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Hundreds Leave "Boss-less" Zappos As "Get-Paid-To-Quit" Scheme Backfires
Many workers dream of one day being their own boss. At online clothing retailer Zappos — an independent subsidiary of Amazon — employees can realize that dream via the company’s “Holacratic” corporate culture. Holacracy is, in the words of CEO Tony Hsieh, “a system that removes traditional managerial hierarchies allowing employees to self-organize to complete work in a way that increases productivity, fosters innovation and empowers anyone in the company with the ability to make decisions that push the company forward.” So essentially, it’s a boss-less structure aimed at driving productivity and innovation by allowing employees to take ownership of their respective goals and responsibilities.
On the surface, one might imagine that everyday employees would be thrilled to work in an environment free from overbearing supervisors (that class of non-farm laborer who, in America, is enjoying record wage growth even as those they manage have seen their pay stagnate) harboring false notions of superiority. This is probably why Hsieh felt comfortable distributing a memo which criticized the company’s lack of progress in shifting to a completely Holacratic structure, to Zappos’ 1,500 employees.
In the memo, Hsieh essentially gives employees a deadline for full implementation before reminding them that they are free to take “the offer”, a reference to Zappos’ practice of offering to pay employees to quit. The rationale behind the practice is to ensure that everyone who works at Zappos truly wants to be there. Historically, only around 1-3% of employees accept the pay-to-quit proposition and as such, it likely came as quite a surprise to Hsieh when more than 200 people chose to take the money and run rather than work in an environment with no managers. Here’s WSJ:
About 14%, or 210, of the company’s roughly 1,500 employees have decided to leave the firm, according to Zappos. The exodus comes amid the company’s transition to an unusual management structure called Holacracy, in which employees essentially manage themselves, without traditional bosses or job titles.
The company has acknowledged that the transition to this new form of self-management has been a difficult one. In March, Mr. Hsieh sent a 4,700-word memo to staff stating that Zappos, an independent subsidiary of Amazon.com Inc., was taking too much time switching to this new management structure. He offered all employees at least three months’ severance if they decided by April 30 that working in Holacracy was not for them.
In its training for new hires, Zappos promises a month’s pay to anyone who decides the company’s playful culture, in which employees have dressed up in animal costumes during the firm’s all-staff meeting, isn’t for them.
Here are excerpts from Hsieh’s memo:
We’ve been operating partially under Holacracy and partially under the legacy management hierarchy in parallel for over a year now. Having one foot in one world while having the other foot in the other world has slowed down our transformation towards self-management and self-organization. While we’ve made decent progress on understanding the workings of the system of Holacracy and capturing work/accountabilities in Glass Frog, we haven't made fast enough progress towards self-management, self-organization, and more efficient structures to run our business. (Holacracy is just one of many tools that can help move us towards self-management and self-organization, but simply abiding by the rules of Holacracy does not equal self-management or self-organization.)
After many conversations and a lot of feedback about where we are today versus our desired state of self-organization, self-management, increased autonomy, and increased efficiency, we are going to take a "rip the bandaid" approach to accelerate progress towards becoming a Teal organization (as described in the book Reinventing Organizations)...
Teal organizations attempt to minimize service provider groups and lean more towards creating self-organizing and self-managing business-centric groups instead. As of 4/30/15, in order to eliminate the legacy management hierarchy, there will be effectively be no more people managers…
Self-management and self-organization is not for everyone, and not everyone will want to move forward in the direction of the Best Customers Strategy and the strategy statements that were recently rolled out. As such, there will be a special version of “the offer” to everyone who reads Reinventing Organizations and/or meets some other criteria (outlined towards the end of this email).
We’re sure there are lessons in here somewhere both about workers’ desire for guidance and structure and about whether it’s a good idea to force people into choosing between a seemingly unpopular ultimatum and free money, but we’ll leave you with the following gem from the Zappos employee who we cannot say is “in charge” of the transition to Holacracy because to say that would be to violate Holacratic principles, so we’ll just say he’s ‘interested’ in facilitating the transition:
“Whatever the number of people who took the offer was the right number.”
It's hard to argue with that.
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You mean you want me to be responsible for myself.......?! I'm outta here......
I'd make such a horrible boss, I could never work for myself...
[I'd probably wind-up filing a labor grievance against myself for 'hostile work environment.']
The slaves desire slavery.
Actually, I bet most of those that left are soon to be former managers.
"dressed in animal costumes."
Perhaps they will be welcome in the 'Spaceship' when completed.
