Year: 2019

Good Decisions Between Consensus and Consent

Published by Marcus Raitner

Who decides and how can good decisions be taken? For a long time, this question did not even arise in many hierarchical organizations. In case of doubt, the decision is up to the boss or a small high-ranking leadership circle, which in the best case features a high degree of diversity and honors disagreement but which in the worst case scenario only consists of claqueurs. As more and more organizations try to become more agile, new answers to the question of who decides and how to decide are of central importance. After all, agility means subsidiarity, i.e. that decisions must be made as decentralized as possible in self-organizing teams. Only how? Democratic Majority Decision Democracy is a device that insures we shall be governed no better than we deserve. George Bernhard Shaw The days of autocracy, in which an absolute ruler decides at will, are fortunately over in most states since the Enlightenment. It has been followed by (parliamentary) democracy, in which the decision-making lies with a (representative) group elected by the people. The method …

Independence in the Sense of the Whole

Published by Marcus Raitner

Digitalization does not replace humans and it cannot do without them. On the contrary, it is precisely because of digitalization that what is typically human is more in demand than ever before. This refers in particular to our ability to find creative solutions together as independent individuals and to work together effectively and efficiently in teams and organizations. In the past, this cooperation has long been characterized by central control on the one hand and obedient fulfillment of duties on the other. What was not very human for unskilled workers at the beginning of industrialization, but at least productive, has finally become a degrading impertinence in the middle of the information age. New leadership today aims at cooperation that enables independence in the sense of the whole.

Lean Leadership: Empowering Instead of Instructing

Published by Marcus Raitner

Much can be learned from Lean Management: Understanding the value for the customer, then identifying the value stream and optimizing the flow to avoid unnecessary effort and last but not least ensuring continuous improvement. However, the focus should not only be on the application of other and better methods, but also on a different leadership culture. The second pillar of the Toyota Way therefore is respect for people. At the core of Lean Management are the people as its essential success factor. The motto of Lean Leadership is therefore “empowering not instructing “. This principle deserves to be disseminated at least as vigorously as the well-known concepts and methods of Lean Management.

Don’t scale agile – descale your organization!

Published by Marcus Raitner

Agile organizations are lean, flexible and adaptable. This is accomplished less by “agilizing” existing structures and processes but rather by consistently questioning these. The solution, of course, is not to fall victim to the cognitive bias of Maslow’s hammer and to apply the shiny new agile methods to all existing calcified organizational structures and their wasteful procedures. Rather the motto is “Don’t scale agile – descale your organization!”

Pain of Adaptation in the Corporate World

Published by Marcus Raitner

After my switch from our small but fine start-up esc Solutions to the BMW Group IT in 2015, I was asked more than once whether I really was serious about this move. To be honest, I asked myself this question also more than once in the first half of 2015. A short story full of pictures about the pain of adaptation in a large corporation and how it helped me find my role as corporate rebel and court jester.