Getting Performance Without Performance Management
The performance is a typical feature of a "machine", like a car engine or a computer. All human systems are not designed and built, but they are made of people that establish relationship among them and environment much more entangled that anybody outside can figure out. Even the concept of "management" is outdated at the dawn of the third millenium. Unless we will still consider these paradigms no real progress will be possible. My contribution here is to pose a completely different question: how can we see the "human community" that we call company in a totally different perspective?
I have a first answer: new "cognitive resources", that permits to think differently (i.e. non machine oriented) and new knowledge already available (from mathematics, physics, sociology, biology, etc.).
As a very first step I suggest to perform a social "cognitive defreezing" about an issue. Bring your people, the team you work with, in considering the degree of freedom you have to address a real working issue. Any contribution is good. After a while, if you write down on a board divided in two area all of them (one part for actions you can perform and the other depending form the other) you will realize that all the thoughts are blocked on what is depending by others. Highlight this and invite people to move "around" these costrains.
Luciano,
This is an interesting point. I acually like the word "performance", I struggle much more when it is combined with "management". The problem is maybe how we define performance, as it too often is reduced to "hitting that number, whatever it takes". For me, performance is about moving towards that inspiring purpose we all share. Does it not all start with getting that purpose right?
Thanks,
Bjarte
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