分工合作和合作分工

分工合作和合作分工


最近接觸到也看見、聽到下面的故事。

一間很有規模的公司,管理理念從合作到分工。分工只不過是一個過程;合作是價值和典範 (paradigm)。
另一間也是同具規模的相似組織。它的管理模式是把產品分派到不同的部門和組別(分工)。在分工中再找合作機會,例如共用一些資源和器材。他們的合作是一個過程。

你想一想,那一家公司比較理想。

The social side of the triple bottom line

The social side of the triple bottom line

Social refers to those matters related to society. This is the most difficult part of the trilogy. A society is a group of people with a persistent relationship with each other. This could be simply geographical, political, or some cultural things.  A community is a society in a narrower sense in the number of members or in the purity of relationships.

Social concerns in HK started in the 60s or early 70s when there was a large influx of immigrants and the government was not able to do too much to care of these people. Some people took on to themselves to start roof-top schools and other programs.  They got organized to become the NGOs.

The social issues are becoming more acute all over the world and the polarization of the rich and poor are getting stronger. This uneven distribution of wealth, resources and power leads to social unrest as we have seen, the most recently, the London Riot.  A citizen, or a member of the society sees himself through his "function" and his "role" in order to relate to the society. If these two basic elements are missing. He becomes a non-citizen. When the number of dis-satisfied members reach to a threshold, the "tipping point" triggers a riot or a revolution.

Therefore the society, an organism by itself, will find a way to stablize itself.  Today with the complexity of the society, none can handle it alone. Thus for sustainability, all have to work together with the three bottom lines considered at the same time.

The environment side of the triple bottom line

The environment side of the triple bottom line

Two closely related factors drastically put a heavy burden on self-renewal of ecology. 

1. The sheer growth of world population. It stands at 6.9 billion, was only 300 million in 1350, 2 billion in 1920 and 8 billion by2025. One billion people will be added in 15 years.

2. The exponential growth of technology and productivity. The advancement provided the much enjoyed prosperity and yet through the power of marketing produces blind-sighted consumption and waste.

A few mega-scale disasters shook up then a small percent of people to the unbalanced environment issues. The green movement soon spreads to many responsible corporations that put environmental concern in their business strategies. (what M Porter and Drucker called Corporate Social Integration)

The evolution and the development of this bottom line is the effort of many but we know that by themselves, it is not enough.

The economic side of the triple bottom line

Centuries ago, missionaries learned that "save a soul" is not sufficient. A human being has multiple dimensions. After a native got "saved", he continued to "live" in the world. They started to teach the natives a sustainable better living environment. This root of "doing good" emerges itself in a form of social enterprise, irrespective of religious or not.
In social enterprise, the mission of the business is to address a specific need of the society of the time, with the aim to be "profitable" for self-sustain. This is the concept of "doing good well." Well refers to excellency in business performance in terms of economics. 

永續的底線包含了「經濟」因素。我們生活在一個以財富為指標的社會,金錢原本不是萬能,但因為 dollar and cents 容易明白和毫不含糊,金錢背後便代表了資源和成就。「經濟」在這個經濟型社會成了不可或缺的一環。

從一個歷史和理論層次,我們可以這樣理解永續三底線的經濟因素:

早時宣教士被差派到一些落後地方傳福音,他們很快便明白到「救恩」不能單單弧立為靈魂的救贖,也要把這些土著帶進一個比較進步的社會生態, 即所謂「授人以漁」的觀念, 漸漸這根源發展為現今的「社會企業」, 以優良的營商理念和手法做「社會」 事工, 針對解決當今社會的需要。這個優良營商的條件當中重要一項是「經濟」,因為只有能夠超過「自負盈虧」才能確保有「永續性」的可能。

Sustainability and the Triple Bottom-line

When the commercial side of the society was making great strikes towards prosperity, the need for environment concern was felt. Yet little was done in a systematic way. Until recently, corporations are changing their mission statements to reflect the world's awakening to involve the business side for a sustainable environment. Hence, we have the triple bottom-lines sustainability conditions: economical, environmental and social.

