Powering Decision Makers

People without money aren’t infants. They don’t need decisions made for them. They need money. Money is the fundamental unit of decision making in a market-based economy. Democracy shouldn’t be about making decisions for other people unless it absolutely has to be. Adding conditions to how people make their basic choices costs money. You have to employ pseudo-parents to question real life adults. To strip them of their agency. People who aren’t in poverty tend to have big ideas about how people in poverty should make their choices. Either from a moral or “quality” perspective. All businesses boil down to problem solving for people with money. Good businesses have direct relationships with decision makers. If you want to solve the problem of poverty, create more decision makers. Then watch how the problems get solved. Spontaneously. From the bottom up.

detail from a drawing

by Leonardo da Vinci

Know you Know

Tacit Knowledge is the stuff we know without even necessarily knowing we know. It is near impossible to communicate, because it is embodied rather than conscious. We may even tell ourselves an incorrect story about why we are able to do something. Knowing how to do something, and knowing how you know how to do something, are different skills. Being able to put that into words that someone else understands and can replicate is, again, a different skill. “The Future and its Enemies” by Virginia Postrel was first published in 1998, but remains a timeless explanation of why decisions should be made where the knowledge is, and not around boardroom tables. The “Postrel Problem” meant when I was still working for a salary, I spent a large part of my time writing memos, emails, and justifications. I have loved been freed from my inbox. Free to experiment and learn, in a micro-ambitious trial and error way. Thinking big can forget the power in small. Thinking big is imposing. Thinking small is empowering.

Tell my Wife

Smarter Barter

All businesses are traders. They swap a solved problem for money. Money isn't a thing. It helps solve coordination problems. Money is more analogous to words. Words also only exist in our heads, and in the heads of people who understand what the words we use mean. Money is the same. It only exists because the Government says so by law, and we believe them. For money to change hands, you need to be able to clearly articulate your problem (ask), or someone needs to clearly articulate the problem they can solve (offer). Words and money are just tools to get things to happen, and stuff to move. It is still barter, it is just a little smarter.

Connecting the Dots

Messy Thinking

I try write in my blog every day. I believe we are mostly a collection of habits. I want writing to become a habit. Making it a part of what I do automatically means I am not waiting for inspiration, I go looking for it.

I know this means that many of my blog posts don't make a lot of sense. They make sense to me! (As I press publish... not always afterwards) I do read through them as carefully as I can. 

The second job I had after working in product development, was as a Marketing Actuary. Trying to take technical ideas and put them into a communicable form. There is a big gap between the people who have the time to think through issues (because it is their job) and the people who are doing other things. The Curse of Knowledge - 'The better you know something, the less you remember how hard it was to learn'.

The only way to find out if an idea can still connect to people, is to engage. The problem is you can't wait till an idea is fully formed before you do that. A lot of people 'stay private till they plonk'. Then when they reach their 'Eureka!' moment, no one else has a clue what they are speaking about.

My thinking is messy. I often confuse myself, and a lot of what I say is nonsense. I have been in several discussions where I have said, 'Okay, I am not making a lot of sense. I am going to shut up now.'

Lost in Thought in the Long Grass

As important as the conclusion you reach, is the path you took to get there. We are good at simplifying that path in retrospect. 'Our story' seems clear in hindsight. I know for me, that is rubbish. Much of our knowledge is what Virginia Postrel calls (in The Future and its Enemies) Tacit Knowledge. We don't know why we know what we know.

This is one of the challenges of a Global v Local world. The further decisions get stretched from the places where the results are felt, the more Tacit Knowledge gets lost.

By writing every day, I am 'thinking in the open'. People who know me will be able to read between the lines. They will read between the lines in ways I don't understand. That is because even if I have shared an experience with someone, they would have seen things differently. That can only add to my understanding if I invite them into my thinking. If we think together.

So I apologise if I lose you. I may be lost too. In conversation or in reading what you write, I will try my hardest to tell you when you have lost me. Please do the same.

