Redefining HR in the minds of the employees Between capitalist and communist society there lies the period of the revolutionary transformation of the one into the other. Corresponding to this is also a political transition period in which the state can be nothing but the revolutionary dictatorship of the proletariat - the words of Karl Marx1. The leaders of the Russian revolution were inspired by such propaganda of great communist thinkers which in turn led to an autocratic rule in the communist USSR. Eventually though, this led to the fall of Communism. The thinker had a fore vision on the proletariat dictatorship but they failed to foresee the system or the political checks and balances that would sustain through till the transformation. On the other hand, many propagated anarchism as a solution to the class struggles during those times. But, complete freedom without any centralised authority would also not sustain over a long time. The logic behind anarchism is free association which means individuals are no longer deprived of access to means of production enabling them to freely associate (without social constraint) to produce and reproduce their own conditions of existence and fulfil their individual and creative needs and desires. So, it was assumed that when individuals are given complete freedom they freely associate with each other and work towards satisfying their needs and desires. But, this basic assumption in itself does not hold good. A very good example for this could be the failure of the agrarian industry in Zimbabwe after the land reforms measures in 2000. Amongst many reasons, the disinterest of new land owners in farming is also argued as one of the reasons for failure of the land reforms. So, it is evident that free association is not always possible. Transfer of power from one authoritative group to another authoritative group is not the solution for class struggle in organisations. Neither is the complete breakdown of authority. Chris Argyris, a management thinker, proposed the mature-immature continuum theory in which he suggested that individuals always strive to move from immaturity to maturity and mostly the authoritative or centralised organisation structure is built in such a way that it prevents this development in individuals. Thus, he proposed a non-hierarchical organisation structure in place of the pyramidal structure. But, as we saw in the failure of Anarchism, individuals do not always work towards moving from immaturity to maturity. But, we have several other advantages of having a non-hierarchical organisation structure in place. Especially in today’s business scenario where ideas could transform the whole image of the company, it is necessary to have a non-hierarchical structure which would enable the employees to come forward with such ideas. But, this again at times could lead to a herd-like mentality. Moving to a non-hierarchical structure from a hierarchical one therefore has its pros and cons. Building a non-hierarchical leadership into an organisation that has followed hierarchical leadership and also retaining the pros and eliminating cons will be the most challenging task. From the design phase to the implementation phase and thereafter, effective monitoring of the implementation is a daunting task. However, many organisations have successfully done this in the near past and some organisations hav 1 Cited in “Karl Marx: His Life and Thought” by David McLellan (1973) taken steps towards this. The cultural change that such organisations have undergone has benefitted them hugely but the process behind such a change is always a difficult path to tread on. Any such change dissipates from top to bottom even though the focus is on elevating the bottom to disintegrate the hierarchy. So, while building a non-hierarchical organisation, the main focus should be to design the system with mutual checks and balances that will result in the paradoxical “controlled freedom”. One way to bring about this balance is in thoroughly understanding the fact that non-hierarchical organisations are all about collaboration and right to use of technology. In the modern era of Information technology, effective communication is one of the ways of achieving collaboration. IT has enabled peer-to-peer new communication, bottom-up communication and much more which helps collaborative decision making, sharing of new ideas etc. These IT systems should be weaved into the functions and divisions of the organisation instead of acting in isolation. Information Technology in the form of social media has changed the way how people work together. Newer technologies like mobile computing have further increased the proliferation of social media in today’s organisations. Thus, a proper system design backed with an appropriate technology, could lead to the creation of empowered and efficient individuals, at both a societal and an organisational level.
Posted on: Mon, 05 Aug 2013 07:17:28 +0000
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