永續性的三底線
過去幾十年，憑藉努力和科技的進步，超倍數的生產力帶來社會的繁榮，同時也帶來了環境和貧富的問題。不斷的有各類型團體關注這些複雜的社會問題，直到最近幾年，企業開始修改自己的使命宣言，反映了它們對社會的闗懷。所謂的永續三底線說明了這個樂觀的方向。三底線包括了：經濟、環境和社會條件。

Scotland Trip

I was away for more than two weeks, visiting Scotland and country sides of England. Just return yesterday and I will be off to an Asian country to teach for two weeks.

What did I learn in Scotland?

The country is old but not ancient. They keep many old buildings and traditions. They are quite happy with the inheritance and traditions.  Asia is ancient but young.  We are getting rid of the old stuffs quickly and embracing the new. However, in establishing the new, we have ignored and neglected the fundamentals that are true no matter it is old or new. May these fundamentals be values, such as dignity, true, beautiful, or heritage.


                                                                                          edited from a group post published June 29 2011

About learning

How do you learn? Very often we learn with a definitive target, such as a musical instrument, or a discipline subject such as accounting. This is great. They are more to-do, or knowledge based learning. Another way of learning is though imitation such as a child learns from his father. Other methods include experimentation, try and error, internalizing observations.

Learning in management, I think, the most effective and sure learning is by doing. In doing, one is able to include the variations of external factors and the influence of implicit power and dynamics in his learning process.

If you have a desire to learn, be active and take up responsibilities. Let the fear of failure and desire to succeed be your teachers.


                                                                                                  edited from a group post published   May 30, 2011 




Responses:


LP
I could relate well with your insightful analysis. Well said.

To add on to what you have started this conversation on external factors, I would like to add that not all learning are well paved nor maped-out by our forerunners with role models for us to mimic.

Necessity could put us in the forefront of learning - so a society/corporation/entrep​rise/group mees the needs or address a crisis or solve an immediate situation by developing innovative responsive adaptative technology or re-organize the resources (human resources as well as other forms of resources). Of course leadership will make all the difference.

The Robinsons learnt to live in tree house on an island (fictional) and Alice learnt to find friends in another world after having fell into the rabbit hole (fictional).

In real life, at each stage of our life, we may involuntarily find ourselves facing new external factors and have little time to "do our learning" in time - being a new parent, being a new hire, accepting a promotion to a
senior position or on a less positive note, battling with cancer, facing a financial crisis, losing market shares, or morning over a natural disaster.

How Einstein came up with the speed of light and how Newton coined the word gravity after a falling apple are just some of the examples where the talented revolutionaized our social world with unprecedented breakthroughs without following the conventional route of learning.

Chinese restaurants in North America is another example. The railroad workers met their survival needs by delicious North American Chinese food at a time when discrimination marginalized their opportunity to participate in the labour market.

Then in the music world, the Blues, Jazz, Gospel, and Rap artists started out as protest counter-culture. Gradually each of them found their way to enter pop culture.

Could learning by through subjective experience? Intuition? Spiritual guidance? or simply the self-expression?

Some knowledge of ancient civilizations have been lost. Could archaeological digs recover some of these mysterious wealth of knowledge from out past?

What does it take to learn to be empathetic? What does it take for humankind to learn to live in peace without war?  

LP

In simpler terms, learning is a way of life in modern society, an animated way of looking forward into the near fuiture while keeping ourselves modest and humble. The more we learn, the more we realize there is more to learn. It keeps us from boredom while engages us in problem-solving activities like solving a riddle. It keeps us companionship and put us on a meaningful journey.

Happiness often contains an element of learning - a sense of accomplishment of having learnt when we look back in retrospect and be able therefore to carry out tasks.

PL

In learning - higher level learning if there is such a thing, should include a backward looking perspective and a forward looking perspective. These perspectives should not be limited to historical development and future trends, but time perspectives of the learning experiences of the learner. He/she has to relate the learning into his/her own experiences in this area which could be experiential or conceptual.