Peter E. Pflaum - Golden Globe - The Synergy Network http://www.wiredbrain.net/ pflaump@wiredbrain.com RE: How bureaucracy finally strangles its own ability to survive! It is an old family story that Grandfather Edwardo put himself to sleep for several decades reading Gibbon's "Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire." One essentials point is made in that great story: "the Empire fell of it's own weight". It was not overwhelmed by external enemies but simply had become paralyzed by its own bureaucracy. The social law of bureaucratic cancer put an end to the Roman Empire after 25 generations, the Spanish Empire after 5, the British Empire about the same, Soviet Empire in three generation, to IBM and GM in two, and MICROSOFT in one. What brings this topic on, is looking at my institutions phone book and realizing 80% of the names and positions have little or nothing to do with the mission of the organization but could be called support, such as a communications or women's center, but they provide no day care that would support the clients, they have administrative enterprises of all kinds that don't return a unit of measured work or in private terms " PROFIT." Less than half of the institutions resources go to serving the institutions mission. I am not sure people realize this. You need administration, staff services, buildings and grounds etc but enough is too much. They have become so large that the central role of the institution is almost forgotten and becomes secondary to the administration of itself, just like under communism in the USS was. This is an organic and natural process, of bureaucries feeding on themselves, and can only be stopped or reversed by great external pressures. There are more people in the Department of Agriculture, the Agricultural extension services and land grant colleges than farmers. In most large school systems, colleges and universities there are more non-teaching staff (often hidden with teacher sounding titles, than classroom instructors). There are twice as many clerical than sickness treatment people in the modern hospital, including Floor people who do only paperwork , insurance and such like. Is a serious problem. All these people are busy but unnecessary. The fact that they are working hard blinds them to the fact that what they "do" doesn't need to be done. It is only required by themselves and their own system. When the administrative overhead becomes more than half of the total operating cost, it clearly represents a problem. The rebellion of the right led by Newt feels the federal state is strangling the enterprise that makes social life possible. All Bureaucracies in quasi-monopolies, in communist states, in public schools (where less than 50% of resources get to the classroom) , in any big organization's administrative systems, are clearly a necessary evil that can become so large and expensive it overwhelm the ability of the organization to produce and survive. The value of capitalism is that sometimes there is real competition. Real competition forces the reduction in administrators vs." Doers" or downsizing - becoming lean and mean. The Airlines reduced overhead by more than 50% from the fixed price era to survival under competitive conditions, ( not PAA and Eastern, etc.. who are no longer with us) AT&T likewise has been drastically cutting overhead, planes still fly, calls still work, what were all those people doing? Having meetings and passing paper among themselves and creating more paperwork and more administrative positions - this is why deregulation is so important. The Japanese culture promotes decentralization. Decisions are pushed down as far as possible. Western cultures promote centralization. Decisions are pushed up as far as possible. The Western character looks for "heros", who take charge, who are leaders, the cowboy John Wayne enterprise. The oriental civilizations are collective, the desire is to blend in, not stick out. The work groups, the project teams, the "skunk works" are the source of creativeness, synergy, and power not administrative systems. Promotion by seniority has lowered the pressure to create more high level jobs so people can get raises. Flatter pay scales reduce the pressure to have so many captains, majors, col., and generals. This is the real social change going on and sooner or later will get to public bureaucries, schools, banks, police departments. Etc. if they are to survive rather than be replaced or fall of their own weight. ************************************************ Peter E. Pflaum Ph.D. , Headmaster GLOBAL_VILLAGE_SCHOOLHOUSE 225 Robinson Road, New Smyrna Beach FL 32169-2176 (904) 428-9609 pflaump@freenet2.scri.fsu.edu pflaump@wiredbrain.com HTTP://Gold.doi.com/ pflaump@america.com ************************************************