Homo Deus

There are a few books I have read that stand out as having challenged a deeply held belief of mine. Books that made me pause sufficiently long to change path. I have long considered myself liberal. A Word I associate with tolerance, and willingness to listen and learn. Homo Deus looks at the roots of liberalism in the enlightenment and humanism. The raising of the rights of the individual over the state. Human Rights. The book, along with Illiberal Reformers has made me far less comfortable with the idea of the individual as the basic unit of who we are. Less comfortable with the idea of Progress, especially when imposed on others in civilising missions. 

As we move to a connected world, where Artificial Intelligence can listen to the internally competing ideas and signals of our emotions, relationships and experiences - the day may soon come where others understand us better than we understand ourselves. Ideas of self, free-will, autonomy, trust and decision making will be turned on their head. This is an important book.

Expertise and Resilience

Confidence is attractive in a world that is complicated, uncertain and ambiguous. The idea that even though there are tough problems in the world, there are creative geniuses who can solve them creates a sense of hope. The hopeful idea that what we need is great leadership. Someone to save us. I am sceptical of expertise. Not in the support of the popular anti-intellectual wave, but sceptical that individuals, or small groups, can have a superior disinterested understanding of the public good. I am sceptical that leadership beats empowerment. That answers beat questions. My hope lies in strong connections. In understanding that our identity, and understanding, lies in the individual links rather than the individuals. The more links, the deeper and wider the expertise. Expertise defined by resilience rather than answers.

Resilience

Constitutional Liberal Democracy

Democracy is not majority rules. Some choices should be made by individuals. Some choice affect others, and so should be consensual. A constitution can provide the boundaries of what they are consenting to. Without those limits, and the freedom of movement of people to leave if they remove their consent, there is no social contract. Very few decisions should be forced on people. Raw, messy, emotional decisions should be as small as possible and made amongst people who have done the hard work to develop relationships. A liberal world is a tolerant one, that allows people to make choices and puts in the time to develop a supporting community. To lift each other when we fall, and empower each other when we stand. To see each other. To walk with each other.

Democracy isn't about Majorities or Powerful Minorities

Spontaneous Order

We can't avoid politics - 'All politics is identity politics'. Family politics. Bedroom politics. Staffroom politics. Wherever there are people, we will be negotiating our place in the world. The job of Big Government should be pretty boring. In my Utopia, the real juicy politics would be very local. Big Government would be about the basic Human Rights. The lowest common denominator. The stuff almost everyone agrees on. Then people would be able to move around to find the kind of world they want to live in. Or stay in one place and build it together.

 

People are better at solving their own problems than other people are at solving those problems for them. We have a lot of Tacit Knowledge that is hard to explain, and it is very hard to understand other peoples worlds. The combination of a Universal Basic Income, and open borders with local rules allows lots of community building and allows people to think of things that are hard to monetise, i.e. A UBI, Rule of Law, and freedom of movement release humans to solve human problems. It isn't a policy pathway to a solution. It isn't politics. It isn't ideology. It is a framework for spontaneous order. It is the oxygen, water and soil that allows evolution to start and do its own thing.

The majestic beauty of spontaneous order

The unavoidable politics then stops being about campaigning for power, and becomes about the individual relationships. The complex, ambiguous, uncertainty that exists in all the relationships that matter to us. How much to open up? How much to trust? How much to invest? How much to risk?

 

If we live in a world where everyone can be assured of their human rights, then we don't need to panic as much about plotting each step on the path to where we want to be. Where we want to be is very detached from where we are. We have no idea what the world is going to throw at us. What we know a lot about is right now. We know a lot about how we engage with others. We know a lot about the next step we take.

Appreciate where we stand. 

Have the strength and support for the next step.

See each other. 

Move together.

Protect the things you love.

Chip away at ignorance.

Learn.

Create.

Love. 

Considerate Coordination

It is estimated that between 1959 and 1961, between 20 and 43 million people died in the Great Chinese Famine. During the Great Leap Forward, policies were enforced to shift people from agricultural work to iron and steel production. An instruction was given, but there was great distance between the decision maker and the decision implementer. Out of authority and respect, even if the subsistence farmer thought it was not a good idea to melt their tools - they did as they were told. Mao famously made grand tours to see for himself what was going on. 'Management by walking around' is unfortunately hardly effective when people are super keen to please you. The truth of a bad policy can be hidden if there is a massive incentive to please those further up the chain.