Dude, I'm no expert, the last severence package I took did not include unemployment.
Its pretty obvious the managers quit. They need to lord over some hapless souls. Goodbye and goodriddance to middle management which does nothing.
Take this job and shove it.
I'm getting free healthcare and taking a 29.5 hr/wk job.
This working stuff is for suckers.
Self Organizing = Exponentially Growing Cluster Fuck
Here's what it's all heading towards soon: MANNA
http://marshallbrain.com/manna1.htm
Thinking makes my head hurt.
Hell or Crazy
Take your pick....
"holacracy"? sir, will you have one or two teaspoons of estrogen in your latte?
Do I envision a stone age tribe in the Amazon when I think of Holacracy because when humans developed hierarchies to manage production they left the jungle and poverty behind??
You got it backwards. We overthrew the alpha male of the group in order to develop civilization. There is no room for managers in the future.
We are all sovereign and supreme.
But then, we are a slave race created by the gods, old habits die hard.
So, I can assume that you approve of this mini experiment in communism?
From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.
MANNA was a very interesting read....but I have not read the next generation yet. Automation & tech are going to radically change humanity. Thanks.
While I do not see value added by all middle managers there are definitely some that add value. The key would be to weed out the non-value added managers - but then again there are not enough value added managers that can actually accomplish this.
That's why we've been in a mostly Qualitative Easing mode among the middle and upper classes as of late, and this process is long and slow one to recover from. If you do, you are part of the recovery.
I have a friend who fires people for a living. When his company gets hired to fix a large corporation, he fires almost all the upper managment.
Upper management is where the useless assholes and boot lickers collect.
Middle management is where the actual supervision gets done, but it is also where the useless idiots at the top like to make cuts to justify their existence.
No company has ever suffered as a result of a company-wide Vice-President purge.
Maybe the three month severance was too enticing to the younger crowd. Take the summer off and find something else to do.
Yeah, that was my take, too. Offer that shit in January.
The people who quit are dumb asses, bad at math. You quit and get 3 months paid vacation. You stay, get laid off, and you get unemployment for 6 months. Doh!
On the other hand, that managers just had their careers destroyed. Better to move on before your job skills expire.
Great job market to be unemployed. LoL
Lot's of company, and it's a hell lot more than 5%.
If any of them have an engineering degree or skill, they can always move to Houston and join the 40,000+ engineers layed off in the last 6 months from Big and Medium sized oil and gas companies.
" Yes we can! "
Completely different industries. Your talking about petro/mechanical/geo engineers vs electrical/computer engineers.
They probably didn't leave because of this move towards self governance...whatever that is.
It sounds like they left because it's a fucking weird place to work. Wearing animal costumes to a staff meeting...that's cultish behavior.
I'm sure Tony Hsieh is a brilliant guy...he built a great company. But he's an eccentric guy and not everyone can handle working in that kind of environment.
Someone tell Tony they sell shoes...he doesn't need to reinvent the corporate culture.
Damn weirdos
"dressed in animal costumes."
We have a 16 yr old son who is addicted to the internet portion of the 'Furry' lifestyle. It's some sick twisted sex stuff and we have been thru hell with him over it. Does Zappos do any investigation of what this harmless fun is rooted in? I see sexual abuse in the workplace suits waiting.
There is management. Someone made the decison that employees must dress up in "playful" animal, furry attire. Perhaps the decision makers are addicted to the furry game. Some furries do so in a harmless manner but as you said for others it is very sexualy oriented. Those who have it deeply rooted into their lives, as these decision makers, are usely into the sexual aspects of it.
I have no problem with what adults do but pushing it onto employees under threat of dimissal is wrong. The office parties are going to get weird later at night.
Ding ding ding! They'll be allowed to keep their current salary until the end of the year but after that they'll have to go before a peer review board to justify their pay. Since they're no longer a manager and have no one under them good luck.
I worked at Zappos and most of what managers did was try to create things for themsevles to do with a 2 hour lunch in between.
Yeap former managers who see it as demotion, and imagine the shit they will get of their former underlings. Hey tosser you ain't my manager anymore, do you remember when you.................. fuck you!!
> The slaves desire slavery.
Not too much of a stretch. Just like women desire to be dominated by strong males. (Generally speaking and excluding all lesbians, transgender, feminists, etc.)
You obviously need to have sex with more lesbians... Consider it a challenge.
