[kashug]

This, so much this. I have been working as a cunsultant at both large companies and the public sector. And they are often unproductive - and for the same reasons. Loads of middle management that needs to be included in every decision-making, but noone that dares to actually make a decision without first asking their managers.

In my eyes, the reason much of the public sector is unproductive is not because it is not motivated by profit. But rather that it is too similar to large companies with loads different management-levels.

I once worked in the public sector when they embraced real autonomous teams with leaders that could actually make decisions when the team needed it. It was just as efficient as the best agile teams I have worked at in the private sector.

[nicoburns]

The real insight here (which you allude to) is that (all else being equal) large organisations are inherently inefficient. If you take the classic libertarian view that government is inefficient and extend the logic to apply to all large organisations (and indeed individuals who control large amounts of wealth) then you end up at a very interesting political position that can provide a unified critique of both modern capitalism and soviet style communism by explaining the failings of both as being due to concentration of power (state power in the case of communism, economic power in the case of capitalism).

[Ma8ee]

Neither is inherently inefficient. It’s just that both types of organisations can afford inefficiencies, while a small private company usually can’t afford it.

That doesn’t mean that small companies always are more efficiently run in all aspects. I expect my local McDonalds be much more efficient than the small sushi place around the corner, which can afford being inefficient due to low rent and probably close to minimum salary for the owner.

[mellavora]

My brother works in HR at a fairly high level at HUD. He reminds me that most large government agencies have to expect that 1/2 of their employees have below average talent and motivation. So they design many of their processes to function under this assumption.

While HUD is certainly less productive (per capita) than a small team of highly talented people, turns out that in most large organizations half the people are below average talent/motivation. And designing for this instead of pretending that all of your staff is above average allows them to have higher productivity.