It's time to reinvent management. You can help.

Humanocracy

As a reverse fairy tale for the CEO set, the reality television program Undercover Boss is fascinating, not so much in the witness-to-a-train- wreck mode of the rest of the genre, but because it is so revealing of our conflicted relationship with "the boss." The premise of the show—that the only way to get a clue about what's really going on in his (or her) organization, is for the boss to go undercover on the front lines—is all too often the actual reality in organizations of any size. Yet, at the same time, the view of the boss as the ultimate authority with the heroic power to swoop in and save the day—whether that means paying down a mortgage, granting an instant promotion, or banishing a reviled policy—holds sway in real life as well as on "reality" TV.
Blog by Polly LaBarre on March 5, 2012
Reflecting on 2010, one of the things I am particularly thankful for is the opportunity to get involved with the amazing folks in the MIX community. I made my first contribution in July and starting blogging regularly on the site in November as a Moonshot Guide focusing on the Enable Communities of...
Blog by Chris Grams on December 21, 2010
While the global financial meltdown and its aftershocks have unleashed a flood of indignation, condemnation, and protest upon Wall Street, the crisis has exposed a deeper distrust and implacable resentment of capitalism itself.
American society appears to be undergoing a crisis in trust. Most of the major organizations that we depend upon, including governments of all types, corporations, our health care system, our financial institutions, and our schools all seem to be failing us. Indeed, I do not believe it is an...
Blog by John Mackey on March 18, 2010
I live a half mile from the San Andreas fault—a fact that bubbles up into my consciousness every time some other part of the world experiences an earthquake. I sometimes wonder whether this subterranean sense of impending disaster is at least partly responsible for Silicon Valley’s feverish, get-it...
Blog by Gary Hamel on November 5, 2010
We have a big dream here at the MIX: to create organizations that are fit for the future--and fit for human beings. It's an aspiration that calls for nothing less than what the philosopher and reformer John Dewey described as a "new audacity of imagination." While "modern" management has delivered an immense contribution to global prosperity, the values driving our most powerful institutions today are fundamentally at odds with those of this age--zero-sum thinking, profit-obsession, power, conformance, control, hierarchy, and obedience don't stand a chance against community, interdependence, freedom, flexibility, transparency, meritocracy, and self-determination. It's time to radically rethink how we mobilize people and organize resources to productive ends.
Blog by Polly LaBarre on November 22, 2010
Our big goal here at the MIX is to inspire and unleash as much collective aspiration, audacity, imagination, energy, and passion as possible when it comes to making all of our organizations fit for the future--and fit for human beings. We've said it before: so much is broken when it comes to how...
Blog by Polly LaBarre on January 25, 2012
Often, when I'm invited to speak to boardrooms, I start by gently saying: "Listen up folks. Business is brain-dead. Right now, even as we speak, your business is probably undergoing a slow, barely perceptible, but wholly pernicious brain death." I might take a custom-made, baby-soft $2000 loafer to...
Blog by Umair Haque on March 4, 2011
Here at the MIX we believe that great ideas can come from anybody and anywhere in the world—as long as you're open and clever enough to ask for them. We're not sure how clever we are, but we're asking. We want YOUR great ideas when it comes to reinventing management. That's what the MIX is designed...
Blog by Polly LaBarre on May 14, 2010
-- A few weeks ago, we kicked off the Hackathon Pilot, an experiment enabling passionate MIXers to collaboratively "write the chapter" on how to enable communities of passion within our organizations (learn more about the pilot here and here ). This is the third post in a series where pilot members...
Blog by Chris Grams on April 18, 2011

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