And he aint lying either, he is hideous, unsustainable, soon to be extint.
it's fucking snake oil... if Denning thinks it's crap, it is crap, period end of story...
most people in the world aren't hyper extroverted self-starters... they need structure and directions and most of all *trust*... the best traditional managers you'll ever see are effectively servants to their team, as can be expected of any true leader...
Most need alcohol and pizza at the end of the day.
Don't denning me Dude.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/stevedenning/
Are you sure that they have to wait until the end of the day? I walked several floors at Zynga a few years ago and there was beer in at least one of the break rooms.
Agreed, this is an utopy. Many people are unable/unwilling to take initiatives, are waiting to be told what to do, in every sphere of their life. Thinking that, out of anarchy, an incredible osmosis will emerge is so naive, almost touching.
Workers just want to come to work and do the work, maybe flirt and gossip a little. I'm just guessing that Zappo's self-management plan replaced managers with odious requirements that workers write daily journals and weekly essays on all the great things they learned that week and the challenges they faced and all the things they will do to make themselves into a better worker and whether they feel they succeeded in their past commitments and what value they added in the last thirty minutes. They probably spend a ridiculous portion of their work day doing the dumbest stuff imaginable. It isn't that they don't want to work or don't not want managers, they just don't want to do stupid shit.
Hmm, but that's what Managers do: Stupid sh!t, like settling childish disputes amongst the worker bees, using a cattle prod on the lazy drones, etc.
Mr. Hsieh sent a 4,700-word memo to staff... and then is "shocked" when they quit. Real CEO material- where does Bezos find these clowns?
You don't HAVE to be a Liberal to do something like this, but it helps.
Yeah - let's see... Tony Hsieh founded and sold LinkExchange, joined Zappos when it had no revenue and took it to a billion in revenue before selling to Amazon. I'm sure your track record is comparable. He's a clown - not a genius like you.
You obviously graduated from the Bezos school of BS accounting. That "billion" is "gross revenue" which was a 60% markup from GAAP revenue. But I'll generous, with a billion in revenue this asshat only managed $10 million in profit in an entire year (and I didn't even dig through the footnotes of the S-4), I cleared more than than that in a single day in my 20's working for someone else. That's also a 100bps (i.e 1%) annual profit margin, I've never equaled that level of underachievement (outside of startup years). Although in fairness, I have never ripped off a customer with valuations that insane either.
https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/1018724/000119312509155961/ds4.htm
You should really do your homework before presenting to the class.
No competent CEO is going to give a memo that long (200-250 words per page) to all 1,500 employees, most of whom are at the bottom of the wage scale and expect it to be properly digested. That is an unprofessional and arrogant stunt fit for a business small enough to fit in a stripmall.
Nice.
thanks.
Based on the ratio of up votes to down votes your comment has received, I agree with you.
But your comment was way too long to read. I quit.
Well, if he had made it three times as long, he could have called it a Manifesto. Too long for Memo, too short for Manifesto ...
4700 word memo? We'll hola at ya.
I didn't know there's that many words in the English language!
The good news is that employees can download the 4,700 word memo on their Kindle and generate more faux revenue for Amazon.
<< The good news is that employees can download the 4,700 word memo ... into their trash bin. >>
I'm wondering why Hsieh gets to be in charge? Can't the workers self-organize to do his job too?
Malinvestment results in some crazy shit.
...as does Radiation. I wonder if this is a combination of the two.
I just go to the adidas site and get the shoes for a better price and free shipping. Zappos prices suck.
A few years ago, they really had good deals. I got Clarke Wallabys there for almost half the cost anywhere else.
The most comfortable shoes on Earth.
Now they're just another one of many online retailers.
No wonder people left. Who wants to work at a place that won't reward hard work with a promotion to a higher salaried position?
I've mostly worked for myself so I have a different idea of what a "Job" is. Owning a business can whipsaw from the greatest thing in the world to the shittiest idea you ever had within minutes.
Sometime 10 times a day.
Been self employed for over six years. Your last two sentences are dead on. But what is a guy to do? Get a ack...gasp....j...job? :-)
Haha, so what ZeroHedge, are you snarking it up about someone trying an unconventional business model?
'We’re sure there are lessons in here somewhere both about workers’ desire for guidance and structure"
Are you, darling? Why not go ahead and draw those conclusions, let us know whats wrong with Zappos' model. 200 left, and 1300 stayed, and?
Talking out of both sides of your mouth again, laughing at people's failures when they try something new, and meanwhile acknowledging the gloom of our dying system. That's the sign of cynicism. Gotta keep some hope and faith in there, amongst the precious metals and cans of beans, or it will be even harder to make it through our difficult future.
