job (process)/career opportunity (outcome); student of what you do (process)/promotions (outcome); save 10% of earnings (process)/financial independence (outcome). I saw little evidence of The Fisher Matrix in practice, which hinges on this presentation.

Then are you saying all this has been for naught? Let me respond by saying the single biggest factor I think that has contributed to greater productivity has been the Depression in the steel and automotive industry. Much has been made about the plight of steel and the automotive workers. These workers have entered my coworkers’ homes through television. This is real, palpable to them. “There go I but for the grace of my employer” has been a conscious presence, a motivator.
Meanwhile, the management profession, which has admittedly been in a long slump, thinking in terms of 1955 competition if not dollars, has been close to panic. Its veritable desperation has been the catalyst to the swelling of my discipline, OD, from a footnote in psychology and definition in sociology to a burgeoning profession. A profession, I might add, without portfolio. Undaunted by this fact, management has stopped everything to listen to what we have to say. Never has such sub players been given such a platform. Never such a willing audience to believe . . . anything. Our ideas did not have to make sense. They simply had to sound good. It was the perfect opening for models and paradigms, questionnaires and surveys. Attention was taken from the bottom line, which made the hardiest manager sink into a deep swoon, if not despair, to process.

“Process” has become the magic word. And such word combinations as a “systematic process” or a “systemic system” or such an innocent connection of words as “this system establishes the process which will manifest . . .” gets the attention of the most competent managers. Ironically, this traumatic shock wave, which has gone through management, has largely escaped the attention of the workforce.

PARTICIPATIVE MANAGE AND HIDDEN AGENDAS

Let us assume that paternalistic management, for referenced sake, was authoritative, task oriented and bottom line driven. Conversely, let us assume that the workforce, which complemented this style, was management dependent, authoritatively compliant, selfishly motivated and bottom line disinterested.

Enter participative management. Usually, under pain of career and compensation considerations, this management has become democratic, people centered and process conscious. Meanwhile, the workforce has become process dependent, democratically cooperative, socially motivated and bottom line disinterested. In other words, the workforce feels good about itself and its workplace – happy – but this has not translated into an entrepreneur spirit or productive work.

A recent experience I had at this plant illustrates my point. I was talking to this first line supervisor, who incidentally thinks all these changes are terrific, asking him about a colleague of his in another company plant.

“Have you seen him lately?” I asked
“Oh, yeah. Over the weekend.”
“How are things going in his operation?” I continued
“I don’t know,” he replied. “We didn’t talk about the company business. We talked about the new businesses we both started.”

After he told me a bit about this, I offered, “I guess it is part of the American spirit to be in business for ourselves.”

“Yeah,” he smiled. “You want to be independent. Be your own boss. Have something of your own.”

Most every idea, even an “idea whose time has come,” grows out of the decay of the old. There is precedence in the evolution of ideas. “The more things change the more they remain the same.”

THE RISE OF THE NON-DOER DOERS

The organization is made up of those that manage and those that do. Those that manage have grown into a force unto themselves with layer after layer of middle management created to move the paperwork while acting as a buttress between the feudal lords of industry and the masses.

Next there has been created parallel organizations, which support and serve management, but who neither manage nor do (I belong to this exalted community). These non-doer doers have been called “professional” workers, white-collar class and “staff” to “line” (i.e., to the doers). You find these workers in personnel, finance, security, maintenance, marketing, and even engineering and other exalted sometimes-elitist disciplines. Traditionally, they have created a need for their services and then have delivered it with consummate flair.

Once the need has been identified and user-dependent, existence gives way to pyramid building, and then to organizational acknowledgement and acceptance. Translated, management would never think of being without it or them. It is commonly acknowledged, therefore, that we have too many people doing too many non-thing things.

So, the first confrontation that the organization should have experienced when the competitive edge was missing was to do away with the excess baggage. We are talking about one manager to every ten-twelve workers (industrial average) and one staff employee per every four managers (industrial average). This amounts to megabucks in the most conservative of estimates. So, what have we done? Where have we focused our cost cutting attention? On the doers, of course. The powerful on the powerless. The parent on the child.

