Traditional organizations rest on command authority. Information-based organizations rest on responsibility.
When a company builds its organization around modern information technology, it must ask the question: “Who requires what information, when and where?” And then those management positions and management layers whose duty it has been to report rather than to do can be scrapped.
But, the information-based organization demands self-discipline and upward responsibility from the first-level supervisor all the way to top management. Traditional organizations rest on command authority. Information-based organizations rest on responsibility. The flow is circular from the bottom up and then down again. The information-based system can, therefore, function only if each individual and each unit accepts responsibility: for their goals and their priorities, for their relationships, and for their communications. This in turn makes possible fast decisions and quick responses. These advantages will be obtained only if there are understanding, shared values, and, above all, mutual respect. If every player needs to know the score, there has to be a common language, a common core of unity. If the organization is information-based, diversification in which financial control is the only language is bound to collapse into the confusion of the Tower of Babel.
ACTION POINT: Is your organization held together by financial controls or by understanding, shared values, and mutual respect? Accept responsibility for yourself and your unit, including your goals, your relationships, and your communications.
The Frontiers of Management
* Source: The Daily Drucker by Peter F. Drucker