Downsizing seems to be all the rage these days, particularly at tech companies. As someone who has studied innovation for thirty years, I've learned that often, those doing the downsizing are targeting the wrong people.
With that in mind, let me offer up my expertise on what groups should be on the chopping block. In fact, there are a number of departments that I suggest you might consider axing:
- The Creativity and Innovation Prevention Department
- The Office Of Small Thinking and Marginal Ideas
- The Department of Lost Initiative
- The Excuses and Justification Bureau
- The Committee To Create Committees
- The Aggressive Indecision Department
- The Division of Obsolete Technologies
- The Department of Reinventing the Wheel
- The Office of Doing What's Always Been Done
- The Department of Repetitive But Useless Actions
- The Department that Always Does it This Way
- The Office of the Leadership Sycophants
- The Department of Redundancy Department
- The Department of Unnecessary Acronyms (DUA)
- The Secret Innovation Committee
- The Office of the Underachievers
- The Coordinator of Complaints and Criticism
- The Department of Organizational Sclerosis
- The Office of Decision Deferral
- The Team of Perpetual Planners
- The Department of Blame Assignment
In addition, there are a few highly specialized executive positions you should consider getting rid of. These include the:
- Coordinator of Unnecessary Meetings
- Vice President of Hiding Failure
- Senior Director of the Status Quo
- Senior Vice President of Distracting Initiatives
- Head of Cautious Bureaucracy
- Senior Vice President of Never-Ending Strategic Studies
Get moving! Do this today - start out by going down the hall and firing your Innovation & Creativity Prevention Department!
Do something!
Futurist Jim Carroll left the traditional corporate workplace in 1999 when the company he worked for shifted him into the Department of NeverEnding Political Infighting and Backstabbing. He's been working as a solo entrepreneur ever since and doesn't miss the irrelevancy of the bureaucracy that once surrounded him.