Mao on a plane - going to see if his plans were working

Knowledge and the ability to communicate that knowledge are two separate things. Even understanding ourselves is hard. We have to be patient and forgiving. We have to be willing to change our minds and adapt to new information. To adapt to new feelings. The world is uncertain, complex and ambiguous. As soon as we break the link between our world and the ability to respond to our world by giving decision making away, things change.

In the work world, there is a ladder away from the actual work. As people get more authority and seniority, they get more ability to dream but outsource the doing. The problem with this is that the practical constraints of the world are seldom a part of dreams. If you decide to do something, but then in doing it get more information, it can change the decision. If you thought something was easy, so start it and then discover it is hard, you can decide to stop because there are other things that are more important. If you think something is easy, and so ask a junior to do it, it will play out differently. If that junior is super keen to impress, they will work hard well beyond the point you would have given up. By the time they 'confess' to difficulty, they can have massacred an army of their time.

The most powerful explanation I have seen of Tacit Knowledge and the dangers of not empowering people is in the book 'The Future and Its Enemies'. If you combine Virginia Postrel's explanation, with Tim Minchin's idea of being micro-ambitious and Friedrich Hayek's ideas on spontaneous order, you get a powerful case for empowerment. The problems in the world aren't going to be solved by huge dreams. They are going to be solved by individual relationships solving small problems together. They are going to solved through people 'coordinating in intricate and mutually considerate ways'.

Building a Community

At some stage I would like to start a company. I have been plotting for years with some friends. The name of this company has shifted from 'Happiness Inc' to 'Savour Centre' to 'Muse'. The name doesn't really matter, nor does the company. What I am interested in is how we go about community building.

150 People

There is a magic number below which a group of people can know each other, and know how the others know each other. This reduced size also means Tacit Knowledge can be shared. Tacit Knowledge is the stuff we know, but don't necessarily even know we know. Tacit Knowledge is the stuff that can't be explained other than through interaction. We can learn from each other by spending time with each other. Tacit Knowledge is the reason honesty isn't about telling the truth in words, it is about spending time with people. 

Sustainable Community Wealth Fund 

I would like this company to be able to pay everyone a Universal Basic Income. This income would be independent of whether they showed up at work. It would have no strings. It would be for life. I would like the company to be able to build up a fund to be able to support this independently of any other activity. Like a Sovereign Wealth Fund. This fund would act as a muse for the ideas that get generated. The company would be free from thinking only about ideas that can be monetised. Someone's job may then be to visit people in Retirement Homes. Someone else may work as a sport's coach in poorer communities. A UBI would free members of the community to lift their eyes from living hand to mouth.

Representative

We tend to end up working largely with people with similar skill sets. There may be some variety, but only where those are seen as complementary to each other in pursuit of a very narrow shared goal. I would like this company to be able to break down the obstacles the people in it have to understanding other people in the world. It should be diverse enough to open paths of communication between different world views. The hiring process at most companies is a filter, trying to find 'the best of the best'. This type of hiring process reinforces the walls between us. I would want to build a community that helps us see each other.

Relationship Focused

Most of our grand plans have unintended consequences. The world is too complicated for us to understand in any other way than our own chosen story. If we can be micro-ambitious, and work on the relationships between any two random people, I believe we can tap into the tacit knowledge we have. If interactions encourage creativity, reward creativity and constrain activity that doesn't benefit both people - the knock on effect to the broader community can only be positive. I believe the big problems will solve themselves if we focus on creating more friendships.

Catalyst

'Utopia for Realists' talks about a 15 hour work week. Some people would still work 60-100 hours even if they didn't have to. They love their jobs. My concern is that sometimes work becomes a default and we lose perspective about the other things that matter. We become defined by our jobs. We become seduced by our success. I would want to see a company that enhances the other aspects of peoples lives. That supports and strengthens other relationships. I like to see work as a catalyst for life.

Building Communities = Building Meaning

Conversations & Correspondence

We talk about some stuff. Other stuff you only get to find out by spending time together. It is very hard to put things into words. Words don't even mean the same things to different people. They mean the connections they evoke. Those connections build up over time. They build through friendships. Through experiences. Through mistakes. Through successes. Some of what binds us together can't be communicated.

