I don't think selling a company is a bad thing. I think building a company with the idea in mind that one must sell (because one's backers will flip out if there isn't a sale) is bad.
So they're closing the circle and turning it into a revolving door for an incestuous aristocracy where the amount of value you capture is a function of who you know and who owes you a favor instead of being a function of how much value you actually create.
How do you stop any market from getting taken over by psychopaths who want to turn it into an incest-fest? This is also a problem in every other industry ever, and also in government. Is there a such thing as a corruption-repellent, paychopath-kryptonite system, and if so, what is it?
I doubt it. I think we have to just keep reinventing. There's no system we can set up and have it run on its own.
I like the way the Scandinavians think: they hybridize between the socialist welfare state and a capitalistic market for innovation in a way we could stand to learn from.
But that's not what the US Constitution is, either. It was a legal framework and social contract that set up an elaborate system of checks and balances to prevent psychopaths from amassing too much political power. The democracy still running on that framework is a living, evolving thing, that has struggled to adapt with changing times, but it's done a pretty good job of keeping the psychos out of supreme ruling power (or at least keeping any one particular psycho from holding onto it very long) since 1787.
Meanwhile in the corporate world, we don't have that. Most private organizations are not even remotely democratic in nature. I think that's the core essence of what needs to change. And I think that's sort of what you're getting at by advocating open allocation and profit sharing.
Either that, or we need to at least strengthen the welfare state enough to decouple employment from basic livelihood, so that business failure doesn't impose the risk of homelessness/starvation, and most people aren't compelled to become MacLeod Losers, selling all their economic upside risk off in exchange for stable shelter, food, and medical care.
Yes. Make the goal of your organisation a social good, and not making money.
I suggest replacing these useless leeches with open source software.
I believe that most administrative tasks in large organizations are by now routine. For instance, there is absolutely zero invention in the insurance case processing industry : get claimee's documents, validate them and check contract's term. The only thing managers do is add useless overhead that justifies their presence and aimlessly complexify software that could be written once for the next 50 years at least.
With good open-source case management software, any organization can use it readily; no need for clueless suits to come in and pretend they analyze it because they can't; no need for them to demand costly and dangerous changes without any justification (other than the inept rules they created in the first place).
There is no need for the bums any more : just use free software that will readily organize your service.
Neither do I see it as an inherently bad thing. There are valid and compelling reason to sell a company. E.g., There might be no "family successors". Your heart may no longer be in it. You might want to do other things. You might feel that someone else might take it to the next level better than yourself at the helm.... etc., etc..
>> building a company with the idea in mind that one must sell [........] is bad
And that's exactly what was being implied here.... "The moment you start a company, it is for sale… at the right price". And I have a problem with that one too!