The Self Destructive habits of Great Organizations (Part I)

I am aware that there is a book that goes by the same name and is a best seller. I havent read it, i intend to. Probably for the gyan and all but more so, because i want to see if there are concurrences and parallels in what the book explains and what i read and learn in my workplace.

Great organizations/brands happen to be a result of either of these things:

Persistence of a brand over time (Coke, GM, GE etc)

Individual/team genius (Bill Gates's Microsoft/ Sergey Brin's Google)

Ability to adapt businesses for the future (Nokia/IBM)

Interestingly there are stories of great organizations that have just fallen way side. There is this interesting statistic where companies that were in the Forbes Best list 20 years back dont exist anymore. And as far as i remember the numbers were unusually large and challenging.

This post will try capturing those tell tale signs within the organization, which speak of decline. I begin writing it as i see it happening in front of me in an organization which, not so long ago, was one of the best places and brands to work for. The tell tale signs are not tangibles, they are not results, they donot get captured in P&L statements, they donot emblazon ET Headlines. these tell tale signals are what flows through the veins of the organization: The People and The Processes. The first signs of rot happens there and stays there for a long time. It is not a gradual decay. It takes its time and at one point of time zooms up exponentially and becomes uncontrollable in time for the fall of the great edifice, our great organization.

Sign 1: Watch out for the pantry table discussions, the smoke break conversations, the grapevine*. The best indicator of how the organization is faring is those animated discussions and jibes. Employees are informal, unabashed, unashamed during these moments.There are tools like Organizational polls, those once a quarter Hello-How-are-you senior management-employee get togethers, those Development plans and discussions, those feedback sessions which are good in their own terms. However, what happens over in the chai-tapri, sutta-break is the real pulse of the organization. Hey Mr CEO! I hope you are radioed in to that... (Corollary to the self destructive habits of great organizations is another school of thought on the infallible CEO. I would probably put my view on that ome time.)
The discussions and the moods can be a serious indicator of how the employees feel about the organization. Everything from the office secretary to the industry strategy gets debated. These discussions have moods and swings, and can be entertaining, gyan, perspective giving or general hogwash. However, when these forums start having a general sense of dissapointment on organization or "organization and individual" issues, things are not as good ass they should be. Worse is when Salaries and Incentives and promotions gets discussed or people start bitching. Then starts the active sharing of job opportunities information, salary break ups etc. It takes a lot to dispel this negativity in the ssystem and worse is that this negativity also starts rubbing off on newly joined, not-so-dissatisfied junta by fueling their fears. It erodes credibility in a manner that can be very damaging to the organization. It actually works towards cutting the linkages between the employee and the organization. The CEOs corner office typically is the farthest both literally and figuratively from these discussion boards. The farther it is figuratively, the more the pain ,angst and dissatisfaction....
So one of the first tell tale signs of the fall is the Grapevine...

*:I first had a whiff of this thought from a book that i had read 3 year back, a book on shaping your careers by David D'Alessandro. I remember him mentioning about Grapevine. Grapevine wa the typical Chai,sutta break or the informal get together of employees and discussing work, lives, seniors, rumours and organization Over the next three years after having examined this theory around and across, i would certainly agree on the Grapevine being the most-effective-accurate-cheapest place to understand how the organization is doing.

(to be continued...)