Vilkko_Virkkala_KONE_OY_Helsinki@QZCOM.MAILNET (05/07/84)
aspect In January I wrote a paper on the above theme, sent a summary of it to this conference, and mailed copies of the full text to a few persons who asked for it. Recently a new aspect of the theme has appeared. As described in my January paper there is a great need to increase participation in the decision making process in most of our organizations. More participation seems to lead to better productivity, better work satisfaction, and even better health of the members of the organization. In my paper I saw two main obstacles to increased participation: - time needed in discussions - managers' learning habits It now seems that there may be a third one, too: health of the manager. Recently published studies at the University of Pennsylvania (see e.g. "The dilemma of excellence: how strategic decision making can kill you." in International Management, Apr.-84, or "Top decision makers - victims of their own competence" in Management Review Febr. -84) seem to indicate that good, very participative decision making can really kill the leader. These studies have shown that better managers are more "multidimensional", meaning that they can genuinely see the problem situation from many viewpoints and also integrate these viewpoints somehow in their decisions. Now, added participants in a decision-making discussion certainly bring added viewpoints in, and also require that their viewpoints should be observed in the decision. Otherwise their their presence is just lip-service to the participation idea. Thus added participation requires more "multidimensionality" from the leader. Unfortunately, according to the Pennsylvania studies, more multidimensional managers appear to have a greatly increased risk of coronary heart disease. As one of the articles says, "this link between excellence and disease is very disturbing, indeed." What is the reason to this? I'd like to throw in a wild guess, to at least open the discussion: that the reason is stress caused by a too difficult mental process. Imagine yourself in the situation that you have to play simultaneous blind chess against a few opponents. You have written, partly faulty notes, in the style "Queen in F7", and you have helpers who give you partly faulty descriptions of the situation in different corners, but you do not see the situation on a chessboard. You also know that you can win or lose millions in the game. There are persons who could do this very well, but I would feel greatly stressed. I would also be willing to find simplified strategies that would not make it necessary to consider the situation in every corner of the board. If the Pennsylvania findings are correct, then probably a number of different things should be done to lessen the stress on good managers. A few ideas are given in the articles, and I can imagine a few more. I also believe that tools, similar to the chessboard, that make complicated situations easier to grasp, can be useful in this respect. In my January paper I try to give some ideas about such tools to persons who have the possibility to develop them further.
Vilkko_Virkkala_KONE_OY_Helsinki%QZCOM.MAILNET@MIT-MULTICS.ARPA (05/07/84)
Relay-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site decvax.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site hou3c.UUCP Message-ID: <54372@QZCOM> Date: Mon, 7-May-84 06:38:00 EDT Sender: ka@hou3c.UUCP (Kenneth Almquist) MULTICS.ARPA, Message_Group_at_BRL_mailing_list%QZCOM.MAILNET@MIT-MULTICS.ARPA Lines: 64 To: Computer_conferencing_experience%QZCOM.MAILNET@MIT-MULTICS.ARPA Cc: msggroup@BRL-AOS.ARPA, Message_Group_at_BRL_mailing_list%QZCOM.MAILNET@MIT-MULTICS.ARPA aspect In January I wrote a paper on the above theme, sent a summary of it to this conference, and mailed copies of the full text to a few persons who asked for it. Recently a new aspect of the theme has appeared. As described in my January paper there is a great need to increase participation in the decision making process in most of our organizations. More participation seems to lead to better productivity, better work satisfaction, and even better health of the members of the organization. In my paper I saw two main obstacles to increased participation: - time needed in discussions - managers' learning habits It now seems that there may be a third one, too: health of the manager. Recently published studies at the University of Pennsylvania (see e.g. "The dilemma of excellence: how strategic decision making can kill you." in International Management, Apr.-84, or "Top decision makers - victims of their own competence" in Management Review Febr. -84) seem to indicate that good, very participative decision making can really kill the leader. These studies have shown that better managers are more "multidimensional", meaning that they can genuinely see the problem situation from many viewpoints and also integrate these viewpoints somehow in their decisions. Now, added participants in a decision-making discussion certainly bring added viewpoints in, and also require that their viewpoints should be observed in the decision. Otherwise their their presence is just lip-service to the participation idea. Thus added participation requires more "multidimensionality" from the leader. Unfortunately, according to the Pennsylvania studies, more multidimensional managers appear to have a greatly increased risk of coronary heart disease. As one of the articles says, "this link between excellence and disease is very disturbing, indeed." What is the reason to this? I'd like to throw in a wild guess, to at least open the discussion: that the reason is stress caused by a too difficult mental process. Imagine yourself in the situation that you have to play simultaneous blind chess against a few opponents. You have written, partly faulty notes, in the style "Queen in F7", and you have helpers who give you partly faulty descriptions of the situation in different corners, but you do not see the situation on a chessboard. You also know that you can win or lose millions in the game. There are persons who could do this very well, but I would feel greatly stressed. I would also be willing to find simplified strategies that would not make it necessary to consider the situation in every corner of the board. If the Pennsylvania findings are correct, then probably a number of different things should be done to lessen the stress on good managers. A few ideas are given in the articles, and I can imagine a few more. I also believe that tools, similar to the chessboard, that make complicated situations easier to grasp, can be useful in this respect. In my January paper I try to give some ideas about such tools to persons who have the possibility to develop them further.