Part of what I would like to do with this blog is write about the real experiences of real people. Because communication is so hard, we often only hear from the writers. The artists. The musicians. There is a lot of untapped wisdom in the people who tend to just get on with it. No songs. No dances. No mess. No fuss. It would be a pity if our stories were only those of the singers and dancers.

I invite two types of contributions to this blog. If you would like to write your own post, that would be great (trevorjohnblack@gmail.com). The alternative is a Guest Conversation. In these, I write 100 words, then you do, then I do. We each have five turns. The fun bit is that we aim to build on what the other person has said 'Theatre Sport' style. 100 words isn't that intimidating, and because we work together, it helps get over the block of having to think of something worthwhile to say in advance. I am not a big believer in waiting for inspiration. Inspiration comes by starting. Inspiration is a habit.

Another block I am very aware of is the fear of doing things in public. We can do conversations that we don't publish. Ideally through a walk and talk, but old school correspondence works. Maybe even by snail mail. I work through ideas best in conversation. Particularly with someone who I trust. Where I can say something and see how it fits. I don't like a 'devil's advocate' approach where people actively try tear down what others are saying. I like constructive engagement. Where you take what people say and see what interesting questions are in there. What words clearly mean different things? What experiences lie behind those meanings? Where we listen.

Walking and Talking in Nature

One of the best parts of being human is that we get to learn together. We can tap into the collective experiences we have had. We can feel mistakes without making them. We can get emotionally involved with stories in a way that makes us feel like we had actually lived them. 

Life is a shared story.

The World We Live In

When something horrible happens to one person, it is a story. When it happens to a vast number of people, it is a statistic. We are much better at caring about things we relate to. This is a problem if we are only surrounded by people like ourselves. Malcolm Gladwell looked at how little things can make a big difference in 'The Tipping Point'. He talks about how in groups of 150, people can know each other. They can also know how the others know each other. They may not even understand what they know. 

When things are small enough, magic happens. With your closest friends, this intuitive support can be the glue that keeps you together. When we start thinking about the 7.4 billion people on the planet, it can be completely overwhelming. But what if we thought of it in terms of 150 people? 75 men. 75 women. 28 Chinese people. 26 Indian people. 20 people living on less than $1.90 a day. I don't know one person living on less than $1.90 a day. I bet if I invested in some personal affirmative action and got to know 20, I would have a much better understanding of the world we live in. Rather than the world I live in.

The Little Things

The problems with only focusing on the big things, is you never get to the little things. They are never important enough. But they niggle and they gnaw. A friend of mine who has been a very successful businessman said his goal with the little things was to never give them more time than they deserved. The best way to do this was to do them straight away, not to put them off. Another friend said she started her day with three little task. Ideally in the first hour of the day she would be able to say she had got something done. If she was being very diligent, she would right them down on a list for those moments when you wonder if you are no further forward than you were a week, month, or year ago.

Another way to handle the 'less important stuff' is to delegate. I have a big problem with delegation. Not that I can't do it, but that I think there is an implicit message in delegation which sometimes causes problems. When you say, 'Can you do this, I don't have time', you are also saying, 'I have a list of priorities and this is not high enough up on the list, can you put it to the top of yours.' Delegation can be a power play. A statement that you are above a task.

It is different if the task is delegated as a learning mechanism. But I think this is often a cop-out. Learning curves are often quite steep and then flatten out. If you are still delegating a task to someone when they are already very capable at it, then you are back to power games. The best leaders I have known are the ones who roll their sleeves up and get stuck in alongside the people they are working with. There are some things that can't be communicated up. 

Make your own tea, for example. Obviously when you are busy, it seems like 'n las (a burden). Making for a few other people when you need to get a few moments away from the desk buys you a few free cups later. Write your own emails. Put your own presentations together. Cook your own dinner from scratch at least occasionally. Dishes. Bed. Rubbish. Dusting. Shopping. Don't ask other people to do tasks you aren't prepared to do yourself at least every now and then.

