informal coalitions

Facts never speak for themselves

This morning, I happened to catch a brief exchange on Radio 5Live's "Your Call", hosted by Nicky Campbell.  The topic of the day was the Government's plan to change the way it deals with the funding for children who are deemed to have Special Educational Needs. The proposed approach would allow parents to choose alternative forms of expert help for their children, rather than support being restricted solely to that provided by local authorities.

One of the callers was irate at what she described as an attack on local authority funding and "a tax on our children". Campbell interrupted her to point out that, earlier in the day, Children's Minister Sarah Tether had categorically denied that the change was aimed at withdrawing support from children.

"Well she would say that, wouldn't she?" the caller responded curtly - seemingly oblivious to the ideological basis of her own comment. That is to say, it would be equally valid to state in response to the caller's own remarks, "She would say that, wouldn't she?"

Je ne target rien - Enabling performance in organizations

In the previous post, I endorsed a recent article in the Sunday Times, which pointed to a number of flaws in the widespread practice of linking individuals’ pay to their perceived performance.

In addition to the problems identified in the article, I called into question the fundamental premise on which performance-related pay is based. That is, that direct relationships can readily be established between organizational outcomes and the decisions and actions of specific individuals.  The complex social dynamics of organization make such links impossible to establish.  In other words, it is simply not possible to isolate the effects that the intentions and contributions of a particular individual have on organizational performance.

So the challenge to target setting and performance-based rewards for individuals can be made on two fronts:

• First in relation to the supposed effect that these have on an individual's tendency to work more effectively than he or she might otherwise do (that is, the proposition that targets increase motivation, focus effort, and enhance accountability).
• Secondly, as regards the complex social dynamics of organization that inseparably intertwine the intentions, interactions and contributions of those we are seeking to appraise with the intentions, interactions and contributions  of all other participants – both ‘within’ the formal boundaries of the organization and ‘beyond’. These dynamics render the notion of cause and effect meaningless in relation to the effect that individuals' contributions have on organizational outcomes.

Fundamental flaw in performance-related pay

An article by Carly Chynoweth, in the Appointments section of the latest Sunday Times (5.2.12), includes a refreshing challenge by Warwick Business School professor, Bruno Frey to the notion and practice of performance-related pay. The article was no doubt prompted by the current furore over the size of executive bonus payments and other 'rewards for performance'.

Referring primarily to the pay of CEOs, Frey’s main suggestion is that target-based approaches to bonus payment should be scrapped.  He argues that any such pay should be based instead on an annual, retrospective judgement about the nature and extent of bonus that a CEO’s performance merits.

Several of his points resonate strongly with those I have made in earlier posts, such as Building commitment –v- rewarding performance and Public sector pay review – Off target. At the same time, his notion of an annual appraisal, based on hindsight, still assumes a degree of objective knowledge about the causes of performance outcomes that I don’t believe is credible in the socially complex world of organizations.

The match turned on the penalty. Or was it the throw-in?

Football’s ‘game-changing’ incidents and parallels with the complex dynamics of organizations

As yesterday’s programme of professional football (‘soccer’) matches came to an end, another round of post-match inquests, complaints and accusations began.  Week-in-week-out, players and managers question the decisions made by match officials.  Then, as yesterday, post-match interviews and phone-in programmes provide further opportunities for referees’ decision-making and competence to be called into question.

Alongside this constant haranguing of officials, fans are fed a diet of instant replays during live matches, highlight programmes and match reports.  These all describe ‘the action’ in terms of a selection of discrete events that are claimed to have been critical to the outcome.  And, more often than not, these are liberally peppered with what commentators see as ‘poor decisions’ by the referee.

Against this background, I want to challenge the notion that the outcomes of games are determined by these high profile events and/or controversial refereeing decisions.  And that, by inference, the seemingly more mundane aspects of the game are of secondary importance.  By extension, I also want to draw a brief parallel with what goes on, day-in-day-out, in organizations.  

Don't put all your 'X' in one basket

On 5 May 2011, electors in the UK will be asked to vote on the relative merits of the UK's current, "First Past the Post" electoral system (FPTP) and the "Alternative Vote" (AV) for UK General Elections.  