Agree with @ucde... is ZH really opposed to alternative organizational models? All the content here is about the problems with global macro/micro -- would be nice to have some proposed solutions -- or at least a spotlight / constructive criticism aimed at alternative proposals.
But perhaps ZH wishes only to stir the pot... it doesn't seem like ZH has any interest in 'alternative models', just complete and total collapse of society.
You mean to tell me that a nihilist worldview website with anonymous authors posting as a nihilist from a nihilist movie engages in nihilism?
Knock me over with a sequined boa!
HuH?
But I liked the upper two posts for their naive attitude.
Somewhere it it is good to be young and stupid, and I'm glad to see it here.
While I'm all for experimental, its so much easier to experiment with other people's money. Its a little different when you are leveraging YOUR future. My experience has been that for people to excel it is important to have individual as well as overall goals for people to shoot for. Most need goals and tools to achieve those goals. For people to show up to a board meeting in costumes would be pretty disgusting to someone who was serious about their work.
I've found that many of us enjoy a fast and loose environment when young, but most at some point start to get serious at some point. High tech industries have been so blessed with obscene margins that they could effectively make a brick fly. Its only when the find themselves forced to compete that reality takes hold. Then the leftists scream like little girls.
Nice.
(thanks)
This is my nice night for some reason.
Nice'n your nice:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=rQnYi3z56RE
90% of the population is filler. You gotta hire some of them just to fill the chairs. Zappos is just trying to hire from the 10%
Some employees do as much work as 3 but you can never find enough of them.
Ucde, present your solutions or STFU. Idling waiting.
Atomizer,
Its not about me as an individual dreaming up 'solutions'. We aren't Gods and that doesn't actually work. Have you ever dreamed up, on your own, a solution to a complex problem that involved other people, then delivered it to them, had them implement it, and everything just worked bang-on? I remember some software engineering disasters which resulted from people trying to do exactly that. Its not how things get done in real life.
Instead we, all together as a group/society, and also in individual little cliques, each innovate and try new things. Maybe Zappos' model is a colossal failure, maybe something from it sticks. At any rate, they are trying something new. That alone is very valuable.
And whats with this STFU business? Its the internet and the site is about snarking, if I want to use snark to counteract snark, whose to stop me? The point is that being a cynic about every single societal development indicates an imbalance in the self and a crushed, hopeless view of reality. That's an extremely weak place to be coming from.
Based solely on your previous post... you should know better than to construct that strawman.
Ideas are a dime a dozen. Actual lower primates are capable of ideas. I have enough business plans and road show decks with actual brilliant ideas that are not worth the paper they are printed on to wipe my as for the rest of my life and yours.
Management is about execution, and you know it, and admit as much.
Spoiled brats with "ideas" both are a cancer and a dime a dozen.
We graduate millions of "masters of business bullshit" who could have executed this better, regardless of the merits of the plan itself, at a fraction of the cost.
In four bullet points (since I actually do respect other's time):
* 2-4 pages maximum with links to supplementary materials, AssClown disrespects ether his employees time or his shareholders' money
* different 2-4 page pitches to enlisted and officers, with different supplementary materials (irrespective of a common "manifesto"), As is = Hubris + Arrogance + Disrespect of Subordinates.
* respond to feedback, and have contingency plans and execute contingency plans. How is the attrition rate in any way acceptable? The average quota money or inbred in-law could execute better.
* Bezos = Bullshit (always), and Arrogance and Hubris always result in failure, on a long enough timeline.
That second bottle of Ossinger is begging for equal time...
Practice makes perfect.
Mr ucde is a time waster.
But as you've well proven, a useful foil to make cognitive points.
"Management is about execution..."
What business self-help book did you read that one in? sheesh. ok. Slogan game is tight.
Holacracy harnesses the conscious capacity of those within to sense dissonance between what is (current reality) and what could be (the purpose): the feeling of a “tension”. When there’s lack of clear and effective channels for processing tensions, they fester into frustrations, burn-out, and disengagement. Tensions are only useful to the extent the organization can process them into meaningful change. Holacracy provides several explicit channels to process tensions.
Holacracy installs clear processes for “governance” and “operations” – in every team, at every level of scale. Governance is about working “on” the organization, and operations is about working “in” it – each has different mechanisms for processing tensions into actionable clarity.
http://holacracy.org/how-it-works
Just...lol
I wasn't familiar with the idea of Holacracy until now. Spent some time at that website. Thanks
It appears to me a complete clusterfuck and I will be very surprised if it works rather than prompting even more people to leave and take the package.