Since the ownership spirit is precisely what we are trying to instill in our employees and since the referenced supervisor had been sent to a considerable number of courses and laboratories to develop his consciousness concerning such ownership, I said, “How does this differ from what you are doing here?”

He looked at me in amazement. “I don’t want to do this all my life.” Sensing that I wanted to know more, he continued.

“My wife is my partner in this.” He started to laugh. “She has a real problem paying the help $4.00 an hour.”

“Joe, that’s not even a living wage,” I responded. His expression translated – “So?” This intrigued me. “As you know from your own people,” I continued, “They want more money not because they have done more, but because they need more. It seems you are faced with the same problem we are.”

He scratched his head. “I never thought of it like that.”

“No, possibly not,” I offered. “Perhaps because it is coming out of your pocket now and you can feel the pinch.”

“Yeah. I see what you mean,” he replied.

And this was an experienced supervisor who had been given all the training and tools, which were designed to create a feeling of ownership, but he, too, was bottom line disinterested.

What I am driving at is that I think management has thrown the baby out with the bath water. They have shed their old management style like husking an ear of damaged corn. Consequently, some of the linchpins are missing and the participative ship is dead in the water because most of the fuel has escaped.

ENTER INTERNATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF QUALITY CIRCLES (IAQC)

A whole organization has sprung into being, IAQC, with a strategy and determination to get the “mostest out of the leastest” – and they have. What Dr. J. M. Juran calls the problem solving strategy of solving the “trivial many,” they have solved with such energy and enthusiasm to the applause and gratitude of all. Juran and others point out that if the doers knock out all the fat and become lean as a tooth, they still have solved only 15 percent of the problems facing the organization.

Meanwhile, management, which has frequently become “too much and too many,” has difficulty turning the x-ray on itself for the fear that it will see the “big C” – Capital neglect.

Management has purposely established a caste and class system of non-doers who are confused. Just as the doer is inclined to be bottom line disinterested, they are more inclined to mistake their self-interested outcomes (department goals and objectives) as bottom line, which could be even worse.

THE ANSWER TO THE BOTTOM LINE DISINTEREST – SERIAL CAREERS

Add to this the fact that in this changing work climate where all sorts of wonderful programs are being sponsored, the workforce sees its benefits shrinking, its pay frozen, its promotional opportunities disappearing and its job security eroding. Is it any wonder that it goes out and starts another business on the side?

I was writing this in the cafeteria the other day (I often like to get away from my office to write) and there in the booth next to me, on company time, was a company staff engineer selling an insurance policy to an administrative worker – two non-doers doing personal business without an apology, expression of guilt or concern. It was as if “I have the right. I get this opportunity in lieu of pay . . .,” or whatever.

For comparative purposes, out of this population of 4,000, there are 800 production workers (20%), 1,000 engineers (25%), 400 managers (10%), and1,800 other professionals (45%). No less than one quarter of these professional workers are believed to have serial careers, much of which are conducted on company time. From selling real estate to selling diamonds, from pet fish to insurance, from restaurants to management consulting, from private teaching to private investigating, from motel operations to hardware store managing.

What all this seems to indicate is that a great number of attractive solutions have been developed without a clear understanding of what the problem is. Meanwhile, the rank and file go on their merry way oblivious to the anguish and pain endemic to the organization. Put simply, they fail to care because they don’t see it as their problem. Let the “organization” solve it. Ironically, they see the organization as distinct from themselves, as if it has life without their blood in it. If the organization bleeds, they would be hard pressed to see themselves bleeding with it.

To understand how this dilemma has evolved one must revisit the history of the complex organization.

THE SEEDS OF THE PROBLEM

Two hundred years ago, when most of the business of business was conducted in small guilds, there was great informality. People did what they did best. Somebody was in charge but there was an additional role they assumed besides being a line contributor. There were no job descriptions, no performance appraisals, no reward and recognition programs, no staff support, nobody else to blame if they made a product that would not sell because it was made poorly or overpriced.

Survival was predicated on doing the best you were able to do with the skills you had, the materials and mechanics you had to work with, and pride and sense of ownership you brought to the work. Work was love made visible.