If you constantly delegate because other things are more important, you can end up losing 'competence at life'. The truth is, if you don't make time for the little things, the big things will swallow you whole.

Never be too big to make tea

Where the Culture Lives.

When an organisation is small, you don't need to worry about things like precedent. If everyone knows each other, and they know how other people know each other, decisions can take into account things that are difficult to communicate. Difficult to put in words. Impossible to put in numbers. The culture of the group can develop so there are unstated rules and expectations. Knowing each other provides both constraints and support. It isn't that things aren't messy, there is just more ability to deal with mess.

Mess at scale is tough because you lose the bonds that connect. You can work at a company for years without getting to know the boss. Different people in the company can be working on very different projects. The fact that they are in the same company may just be co-incidental. Executives will try and get round this by building up a culture. This is often cited as the one thing that keeps them up at night. Building a culture around a myth that has grown about what the company stood for when it was small. A myth that grows out of trying to put the difficult and impossible into words and numbers. 

One way that culture can be maintained in big companies is through story telling. Stories of how the founding members dealt with situations. Ideally stories that carry enough ambiguity that they can carry a bit of that founding member's soul to those that follow. That can allow them to face the problems that arise like that person would have done it. What would the founder do?

What dampens the story is that big organisations by their nature tend to move into Silos. Working in parallel next to each other. The projects that the bigger group are working on are too big for everyone to wrap their head around. So we focus. We don't know people outside our bubble. We don't know how other's know each other. We lose the subtlety. The stories lose relevance and we start comparing people by summary bits of information like years service, qualifications, hours worked, grades, gender, job title, age.

Focusing on Silos

(finepixtrix)

Skill is only a fraction of what makes people succeed. A huge driver is the web of relationships within the group. Relationships are where the culture lives.

Rank That Reeks

I am all for being visionary or idealistic and imagining your version of Utopia. I am all for working towards it. But:

(1) My version is very different from other people's versions

(2) My version isn't going to happen, and 

(3) Being in Utopia is less Utopian that getting there.

I have always had a bit of a chip on my shoulder when it comes to authority. I don't like being told what to do. I don't like feeling like I am doing something that anybody else could do. That whole wiring of 'wanting to be special'. I also get very uncomfortable telling people what to do. Particularly if you know the person doesn't want to do it, and you are having to 'pull rank'. I don't like rank. My favourite successful people are the ones who don't reek of rank. Most times when you are particularly competent at something, you have cultivated another area of incompetence in exchange because of the focus required.

I am also a sceptic when it comes to delegation and outsourcing. I know people who will laugh at me for this. I used to be very keen on getting rid of tasks I wasn't better than other people at. The theory of competitive advantage is that if everyone focuses purely on what they do best, and trades, we all do better. I think that is theoretically true, up to a point, but that it comes at a cost. The cost is empathy and communication challenges. If you don't try a task, or see it as beneath you, your rank is likely to reek. At some point, you can get to enough. Beyond that point, I think the cost of outsourcing outweighs the benefits.

If a task is purely repetitive with zero creativity, we are probably going to be able to get a machine to do it. I am not a work for works sake person. I get that repetitive tasks can be meditative. They can become an artform. Sweeping can be Kung Fu and all that Jazz. Most people who are sweeping aren't doing Kung Fu and would rather be doing something else. If what they are doing is creative, it hasn't been done before. The person delegating the task doesn't know what it involves. They are just setting a challenge.

Yes Yes, Sweeping can be Kung Fu

The problem comes in when work becomes a continual evaluation. The subordinate is constantly trying to impress their boss, and so is unlikely to be able to be completely honest about the difficulty of the task. One of the best measures of happiness is apparently how far away from you your boss is. An easy task may be hard. A hard task may be easy. The structure of a Boss-Employee relationship is that the aim of the employee is to prove themselves, and improve themselves. It isn't a partnership. The only way to understand a task is to roll your sleeves up and get involved. Again, the successful people that have impressed me are never the ones in the Ivory Towers. They are the ones with dirt under their fingers.