The exodus may have more to do with the fact that Zappos pays salaries that are often below market rates -- the average hourly worker makes just over $23,000 a year.
http://about.zappos.com/press-center/media-coverage/what-would-make-you-...
Sounds like he is trying to start a commune where everyone is equal (except for Hsieh, of course. He is more equal than the rest). Sorry Hsieh but this little social experiment has been tried repeatedly over the years and the outcome is always the same. In the mean time, here is your little brown hat . . .
Have you ever notice that Socialists that want businesses to work on a socialist model of complete egalitarianism never get together and pool their money to start one?
Why if it's such a great idea? Surely there must be at least one company that started out that way and the CEO and the floorsweeper earn the same?
No?
Ah, so a scheme in which those with the loudest voices and/or best ability to build coalitions with others in their immediate work area, irrespective of their technical ability and work ethic will decide how things will be done, which is to say they will tell others what they are to do.
Undoubtedly a great future for that. Indeed it seems remarkably like what operates in the political sphere which is not fading away. Of course the political sphere has the ability to impose taxes on the community at large and even print money.
you got it... I wish Hsieh and others like him were forced to read this...
http://www.amazon.com/Quiet-Power-Introverts-World-Talking/dp/0307352153
Your Union Dues at work.
Yes, the best workers are usually modest and quiet.
You know the top is in when companies start paying their employees to quit.
You know the top is in when companies start paying their employees to quit.
ZERP - Zero Employees Really Performing
Sarcasm Mr Yen.
Nice.
Golden Quantitative Easing Parachute.
How about one group works according to the new priniciples, and one group works according to the old principles, and after a year compare?
Sit between two stools (now), or eggs all in one basket (next), seems like a dilemma only a corpratist could love.
Was there an asylum near you closing due to water shortage?
Seperate budgets! What if one side goes tits up before the year is out? Can't run your department like Detroit.
I would hazard to guess most of those 14% were some of the best performers. Likely had marketable skills and had a job waiting.
Megabucks is up to $10,000,000.
No way I would stick around. OTOH, no way would I ever work in retail, so the point is moot.
only 15 percent. I'm disappointed, it should have been over 50 percent. I live in vegas and don't understand hisch or his company. The mayor and ex mayor of vegas worship this prik. He's supposedly revisitizing the downtown area. just a huckster to me.
This is not a new operational concept, and the reason you don't see it in widespread use is that from a basic business perspective it is seriously flawed. I won't bore with all the details but just say that Hsieh clearly doesn't appreciate the difference between a "boss" and a management professional, nor does he appreciate the need for the latter. The putz ought to be fired before he causes more damage.
This 'Pay to Quit' program has actually been around awhile. Amazon has their own version of it copied from the Zappos model....
http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikaandersen/2014/04/22/want-to-earn-5000-s...
Hey, that's great!
Think of all the money I can make quitting all these jobs!
Heck, that's better than EBT!...
Another piss ant using Matrix structure to run the business. Wait until Salesforce falters.
What is a Matrix Organization Structurehttp://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mCHUkLLSXt4
Have you ever worked at a company that has a Matrix Organization Structure?
I did, once. By far, it was the most dysfunctional work environment I have ever witnessed. Among other things, you don't know who the fuck your boss is(the person who carries the most weight on your performance review) at any given time,
Never again.
Yes, I have worked for a Matrix company. That's why I brought the subject up. Disfunctional business organization.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holacracy
...
The term holacracy is derived from the term holarchy, coined by Arthur Koestler in his 1967 book The Ghost in the Machine. A holarchy is composed of holons (Greek: ????, holon neuter form of ????, holos "whole") or units that are autonomous and self-reliant, but also dependent on the greater whole of which they are part.[5] Thus a holarchy is a hierarchy of self-regulating holons that function both as autonomous wholes and as dependent parts.[5]
...
Sounds like a fancy description of the Borg in Star Trek.
Notice the word play hole / whole. Easy to confuse an easily impressionable mind use phonetics here from a propaganda standpoint when taken in context of describing a government type structure, it is implied it describes a whole system not a hole system.
Notice you have two economic competing systems? We hate the matrix system. We are capitalism endeavors. Your brains will blown be blown away.
Good luck with TPP.
We need a country like that no central anything.
