Simplify!

Even though I'm no longer a working stiff, I still occasionally - okay, rarely - enjoy (kinda sorta) reading about what's cookin' in the good old work world. And this includes what the academics have to say. Especially if the academic is Professor Bob Sutton of Stanford.

I don't know Bob but, in the past, I've reviewed his works, or keyed posts off of them. (Among other books, Bob wrote The No Asshole Rule: Building a Civilized Workplace and Surviving One That Isn't. As you can imagine, I had plenty to say about that one.) We also had a bit of an e-mail correspondence back in the day. 

Bob is a wonderful writer: interesting, witty, and humane, and - who doesn't like flattery - back in the day (long, long ago) when we were blog-pals, Bob recommended Pink Slip to his readers.

Anyway, the latest I've seen by him is an article of his that appeared recently in The Wall Street Journal, which - miraculously - Bob managed to get in front of the paywall.

In "Why Bosses Should Ask Employees to Do Less—Not More," Bob argues that rather than piling on more of everything organizations should think about simplifying. 

It isn’t that addition is inherently bad. But when leaders are undisciplined about piling on staff, gizmos, software, meetings, rules, training and management fads, organizations become too complicated, their people get overwhelmed and exhausted, and their resources are spread so thin that all their work suffers.

Been there, experienced that. All of it.

I worked for one company that was, admittedly, completely undisciplined and supremely dysfunctional. I might even say that this one place put the dys in dysfunctional. I have never seen anything that could quite compare to the crazy little Cambridge place where I spent the longest block (over 9 years) of time during my corporate career. It goes without saying that I loved working there, even though it was spectacularly nuts. (My sister Kath long maintained that I sought out dysfunctional workplaces because I didn't have enough dysfunction in my own life.)

Anyway, at one point, Dysfunctional Software, Inc. (or, as I referred to it in All Worked Up (in which I wrote about the Charismatic Asshole) The Next Billion Dollar Software Company. [Aside to the reader: it wasn't.]) brought in a retired admiral to instill some discipline and turn things around. [Aside to the reader: he didn't.]

One thing that The Admiral tried to do was put some processes in place. And the first place he started was having the retired Chief Petty Office he brought in with him create a manual for how to order office supplies. A 17-page manual complete with flow charts. 

Prior to joining Dysfunctional Software, Inc., I'd spent a few grim years at Wang Labs, which had insane processes for everything. Even Wang didn't have a 17-page manual detailing how to order a pencil.

Bob's article included an interactive component, asking readers "which time-wasting activity most needs to be cut back in your organization?" The choices: Meetings, Emails, Documentation/Record Keeping, Hiring Processes, Socializing, Training, Performance Reviews. 

I do have one question - by Socializing, does Bob mean "obligatory fun" corporate functions, or hanging around BS-ing with colleagues - but for the most part, the choices are good ones. I will observe that I never worked for any place where we spent too much time on Performance Reviews. I often went years without giving or receiving one. 

Anyway, although I don't work, and thus don't have an organization, I voted anyway. (Hope this doesn't constitute voter fraud.)

And I voted for Meetings.

One (needless to say, dysfunctional) place I worked - it dysfunctioned its way into bankruptcy and dissolution - was completely meeting-crazy.

You could literally spend your entire day in meetings, from 7:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. Other than the absence of the bell ringing alerting us to change classes, I often felt as if I were back in high school. Five minutes before the hour, pick up your notebooks and move onto your next class meeting. 

Some folks brought their laptops and did work during the meetings, which I was never bold enough to do. Of course, when the meetings were blessedly on a conference bridge - this was before meeting technology was advanced enough for Zoom-like video meetings - we could turn on mute and work away.

A prominent feature of meetings in this company was that we were often fed at them, generally that meant a full breakfast at an early a.m. meeting, and - of course - a full lunch for noon gatherings. 

After a while, I figured out which meetings I could delegate someone else in my group to attend. This often meant that the meeting organizer was pissed off. It was deemed insulting to send someone junior. But everyone did it, and enough was enough. I made it okay for the people who I dispatched in my stead by giving them opportunities to attend and, if possible, have a real role at, meetings where there were more senior people they could gain some visibility, strut their stuff, network...

In his article, Bob includes a lot of good examples - far better than my personal experiences: his are actually researched. So since the piece isn't behind the WSJ paywall, go forth and read. 

Here's his bottom line on why more isn't necessarily more.

For so many companies, the opposite—less, less, less—is the key to success. Subtraction clears our minds and gives us time to focus on what really counts. It sets the stage for creative work, giving us the space to fail, fret, discuss, argue about and experiment with seemingly crazy ideas—the ideas that can transform a company, and make employees happier and more productive.

Addition by subtraction. Not that I have any skin in this particular game, but I'm all for it.