Reinventing Organizations: An Illustrated Invitation to Join the Conversation on Next-Stage Organizations

But today, in many workplaces, we simply accept that most people aren’t motivated, and we try to buy them off with the promise of a fat bonus (despite the fact that research shows that bonuses don’t work or are even counterproductive).12

Viewed in this light, it’s not extraordinary to think that we might be about to invent a whole new management paradigm

Survey after survey shows that the vast majority of employees are disengaged at work. A 2013 Gallup poll, for instance, found that only 13 percent of employees worldwide are engaged at work (63 percent are not engaged and 24 percent are actively disengaged). Management guru Gary Hamel rightly calls this “the shame of management.”

Our world is becoming too complex for us to continue operating with the pyramid we inherited a few thousand years ago.

Where Amber relied only on sticks, Orange came up with carrots and invented human resources in the process.

Let me try to illustrate this. We all have an ego, a part of us that seeks success and recognition, that wants to look good, to win arguments in a meeting, and so forth.

The scientific and industrial revolutions have brought us enormous freedom and prosperity. Increasingly, we also witness the massive shadow they cast on our future. One shadow is “innovation gone mad.” With most of our basic needs taken care of, businesses increasingly try to create needs, feeding the illusion that more stuff we don’t really need—m

What is at play here is a subtle, but powerful, conspiracy of fears. Organizations fear that if people were to bring all of themselves to work—their moods, quirks, and weekend clothes—things would quickly turn into a mess.

we played the game of success and ran the rat race. And now we realize we won’t make it to the top, or that the top isn’t all it’s made out to be. When all boils down to targets and numbers, milestones, and deadlines and yet another change program and cross-functional initiative, some people can’t help but wonder about the meaning of it all