So my Utopia involves a world where we don't work for work's sake. Machines do that. In my Utopia we work on creative problems. We work for flow. Or we sweep for Kung Fu's sake. But we do it together. The issue we have to figure out is that in a lot of people's Utopias, rank features quite strongly. In a lot of people's Utopias, climbing the ladder is Utopia. Utopia is relative.

Pulling on the Jersey

One of the reasons I don't like party politics is it makes no sense to me. It is like saying, 'We don't know what we are going to disagree on, but let's choose in advance who we are going to disagree with'. You are creating a team. I love teams. I got nuts when the Boks play. I get very happy when they win, and incredibly sad when they lose. Unless it is against England or Die Ou Transvaal, I am even a gracious loser. I have jerseys. I sing songs. It feels good to be part of something unconditionally and grrrr in the general direction of the opposition. But not for stuff that matters. 

Sports matters because of the connections it creates. I have a buddy that I can depend on having some whatsapp banter with every match. We even managed to go out to the last world cup together. After South Africa got knocked out early, we realised that having a good trip was more important than sulking. I bought a Kiwi jersey and leaned in to the occasion. Other than a brief moment of worrying for my life if France had pulled off the final (by brief, I mean 80 minutes at Eden Park), it was a good choice.

When it comes to party politics, I don't seem to find parties where I could pull on their jersey. I thought a good simplification was that I was with the Republican Party on economic issues, and with the Democratic Party on social issues. Then I heard someone describe the Pope as with the Reds on social and the Blues on economics. But that makes no sense to me, because then that should be a person I disagree with viscerally. If I got a vote for Pope, I would pull on a Francis jersey. The dude is awesome.

Perhaps some new decor Mama? Chat to Papa...

David Graeber explains that elections are not the key to Democracy. The key is giving people's views consideration. He argues convincingly that it is just the word 'Democracy' that we inherited from Greece. Methods of communities coming together to make decisions are common to almost all human cultures since coming together is common. Inventing democracy  is a little like inventing family. Well done, great idea Einstein.

Explaining his views as a 'small a, anarchist', I found what he was saying very similar to a book that explained some of the key ideas behind Libertarianism to me. 'Subsidiarity' is a jargon word he uses because he can't think of a better one, to describe the idea that most decisions should be pushed down to the smallest, lowest-scale, possible. This is similar to the idea Virginia Postrel talks about as tacit knowledge, and the advantage of the people doing the work making the decisions. Things should only be bought to discussion when they affect everybody, e.g. Scotland being part of the UK. They should only be bought to a vote as a last resort. Yes/No creates camps. There are other ways.

So I don't think we should be surprised that Bernie and Donald supporters probably have heaps in common (don't like professional politicians), as do Jeb and Hillary supporters (We've mostly got it pretty good). You likely have something in common with all of them. If you are in the UK, read any of the manifestos and there would have been things you agree with, and things you disagree with. The Democratic Alliance in South Africa basically wants to implement the 'National Development Plan' of the ANC. A vote in SA for lots of opposition members becomes simply a way to stop one party being able to change the constitution. Changing the constitution should be something we vote on, the rest of the time we should be working together. Leave the face paint for world cups.

Kissing Babies

We have a natural limit on how much we can interact with the world. Unlike the Artificial Intelligence that is being developed to drive cars, we can only be aware of one thing at any specific moment. We can divide and shift our attention, but it still means we are moving from one thought to another. No two thoughts can exist at the exact same time. The reason learning to meditate is so powerful is because it is developing the ability not to jump from thought to thought. To still the mind and focus.

Extend this further and we end up having to develop the ability to communicate what we are doing. The most powerful person in the world can still only think of one thing at a time. They are completely reliant on the ability of others to communicate (and do) whatever else is going on. The problem becomes that, without trust, a lot of time ends up being spent on the communication part. Communication is ridiculously hard because it relies not only on the message but also on the context in which that message is received. We hear differently. We react differently. We interpret differently.

Rather than communicating, we may wish to choose someone we trust to represent us. This is true in terms of front line decisions and the 'employees bosses hire' and big picture decisions and the 'politicians voters hire'. Without trust, you can end up almost permanently on the campaign trail. We see it most obviously in the reality TV show that is the American election cycle with almost two years in every four dedicated to the communication (entertainment) part. Before we get too critical, there are two other places where we do exactly the same thing.