People knew who they were by what they did. Often, the work was dirty, grimy, exhausting with little profit, hardly a living wage. We romanticize this period now, but in reality, it was harsh, hard existence. The guild workers had to work long hours, seventy hours a week was not uncommon. There were few if any entitlements, only work.

Were they happy? Not particularly. Were they productive? Extremely so. Were they doing as much as they were capable? Generally speaking, yes. Did they have the entrepreneur spirit? In buckets! They had no choice. The wolf was always gaining ground on them.

Then the Industrial Revolution exploded into their midst. These self-directed, self-managed, self-motivated workers were forced by necessity into a strange environment of huge machines and masses of people.

There was no model that fit the purposes of the complex organization. The closest model was the Roman Catholic Church and the National Army. The goal of the church was to save your soul; the goal of the army was to save your hide. No confusion there. Everyone knew, understood, and could relate to those common goals.

But the complex organization was an organization of sub-organizations and sub-sub-organizations, all with their own goals along with every individual’s hidden agenda. Meanwhile, the worker who never (from the beginning) felt comfortable with all these goals, dreamed in terms of his own private agenda. He saw himself as renting his body for a price and a time in the factory. But this never included his will. He saw the factory as a voluntary prison that he entered because he had no other choice. He couldn’t compete with the factory from the guild, nor in many cases from the farm. He had given up his freedom out of fear. The fear of survival.

And so, from the opening chapters of the Industrial Revolution to this Post-Industrial Age, the worker has never identified with the factory as “his” factory, or as an extension of his will and his dreams.

This has been the domain of only a precious few, the senior managers of the organization. This is where the power rests, not in the stockholders nor, indeed, in the capitalistic society, which nurture these human mountains. Curiously, senior management to this day operates very similarly to the management of the guilds. There exists a common factor of wills dedicated to the same set of principles ever conscious of the precarious nature of the bottom line. It is, indeed, their organization and their hide if it falls on bad times.

More curious still, the doers and the senior managers are cut from the same atavistic cloth. They both speak the language of the guilds. What makes for the problem of the modern organization is that there are ten or twelve layers of bodies between these guild players. What these doers hear, then, is a language that is remote and beyond their interests and comprehension. Instead, what they hear is demands, threats, candy-coated enticements, directives that a child hears from a concerned or frustrated parent. And appropriately, like a child, the expected behavior follows:

(1) Testing the firmness of the demand.
(2) Accepting punishment as justification for challenging the demands.
(3) Learning to say the right words while continuing to misbehave.
(4) Treating the machines (toys) with disdain, neglect and contempt.
(5) Seeing the organization as blocking them from what they want to do.
(6) Crying, whining and embarrassing the organization into submitting to its will.
(7) Feeling angry and hostile and unfulfilled after getting its own way.
(8) Telling the organization what it wants to hear rather than what it needs to know.
(9) Behaving in a way that says, “I want more” – when more is given – “I still want more” – “I will always want more.”

Consequently, the workforce is frozen in the adolescent-infantile state notwithstanding all the programs and all the slogans, which would symbolize the contrary. Put another way, I am saying the modern organization gets very little real productivity out of its people – perhaps only about 30 percent of what they could do.

Does this mean most workers don’t care? Of course not. It means that the structure of the organization does not fit the tasks – the structure should follow the tasks and not vice versa, which is too often the case.

But more importantly, the workers are not treated as adults, as full partners in the enterprise. Oh! The words are used, but management’s behavior does not compute with the words.

Granted, a great deal of attention is being given the production worker and his environment. Quality Circles, Quality of Work Life, and Quality of Work issues are receiving consideration. As are cross-culture awareness programs getting off the blueprints and on to the factory floor. Moreover, management styles are being painstakingly altered in quest of the magic formula, which will make the organization productive.

What has this achieved? At best, marginal if not ephemeral results. Why? The majority still marches to a different drummer because they have been conditioned to that cadence. And this is extremely important to note … conditioned to that cadence.

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© James R. Fisher, Jr., Ph.D. This is the first segment of a multi-segment reintroduction of “Participative Management: An Adversary Point of View” presenting on March 30, 1984. The next segment will open with “Toward a Conceptual Grasp of the Problem: Erik Erikson’s Model of Human Development.” This speech is being presented exactly as it was given twenty-five years ago.