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Cargo Cult Management.

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13 pointsmspeiser10 comments

Here's an interesting observation, if a bit dangerous for my karma:

On average a succefull media outlet is serving the interest of its audience, otherwise audience will leave and the new one may never come. So you have Fox News with republican audience that only shows them the news and views they want to see. Then there is some similar liberal news outlet that is also careful not to expose the users to an uncomfortable thought. In some sense this is an "Innovator's Dilemma, media edition" - the customers hold producers hostage by using their consumption preferences.

So where am I going with this? There is a distinct flavor of media that is railing against "management". Dilbert being the flag and the articles like the one linked is the rank and file. The article is pretty much devoid of content and is full of emotional appeal to anymosity against "them" and affinity with "us, the sane folks". Just like the previously mentioned political "news" media.

In other words when reading your favorite rant you are reading the content of your own head, as best guessed by the author and selected by your filters.

Most of the time you are reading yourself.

...no mushrooms were hurt in production of this message...

I grant that we read what we want to believe, but this is true of everything, whether true or false.

I can't convince you that the article is not thin other than pointing out that most writing is about communicating a handful of (and often just one or two) elaborated ideas.

That's fine but this idea was better communicated by simply pointing to the original piece - Feynman's speech.

This article was a rehash of Feynman's speech plus a lot of "managers do this, down with managers!". Ironically in its blanket unqualified assertions the article itself is what it complains about - junk science.

Most of the time you are reading yourself.

That's only true if most of what you read is boring.

I have found in myself, that I tend to champion the ideas of the last book I read - i.e. I'm easily convinced and over-enthusiastic. But at least I am aware of that.

Protip: if you choose to criticize something, don't say it's devoid of content then write up a long ad hom.

As I just commented recently on another story here, I am reading "Good to Great" and I tend to agree somewhat. Social science is different from real science, though, and there may be a valid research approach behind Mr. Collins and his team. Its just not clear. And seeing Fannie Mae on the list of "great" companies is just laughable.

I agree that social science is different from the physical sciences, but that's not an excuse for the cargo cult science that dominates the field. Read Historians' Fallacies for a view of how the social sciences should approach their work. (http://www.amazon.com/Historians-Fallacies-Toward-Historical...).

Social sciences have well-developed methodologies for dealing with fallacies. http://www.amazon.com/Experimental-Quasi-Experimental-Design... is the bible, and is mostly taught to doctoral students. But chances are Mr. Collins has never heard of it, since he's in business faculty. But he might have, and might actually have a solid research design. Just that its hard to tell from the book.

The practice of management in the real world is full of imperfections, because its about people, and people are imperfect.

Am I the only person who exposes themselves to things they don't like (be it Fox News, conservative blogs, or even sites on car repair and marxism), just so they can avoid this trap? So you can know that whilst, yes, most of the time you're 'reading your own mind', as it were, you're also making sure to give yourself a taste of the other side.

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