Rebellion in companies: it's time for professionals

Jordi Varela

Editor

Joost Minnaar and Pim de Morree, in the book they have just published, Corporate Rebels, make work more fun, explain that, in the summer of 2015, having a beer on a terrace in Barcelona, they decided they were tired of being treated like children in the companies where they worked. They hung up their habits and set out to travel to see how the companies that had opted to rely more on the capabilities of their workers than on process control worked. As a result of the inspiring Barcelona beer, they not only left their jobs but also created a blog, Corporate Rebels, and generated a list of innovative companies, both from an organizational and labour point of view. That said, do not assume that the initiatory journey of the two young Dutchmen is about promoting start-ups, but about how companies can be transformed from below.

If you take a look at the list of innovative leaders, many of whom are protagonists of the book, you will realize that Minnaar and Morree did not have any prevention in the choice, neither of sector, nor of size nor of specialization, but look at some examples: Koldo Saratxaga, the man who transformed Irizar, the Basque coach manufacturing cooperative, into a genuinely participatory company, as well as internationally competitive; Zhang Ruimin, CEO of Haier, the Chinese appliance giant, an organization that went from communist inefficiency to a network of innovative groups that allowed them to achieve a leadership position in their sector; Cristóbal Colón, creator of La Fageda, a foundation that provides work and services to disabled people in La Garrotxa; Frank Van Massenhove, a leader who radically changed the way the Belgian social security ministry works for the better; Ricardo Semler, a Brazilian visionary who inherited a hydraulic pump company from his father and transformed it into an admirable business network; David Marquet, commander of a US Navy submarine who realized that it was preferable, for his own safety, to listen to his sailors rather than give them orders; Jos de Blok, founder of Buurtzorg, a very innovative professional project (and well known on this blog) that already brings together more than 15,000 community nurses in the Netherlands.

What seems incomprehensible, especially after reading the book, it's how the world economy, public and private, insists on functioning with rigid companies and institutions, which spend their efforts in planning, budgeting and controlling, but in reality, they do nothing more than provoke the dissatisfaction of their workers, generate low productivity, poor results and loss of competitiveness (I recommend taking a look at the post The epidemic of job disaffection compromises the results).

Chilling Data on Wastage Due to the Traditional Hierarchical Model

a) According to Deloitte, 86% of company managers are aware that the traditional hierarchical model does not work, but instead admit to being trapped in command and control. On its own, Ford has calculated that their internal planning, budgeting and control processes cost them 1.2 trillion each year, money spent uncritically under a nebulous idea about the predictability of the future.

b) Along the same lines, we must pay care to a survey that has detected that the directors of US companies spend 23 hours a week in meetings when they admit that half of this time is wasted time, in addition to doing wasting time with your middle managers and workers. Continuing in the US, the authors of the book claim that the cost of mismanagement of companies wastes 310 billion dollars each year.

c) In 1989, a consultancy firm, Sydney Yoshida, did a study for Casonic, a Japanese car company and found that the real problems of the production lines, although they were known by 74% of the team leaders, only reached 4% of the managers, who would end up being the ones who would make the budgetary and investment decisions of the production chains. They called this phenomenon the iceberg of ignorance.

d) According to Gallup, the number of workers who feel involved with their work barely reaches 15%, which is estimated to give a loss in the global economy of 7 trillion dollars annually, a little more than half of China's gross domestic product.

What model do Minnaar and Morree advocate in the book?

The authors, after having accumulated a large number of interviews and visits to innovative and participatory companies, conclude that there is no model that by itself guarantees success, but it seems that, instead, there are some fundamental aspects to create a favourable climate for the revolt of the professionals.

1. Workers should perceive work as something of value, a place where the best of them is exploited, where they feel useful and where their point of view is heard.

2. The work should be organized in small teams of professionals, provided that this makes sense based on the expected production. The 10-15 worker size is ideal (as in Buurtzorg). These groups, usually multidisciplinary, should have as much autonomy as possible and at the same time should be transparently accountable for results.

3. There may be leaders in work teams, but it’s always better for them to develop the functions of coach, than traditional management. In these teams it should be possible to discuss all the aspects that matter, such as distribution of loads, hours and salaries, and there are even companies where the work teams themselves are the ones who choose leaders and managers.

4. The central structures for management, analysis, control, human resources, logistics, etc., should be as small as possible, bearing in mind that competencies have already been transferred to small professional teams. The traditional dynamics of direction and control must be overcome by the adaptation and adjustment of the results proposed by the work teams.

5. Work teams must have sufficient margins and confidence to experiment and innovate in what concerns them. Experts say that it’s better to err first and, therefore, learn quickly, than wait for the others to pass by.

The keys to transformative projects, according to Minnaar and Morree, are neither an ideal model nor a miraculous methodology, but an admirable combination of vision, modesty, rebellion and stubbornness, as well as an authentic appreciation for what is intended to be done and genuine respect for those who should do.