Freedom, Inc_ - Brian M. Carney [59]
“Otherwise, I changed nothing,” Zobrist recounted.
Faithful to his approach of not confronting the “how” managers, the “rocks” in the stream, he left in place many of the managerial practices and decisions he had found there—the monthly bonuses, the quality meetings, the locked supply closets, the coffee machine, the time clocks, even the adjustable wrenches. But he knew that these things were bad for the company.
FAVI’s organizational chart looked liked any other company’s—it showed you who tells whom how to do their job, which way the lines of authority ran, and so on. While looking at it one day, Zobrist realized that it contained a second, very different kind of information. Written into the very structure of the company was the message Man is not intelligent. Otherwise, why employ supervisors and industrial engineers to tell others how best to do a job that they perform hundreds of times a day?
The chart also said Man is irresponsible. Otherwise, he would not need controllers, who were, in turn, controlled by others, and so on.
Man is lazy, the chart said. That’s why he needs someone above him to dictate the pace at which he works.
It even suggested that men are thieves, and so everything needs to be kept under lock and key, with guardians employed to protect company equipment and supervisors to review requests for new items.
In short, Zobrist concluded, “the organizational chart was built on the assumption that man is bad.” He decided the time had come for the stream to flow under the “how” managers’ practices, and he called a meeting. The force of the stream, Zobrist explained, was the force of his convictions, which he hoped would erode the managers’.
“And what if we consider that man is good?” he asked the group.
An uproar ensued. One manager summed up the group reaction: “A good foundry worker is an idiot with muscles!” Perhaps he was inspired by Frederick W. Taylor, one of the world’s first management theorists and consultants, who once qualified a steel-mill worker as “sufficiently phlegmatic and stupid to choose this for his occupation.”5
Zobrist concluded then that the rocks would not easily be washed away. He would, instead, go around them and appeal directly to the frontline people. At 11 a.m. on December 24, 1983, Zobrist convened a company-wide meeting to present his Christmas wishes. Standing on the shop floor on a little podium made of a couple of palettes, he addressed his employees. His Christmas speech is worth quoting at length.
“It has been nine months that I have been among you … During these nine months, I have observed you and seen people of courage, great professionals who love their job but who are prevented from working efficiently. I have arrived at the conclusion that people of your qualities need neither carrots, nor sticks,” Zobrist began. He noticed a couple of production managers immediately turning pale. “Carrots and sticks are unworthy of professionals, which you are. That’s why, once you come back from Christmas, the time clocks will be dismantled …. There will be no time clocks because you’re not paid to make hours but products, and good products. That’s why the bell will also be gone. There won’t be bonuses anymore either…. [Instead,] we’ll take the average bonus everyone received over the past two years and will add it to your salaries. There are no thieves among you, so the doors of the supply closets will be removed … We’ll put up a board and a pen, and everyone will mark what he took—no names—so we can reorder supplies at the appropriate time …. There won’t be any paid drink dispensers, but for each workshop we’ll provide two free cold water dispensers with syrups and two coffee dispensers. The adjustable wrenches are out. Each machine will have its own complete set of maintenance tools. And to allow everyone to equip himself as he desires, every employee will have a budget