Monday, August 27, 2007

Foolish Drones

Like a hoard of angry insects, the next buzz is upon us, and its name is Enterprise 2.0.

But we should not judge something too harshly before we have at least investigated a bit. Digging not too deeply, we see that Enterprise 1.0 is a hierarchy, while 2.0 is a 'flat organization'. Interesting.

The last time I worked for a 'flat' organization, it was that way for an unfortunate reason. The spin was that no one reported to anyone else. Everyone was more or less equal. Initially you might think that this might be quite the novel idea, but as we so often learn, nothing in life comes for free.

The lack of an official reporting structure doesn't stop people from having to report upwards, but it does insure that there are no pesky middle-managers between the top and the bottom. To put it bluntly, it is a control freak's dream reporting structure. You sit at the top, tell them they are all equal, and then use that to drive them all nuts. No fuss, no muss and definitely no middle management. You still write the checks, so they have no choice, and no way to protect themselves. Hierarchy not only leverages our bosses, but also protects us from theirs. Given the type of personality that is often drawn to the light of executive status, that can be a good thing.

So, I'm thinking that the 2.0 really stands for 'twice as sucky', or something similar...

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