Unfortunately most people support communism because they don't truly understand economics. I've found that those who claim to support free markets don't support free markets at all. These Romney and Obama types believe in hard core central planning so when 2007 came along they were and alway will be the first ones in line for a bailout.
What they really want is to own slaves but they don't realize that unhappy slaves have a tendency to riot. Perhaps they thought that dumping the companies problems on white middle class people would solve their problems. It hasn't and now that that class has diminished these losers who habitually get bailouts from crooked banksters who control the Fed. Will have no other choice but to confront the anger of minorities who really hate them. That is what is really behind this whole black lives matter thing is.
Oh and its only going to get a lot uglier. This is just the beginning so these losers will have to kill around as many as chairman Mao did in order to get what they want. Then and only then will people realize that these people weren't capitalist at all. In the mean time I will continue to show what real capitalism is.
One philosopher I have the utmost respect for is Socrates. He never confronted Justice by saying it was right or wrong. What he did was very ingenius he would ask all of those who called for justice. What their view of justice was; from there he handled the situation accordingly. The same can be done with capitalism, communism, socialism or any other form of government. You see by asking people what they think is right you get down to the nitty gritty of what they really want; tyranny or freedom!
Ahem......
Zappos must not be a true decentralized organization. I can assure you that managers cause more harm than good. First of all managers don't work and like employees they are self interested. So they tend to hire those that kiss their behinds then use them to gain power in the company. Most of the people these managers support are lazy frackers who don't want to work and some don't even know how to. So they need to keep hiring temporary workers to do the work or they need peeons that will take all kinds of abuse.
As a matter of fact a truly decentralized company can easily outperform with 1/8 the force of a fully organized centrally planned top to bottom outfit. There is no one to get in the way and the more people work the more they make. So you ae using the employee's self interest to gain more production and more revenue.
Now for the problems with a decentralized organization.
1) Its not truly decentralized so people wind up giving up on it and people who support central planning use it as something to point to. So that they can prove their own self worth of course.
2) People born and raised up on welfare (the give me generation who is always entitled) will never adjust to repsonsibility. No matter how much money is offered to them if they work harder.
3) There is no incentive program or the program has the wrong incentives which encrouages cheating, lying and corruption.
If all three of those are eliminated then a decetralized work force will produce up to ten fold more than a centralized organization. People who are responsible and hard working don't need to be watched while those who are lazy and irresponsible always need to be watched.
Ahem.....
"managers don't work".
From my perspective (military), I went from peon (Private) to low-ranking supervisor of peons (SGT) to trying to lead 30 peons (PL) to 2nd in command of 100 peons (XO) to staff officer.
There are MANY, and I mean MANY who will tell you the most fun they had in the military was as a Peon. Do what your told, show up when you're supposed to, stay in shape - PROFIT!
As a middle manager (Major) my responsibilites increased with rank. Sometimes linearly, sometimes exponentially. And I sure as F&^K wasn't doing clothing, or books, or shoes.
Good point.
Like Uncle Buster used to say...
"The guy below you on the ladder only sees what you're ass is doing because he can't see your head."
I remember teachers trying the same approach in class. We were split in groups of "equals" and given assignments.
Out of the 50 people about three did all the work and the other 47 took credit for doing it.
This type of bullshit only works when you have Wall Street money behind you. I remember all of the Dotcoms that allowed unlimited vacation, had pool tables, gave free lunches, and said everyone could work at thier own pace. It was really about lasting long enough to get bought out by a larger company, not actually making profit to pay employees.
Was thinking about the same thing myself ADR. I remember reading news articles about how the workplace has to change to the new way of work back in the late 1990's. All the people in the human resources positions thought this was great. They were getting to spend money on worthless things that made workers happy, or want to work in their company, but actually did not make the company more productive. Truly only works when there seem to be an unlimited amount of funds coming into a company via Wall Street or if you are government entity getting allocated more taxpayer money each year via baseline budgeting. Once the economy hits a downturn, those companies seem to dry up and blow away real fast. I have a feeling we are starting the see the same thing happen again. The oil bust (and world wide debt problem) will slowly be filtering out to all areas of the country in 8-12 months. But then again, QE4 will probably be implemented to kick the can a little further.
If you cut employees loose and expect them to manage themselves like contractors, you're going need to double their compensation. Those that see this, basicaly bolted.
However...
This holocracy bs is nothing more than part of a global wage balancing effort now targeted at the management and C-suties.
No surpise coming from Bezos.