Politicians Kissing Babies

In the workplace, a huge amount of time is spent trying to communicate about what we are doing. You can't just diligently get on with your job unless you work in a role where outcomes are quantifiable, visible and regular. If you work in a job where subjective creativity, knowledge and personal interaction are involved it may be nearly impossible for anyone to understand what you are doing or the value you are adding without direct engagement. What ends up happening is people effectively have to 'look busy' or engage in other means of self promotion. If you aren't good at marketing yourself, how will you get the recognition you deserve?

The second example is in the home. In 'Thinking Fast & Slow', Daniel Kahneman talks about the phenomenon of household chores. Ask each family member how much they contribute as a percentage. It will add up to well more than 100%. Why? Because we are only aware of the chores we do. If you do the washing, pop it in the tumble dryer, iron it, fold it and put it in the cupboard - the house is wonderful and clean. In other words, it is not noticeable. Instead, Day 1: Wash and hang in the lounge. Day 2: iron and put in piles on the dining room table. Day 3: Pack into the cupboards. The second method is a much better political campaign.

Whether a politician, a colleague, or family member, we end up spending a lot of time dealing with the fact that we are limited to our own view of the world. Unless we build, earn, give and accept trust.

Mind the Halo

Engineers are famous for only wanting to work for engineers. They are not the only ones, we tend to recognise the competence of people who have gone down similar paths to us and done well. Warren Buffett talks about a 'Circle of Competence'. He tries to understand the specific area where a person has dug deep and he trusts their understanding of an issue more than he trusts his own. If you don't do this, there is always the risk of the 'Halo Effect'. Because you, or someone else, is really awesome at something, you assume that awesomeness is inherent to their essence. 'Wow, she is smart. I should trust her opinion on everything.'

"As an engineer, I ignore useless input from non-engineers!" "As an engineer, I have firm views on sales & marketing with zero grounding!"

— Marc Andreessen (@pmarca) September 3, 2015

Some things take a hell of a long time for the penny to drop. You have to deep soak. You have to really gain familiarity with base concepts before you get to connect them together. Like learning a language, each word initially exists in isolation but contains layers and layers of meaning. Eventually the words come together in an infinite number of combinations that release additional layers of meaning. It takes time. The idea that a smart person can apply their mind to any problem and solve it quickly is rubbish. Given time, effort, support and resources I do think we can chip away at areas of our ignorance. But that starts with recognising our ignorance.

The moon isn't as big as its halo

Even when someone is particularly competent in a given thing, they may not be particularly good at understanding their competence. To achieve any given goal, we do lots of things. The fact that something works doesn't tell us why it works. Someone can be incredibly successful and not understand the reason for their success. They can credit things they did that didn't contribute to their success. Often you only figure out the reason when something changes that makes you unsuccessful. Even then, you may only realise the thing you stopped doing later. Or you may never realise it. We are good at learning from instant feedback. If there is a delay, we will have done lots of things since the problem.

Being able to identify problems is a skill in itself. Being able to communicate clearly is another skill. The world is complicated. We have to learn to rely on other people. We have to learn to trust. But we need to tread carefully, and with humility. Not only about our own competence or understanding of our competence, but also not overtrusting the competence of our heroes.

Trusted Feedback

If salaries are a poor measure of worth, reviews at work can loom like a public examination of your soul. I have seen various tactics where the two discussions are split. The 'number' is given first so that an open discussion can be had. It is given last because the discussion is more important than the number. It is given at a wildly different time to the chat so that it doesn't dominate either way. It tends to dominate since it is such a clear signal of what the bottom line impression is.

I agree with the principle that if you discover anything that comes as a big surprise in an annual review, the relationship is dysfunctional. If a manager is relying on sitting down with a bunch of data to examine how someone has performed, the relationship is dysfunctional. The only form of feedback that I think we take kindly to is from someone we trust. Trust comes from a belief that someone has a good understanding of what you are doing, what you are trying to achieve and why you are doing what you are doing. Many of these things are ridiculously hard to communicate. The person who has best articulated this for me is Virginia Postrel. Which is why I call the heart of the problem the Postrel Problem.