The "No to AV" and "Yes to Fairer Votes" campaigns are now in full swing, both trying to stimulate interest in the topic amongst a largely indifferent electorate.   Whatever your views on the referendum, it seems to me that some very dubious arguments have been deployed by those who support the retention of FPTP.

Thirty years on - "Open, classless and more equal ..."

Thirty years ago today, I rang a hotel near Birmingham Airport, paid a few pounds by credit card and became a founder member of the new Social Democratic Party (or SDP).

The party was launched on 26 March 1981 by the so-called “gang of four” – Roy Jenkins, David Owen, Bill Rodgers and Shirley Williams, following their breakaway from the Labour Party. They were eventually joined by around 24 other ex-Labour MPs, one Conservative MP and several Peers.  Most significantly, perhaps, many of us who joined the party had not had any formal political affiliation before the birth of the SDP. 

Public sector pay review - Off target

The government-commissioned Fair Pay Review, was published earlier today. Led by the Work Foundation's Will Hutton, the review team recommend a new performance-related pay deal for senior executives that might eventually be extended to middle managers.  The proposals include a suggestion that managers should have to "earn back" a proportion of their pay (say 10-15% of it) by meeting personal performance targets. Provision would then exist for "excellent performers" to earn an additional, bonus sum.

According to an article in HRZone, Hutton maintains that no pay system can be fair if it fails to reflect individual performance.  And there's the rub. The whole pay-for-performance approach - whether in the public or private sector - rests on the proposition that organizational outcomes can be related, in a simple cause-and-effect way, to the 'performance' of individuals.  They can't.

A common sense approach?

It might seem like common sense to pay people according to their perceived performance.  But it is a version of common sense which still sees the business world as ordered, predictable and ultimately controllable.  So where is the flaw in this widely used practice?  And is there an alternative?

Onus on Liberal Democrats to prove that coalition politics work

Following an indecisive outcome to Thursday's general Election in the UK, talks continue on the potential for the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats to work together in some way to deliver successful government.

It is obvious that differences exist between the two parties on many of their policies and their core ideologies.  However, it seems to me that the onus is primarily on the LIberal Democrats to demonstrate that different parties can work together effectively "in the national interest". 

It is presumed that the main 'sticking point' in the negotiations is likely to centre on electoral reform, with the Lib Dems wedded to full-blown proportional representation and the Conservatives remaining steadfastly in favour of the current, "first past the post" system.  One result of the former arrangement would be perpetual coalition or minority governments. And so, it is in the interest of the Lib Dems to show that 'strong' (in the sense of credible and workable) government can be forged by different - and otherwise competing - parties working together in partnership. 

Coalition government? We’ve never had anything else!

As election fever - or, depending on your perspective, election fatigue - grows in the UK, the prospect that no single party will have an overall majority after the 6 May General Election is dominating political discussion and media comment.

Following the first-ever televised leaders’ debate, Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg won viewers’ acclaim for his performance. And, in these ‘instant fame’ times of The X Factor and Britain’s Got Talent, his party’s prospects rose dramatically – at least according to the post-debate opinion polls. That surge in potential support has been halted to a degree, following the second debate in the series. But the Lib Dems still appear to be running a close second to the Conservatives in voter popularity.

Overall, then, this promises to be one of the most interesting election nights of modern times. But why are politicians and commentators so exercised by the thought of the Nation waking up on 7 May to what – in UK terms – has traditionally been viewed as a weak, indecisive result?

Critical role of the local and current context on patterns of thought and action

An interesting piece in the 7 March issue of New Scientist challenges the "simplistic stereotypes" that are often used to define the difference between eastern and western cultures. 

Entitled "East meets West," Ed Yong's article questions the sharply polarized view of these cultures that is usually adopted. This well-established position typically counterposes the independent-individualized focus of western culture with the interdependent-collective focus which is ordinarily seen as being characteristic of eastern thought. The article challenges this established view and argues instead for what Yong calls "cognitive flexibility", which recognises the capacity of people from both cultures to adopt both of these modes of thought. 

Besides the article's implications for cross-cultural management, it seems to me that broader inferences can be drawn from it in relation to organizational dynamics in the round. And it's these that I want to turn to briefly here.