Of the ones that left for reasons that were more because they didn't want to be part of this next wave of the company's journey with holacracy and, more broadly, with just self organizing and a very different way of running a business. Of them from what I've heard there was a sizable percentage of them among the middle management ranks, which you would expect when you're adopting a system that kind of shifts the way management works. You know some of them were, what you often see, and I don't know about Zappos in particular, I don't want to speak for them, I haven't talked to many of the folks there who actually left. But what you see with most companies when you adopt something like holacracy, even when you don't offer a generous buyout, you will see some people leave because of it. And there are often folks who, they know how to lead in the conventional model. They know how to be a manager, they know how to be a good manager sometimes. And they don't want to learn a new method. Or sometimes they're kind of tied up in the status of it. They've achieved a certain ranking in their social hierarchy. And some people aren't interested in losing that status that comes with the title. You see some of that in companies. Although you also see a lot of people who make the leap and love it. I'd say when you adopt something like this, expect some turnover. It's different, in different companies, and smaller companies you might not lose quite as many, but you will see some turnover.
Rob: One aspect I really like is you talk about how people have to relax into embracing the power that they get and that some people, having grown up in patriarchal authoritarian families and culture have a hard time using the power and accepting it.
BR: It's funny to watch that happen, it's uncomfortable. Often when people are used to not owning and leading their authority, they're used to turning to a boss to just kind of make sure it's okay. It's a lot like you know how kids might look to their parents to make sure you know, is this okay? Am I on the right path? And then they have to leave home and grow up and be an adult and make their own life decisions and that's not actually an easy path for anyone, except, in our organizations except in our organizations people don't have to do that, they get to into a patriarchal system and continue looking to someone else to take responsibility for their decisions. And holacracy breaks that. You can see it in early meetings after a company adopts this where you know someone has a hard decision to make and you'll see their eyes naturally go and look to the boss and they're just looking for the approval or the head nod or whatever, they're giving up their power and their autonomy to that boss to lead. You know the job of the holacracy coach, at that point, is to jump in and say, 'wait a minute lets be clear, the boss has no authority here, there is no boss anymore. That person that used to be your manager has no authority to tell you what to do here. You have the burden of leadership, you have to make this decision. You can for any input you want, you can get whatever support you want, but you and only you has to have the burden of autonomy and leadership.'
And then you see nervous laughter, and you see squirming in their chairs. It's uncomfortable to really have to step up and lead and own your authority. And yet what an awesome blessing and the same way when you know kids leave home and grow up and get to be an adult. As uncomfortable as that transition is, I don't think many of us would want to go back. You know, I like being my own sovereign adult in life. And I see the same shift in organizations once people really own that leadership, very few would want to go back to be sheltered by an overprotective boss.
Rob: I mentioned at the beginning I'm interested in narcissists and psychopaths and I interviewed the author of the book Corporate Psychopath, even, and they're there. How does Holacracy deal with this kind of person?
BR: Yeah it becomes very interesting how much it makes it visible and transparent. Holacracy doesn't solve that problem for you. It doesn't make decisions for you. But what it does it make it really hard for that person to hide. When somebody is kind of addicted to their own power, and wielding it for their own ego, that becomes really obvious to everyone around them. And if it's not addressed, it becomes even more obvious that the organization has a serious issue and it's being ignored, which actually make it's hard to ignore. So I do see it forcing some of those questionable people to maybe opt out before they get too exposed or to choose to leave. And if they don't, then it at least forces others to take note and decide what to do with it. It's kind of when you have a system that promotes transparency and gives more people more authority, you can't run a fiefdom like you can in a typical company, which I think is how a lot of those folks tend to operate. They build their little fiefdom, it's often run by fear. And it's often, to the detriment of the company around them to some degree. Or at least it's only serving them enough to maintain that person's power and little silo. Holacracy makes that really hard to do.
Rob: Okay. I want to get back, what about individualism and creativity.
BR: I actually just interviewed with somebody who is writing a book on creativity and asked me that same questions. One of the things that occurred to me as I thought about that, it's not that holacracy is forcing people to be more creative, what it's doing is, removing the obstacles to the expression of creativity. Let me say it this way , I think we have plenty of people that capacity for creativity in companies today. I think the biggest obstacle to them using it, is that it's hard to drive change. We see people in companies that have lots of insight about how things could be better, but they can't act on it. They either have a boss that just doesn't get it or they don't have the time to go convince everyone around them to change something, or it's just too hard. What holacracy does it just remove all of the roadblocks and obstacles and makes it easier to enact change, which I think invites more creativity. When people aren't blocked I think they can be more creative, same in terms of individuality. When you have a process for dealing with the organizational issues and you can structure the organization without worrying about egos getting in the way, it actually frees people to bring their whole self to work, and to be more passionate and more personal because they have an organizational system that takes care of the organization's needs and doesn't let stuff get blocked because of the personalities at play. It's funny, holacracy really differentiates the people from the work. In a lot of companies today it's all fused together, and if you want to get stuff done you have to kind of play the politics, you have to work the personal relationships to get organizational change. And with holacracy you don't, it's separated, but that's not to say you throw one out, it just makes it clear, here's a governance process, that's for updating the organization structure to meet its' needs. When you have the process that holds that well, it frees people to be more human, more whole, more themselves, more natural, more individuals, and to allow that to be in a structured process that can hold it without that getting in the way of the organizations work. Really interesting kind of paradox there of both more impersonal in how we organize and more personal as people honor and embrace their individuality more in the system.
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