The last century has seen the magic of the industrial revolution. Through division of skills and the introduction of machines, productivity has exploded and much of the world has been ripped from poverty. The last three decades in China are nothing short of miraculous. Many of the gains come from cutting out inefficiencies and standardising. If things are standardised they are easily communicable. Once you can do something well, you can roll it out. You can use a cookie cutter approach. Decisions can slowly but surely be made further and further away from the customer.

Except they can't. At some point we get beyond the stuff we have to do, and to the stuff we want to do. Jobs are not just jobs. They are an expression of personality. They give meaning. They are a source of relationships. They start conversations. This is the kind of stuff that can't be communicated through data or even written feedback. Sit down and try write just 100 words on the 10 most important people in your life and why that is the case. It is hard! It is ridiculously hard.

A lot of our knowledge is tacit. We don't even understand that we understand it. It comes through time, nuance, relationships, empathy, connecting and a web that can't be expressed except through experience. That is why Postrel argues convincingly that decisions should be pushed down not up. The role of a manager in a world they don't understand shouldn't be to try. The role should be to remove obstacles. To ask how they can stop getting in the way and how they can provide resources and perspective. Or they should just roll up their sleeves and work with people.

The reason reviews often end up being awful is because managers are typically busy. They don't work with people, people work for them. The best feedback comes from people you work with. It doesn't come in an annual review. It comes over time. It doesn't always come through words. And it certainly doesn't come in the form of a number.

Balanced Scorecards

Being able to quantify things makes them much easier to manage. You can compare them. You can say which ones you prefer. Which ones are more important? You can see if you are improving. You can prioritise. An ordered world helps you figure out what matters. What causes what? Then you can do more of the things that cause the results that you want. Boom. The world makes sense.

By quantifying things, you can use equations to create models of how the world works (aX = Y + e). If I have ‘a’ many Xs, I will get a Y plus some noise, the (e)rror. So, almost Y. Regression models let you build up complicated equations that explain things. Almost. Simple models let you test whether different things (an action and an outcome) are connected. They help the world make sense. You can plan.

The desire to quantify can be very powerful. It assumes there is an underlying order that we just need to understand, and we can bend things to our will. An underlying order plus some noise. Noise is the bit that makes results differ from what we expect. However we explain the world, it is more complicated than that.

There lies the problem. In reality, whenever we test something we are only seeing the results that occurs with that very specific set of conditions. I might prefer Apples to Oranges. But if it is half time at a rugby match I prefer Oranges. I might prefer waking up early to miss a horrible sardine style sweaty commute, but it depends how I feel at the exact moment my alarm goes. aX only equals Yish if there are no oranges, sardines, rugby etc. Then only if I feel like it. It depends.

A popular management tool in the workplace is the Balanced Scorecard. It takes all the aspects of your job and breaks them down into quantifiable targets, then assigns weights to each of the targets depending on their importance. Slowly but surely you add more and more things that are important, until even the very important thing end up getting weights of 10%. Something like getting along with your colleagues may get just a 1% weighting. If you don’t get on with your colleagues, the other 99% may not matter at all.

Balance Scorecards and Rock Balancing

Counter Balance by Leandro Inocencio

Balanced Scorecards give the illusion of manageability. In my experience the best managers I have come across are able to dispense with these tools. The problem is this is not scalable. The magic ingredients they added were time and trust. The very best manager I ever had wasn't even my manager. She managed a team alongside me, and we worked together. But I learnt more from her than from anyone else about how to get the best out of people. Her super power was listening, the occasional challenging question, a sense of humour and a genuine sense of empathy. I wasn't a cog in her eyes.

Knowledge comes from the front lines. It comes from a deep understanding of the specific set of conditions. It comes from the qualitative stuff that glues the quantitative stuff together. It comes from the stuff you can't quantify. The stuff you can't communicate. The main lesson I learnt from her is that the best way to manage is not for people to work for you, it is for them to work with you. Balanced Scorecards are an attempt to allow for distance between where decisions are made and where they are implemented. The truth may be that you can't do that.

It’s more complicated than that. Conditions matter. It’s simpler than that. Trust people.