It's already gutted the working class labor and made in roads in the educated (software) labor.
It's coming to all labor that can be geographically arbitraged until the global wage rebalancing is complete.
Capital vs. Labor: Capital is kicking labor's ass.
indeed
but when labor has no means of buying its own production, things go poof and dissapear
Good concept. Tell it to the I universe and report back.
These Coal, Oil, Railroad, Banking, Manufacturing and Mining Robber Barons have made your world the comfort it is today.
Sorry, saw your last post, Go for a good job, not with the likes of these goobers. ald
What it means is there is exactly one boss.
Ever was.
Went to Zappos dot Com and clicked on their "Jobs" tab at the bottom. All I saw was a lot of smiling hipsters and a lot of high-fiving. Zero work being done. I'd want to leave too, sounds boring (plus being within 20 meters of a hipster gives me the willies).
Now I need to figure out if these guys are publicly traded, and if so, whether or not they'll go under not to long from now. Looks like they have an overly generous pay/benefits package for marginally-skilled hipster jobs though.
If you do decide to apply, make sure you wear a large watch and skinny jeans to the interview. It's a prerequsite for the job.
This whole concept sounds like a way to get just get rid of higher paying management positions. Were the employee's offered a higher pay rate? How were they to be judged or evaluated? This is just really stupid.
A great leader can develop a team that he or she does not have to manage ALOT, if his team members understand the commom goal and how to get there! It's not a hard concept to understand, but it can take time to find the proper people. It also requires a level of communication expertise, that not a lot of management or leaders possess.
SH
I interviewed with them a few months ago (didnt get the job obviously)
Startup culture = "we will let you not dress professionally and act qwerky so we can pay you dog shit wages"
I'd rather wear a suit and tie and be paid what i'm worth.
~DipshitMiddleClassWhiteKid
Job Offer: "We'll pay you what you're worth..."
Applicant: "I can't work for that!" :>D
Those of us that have worked for ourselves know that for most of us it is very difficult to stay focused, driven and motivated with out a "boss" keeping us on track.
Some are born to it, most are not.
I worked as a contract employee for a firm that let me basically do my own thing, though I did have a few goals and had to account for and substantiate for my efforts from time to time--"Tell me what you did the past month." I was only marginally happier with that arrangement than with a traditional hierarchical structured position.
But I thrived as a self-employed person, as the goals were mine--"Sink, tread water, or swim for the beach." (As an old friend of mine used to day.)
Liberty is a demand. Tyranny is submission.
I commented elsewhere that I doubt they left because they missed their managers, rather they left because the managers were likely replaced with onerous daily essay-therapy requirements no one wants to do.
Amazon / Zappas is on the higher end for price. Ecommerce schellping shoes is a shit business. People want to see shoes before they buy, the allure of what this company had to offer is fading quick. Sales taxes are on the rise, shipping fees are higher, and hipsters don't spend the kind of cash on shoes like previous generations.
Dear Tony,
I’m leaving you and Zappos. It’s not that I don’t like working very hard and getting my job done on time. It’s because I feel stupid and incompetent. At first I thought I did understand the whole employee empowerment and self-management thing. But, after seeing those people in squirrel costumes at our last staff meeting, and after reading your memo about Teal Frogs and Holacratic Glass, I realize I still have no idea what I’m really supposed to be doing. To be honest, I don’t much care for being called Holacratic either. It’s sounds like bureaucratic, or like I have a disease or something. Maybe I’m just not Zappos material. I did try reading Reinventing Organizations three times. Unfortunately I was never able to make it past page 30 before I fell asleep. So, I guess I’ll just have to take the standard one month exit pay package. That’s O.K., because, I was about to quit anyway.
Bye.
Mike.
P.S. I won’t tell anyone on the outside that you are still the boss at Zappos.
P.S.S. I’m keeping my Glass Frog stapler, because, my cat likes to play with it.
That sounds like Zappos really isn't a decentralized organization. If they are making you wear funny outfits that you don't feel comfortable wearing then there obviously is a boss lol.
For those of you who thumbed me down on my last response because you believe that others should be subserviant to you? Would you want to be subserviant to someone else? In other words are you willing to wear the other guys shoes? If not then that makes you a tyrant. Sorry but its the truth.
Newsflash:
When I'm paying the cost to be the boss and YOU'RE the guy looking for a paycheck...
It gets done my way or you're on the highway.
It ain't tyranny...It's reality. Start your own business and be all lovey dovey.
Let us know how you make out.
I do have my own business but the problem is that I pay higher taxes because I need to bail people like you out all the time. Its not just one time itall the time. If you really knew how to run a business then you wouldn't need a constant bailout. You also need illegal aliens to stay in business. I don't simply because I do not run a shady business. I am not the problem here its people like you who suck up to the government for never ending bailouts.
Imagine saleforce intregrated into a apple watch. That's pure productivity.
/sarc
3 hours of pure productivity ... until the battery dies.
Hsieh has missed the mark.
We are in a society where people are increasingly trying to pass the buck or to steal it and are becoming increasingly reliant on government for handouts whether they be individuals or corporations reliant on government contracts.
The era of self responsibility, thinking for one's self and independence has largely come and gone.
The decaying process inside brains of those gluttonous billionaires reached such a level that they ran out even of sickest caprices, masquerading as innovative ideas such Holacracy i.e. a type of idiocracy.
So now while they, facing undeniable utter collapse of demand for their products and threat to they stock holdings, they came up with insidious idea of workers doing job of managers, for the same measly salary of a grunt and even job of upper management or job of boss himself while he would be free to indulge in his megalomaniac cult of self 24/7. No wonder that 200 immediately fled fearing for their own sanity.
More on Silicon Valley madness can be found at:
https://sostratusworks.wordpress.com/2015/01/08/smell-of-silicon-madness/
Self governing teams seems like a great idea. For fucks sake people, we all need to work somewhere, unless we all become self-employed, so I'd rather work along side people of equal standing rather some asshole line manager.
Yeah that's the idea, and once upon a time back when Bell Labs was a great place to work almost everyone had the same title, "member of technical staff". But it quickly degenerates, like giving every kid in class an A. And then it invites corruption and extortion, as unofficial hierarchies take over for the absent official ones.
These are old stories, these are virus memes that pop up in different places, at different times, and repeat history. Maybe it's healthy to even try it again every now and then, or at least educational - or at least unavoidable. Maybe it helps keep management assholery to an acceptable level.
How fuckin depressing. Stop the world I want to get off!
Sounds a bit like a scene from Atlas Shrugged, no?
However...
When work can be subdivided into small, fully-encapsulated tasks, and the value of each task can be identified, and the cost of defective work can be identified as well as the cost of the defective work, then individuals can work in such an environment as truly independent self-employed contractors. And that DOES work, very well, very fairly, and very efficiently.
Sadly, not every endeavor or process can be easily subdivided like this.
Almost none can, when it comes right down to it.
So, you don't want a small contract to write some [javascript] code for me, eh? :-)
This is one of the worst ideas I've ever heard. Not everyone wants to be a manager. And not everyone has the necessary perspective to make strategic or operational decisions.
I've worked as a manager for many companies and have been a consultant to many more. The companies that sink the fastest are those with poor or no management. A business is not society and cannot be run like a democracy. Some employee's opinions about the business don't and shouldn't matter.
So the question is - if I work at Zappos - and I masturbate - can I sue myself for sexual harassment? More importantly, can I offer myself (on behalf of the company, of course) a generous cash settlement to avoid arbitration or a trial...?
I think the answer is are you loney?
Kinda like how South Africa voted to reinstate Apartheid after they realized the realities of the alternative.
It's an ok idea. But you're never going to get rid of those "service" teams. You're going to have finance, legal, regulatory, IT at some level. And corporate.
You can "team up" all you want. But you're not getting rid of those.
You basically just create an environment where the only way to reward employees is through pay. You can't give them titles or responsibilities. So if you're not willing to pay high performing people, then your best leave and you're stuck with the rest. They put hole in holistic.
Federal Reserve's Ponzi breeds more Ponzi.
Until it creates an even larger mess than the last implosion.
Sounds like 210 of the managers jumped ship ..........
That gives them some bonus points in my estimation.
Hsieh's "Holacracy" operates under the premise that everyone is capable of being a manager. Anyone with real world hands-on business management experience knows the vast majority of people are in fact NOT management material, and need to be told what to do.
Not surprising that in this new type of corporate culture 210 managers quit .
Wow how surprising , all the little hitlers left .
This is not news. Lots of companies pay people to leave. They're called "buyout packages".
It's all games before the end. We workers and managers alike will wear our issued one piece grayish blue coveralls. We will all eat in the factory chow hall and then the Two Minute Hate. Workers will drill holes in sheet metal stamped out elsewhere and then bolt them on to the weapons of war. For ever.