[magpi3]

Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy absolutely applies here:

https://www.jerrypournelle.com/reports/jerryp/iron.html

"Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy states that in any bureaucratic organization there will be two kinds of people:

First, there will be those who are devoted to the goals of the organization. Examples are dedicated classroom teachers in an educational bureaucracy, many of the engineers, launch technicians, and scientists at NASA, even some agricultural scientists and advisors in the former Soviet Union collective farming administration.

Secondly, there will be those dedicated to the organization itself. Examples are many of the administrators in the education system, many professors of education, many teachers' union officials, much of the NASA headquarters staff, etc.

The Iron Law states that, in every case, the second group will gain and keep control of the organization. It will write the rules and control promotions within the organization."

[DonHopkins]

Self-Licking Ice Cream Cone

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-licking_ice_cream_cone

>In political jargon, a self-licking ice cream cone is a self-perpetuating system that has no purpose other than to sustain itself.

>History

>The phrase appeared to have been first used in 1991–1992, in a book about Gulf War weapons systems by Norman Friedman, and On Self-Licking Ice Cream Cones, a paper by Pete Worden about NASA's bureaucracy, to describe the relationship between the Space Shuttle and Space Station.

[...]

[prabhu-yu]

I want to put it in other words based on philosophy of Friedrich Nietzsche - Exploitation is the key characteristic of living beings. This is applicable not only to humans but also to single celled life forms. (There are exceptions to this). So, those who are dedicated to the org itself are the one who are exploiting. And those who are working for the goal of the org are the exploited. There is always fight between these two group. Some time, a symbiotic relationship, some times status quo. etc.

Those who recognize this will be at peace since they understand the soul of bureaucracy.

[duffydotsvg]

This is new to me. Not sure I totally agree but it's a useful heuristic. Despite being easy targets, orgs do in fact need coordinators, middle managers, administrators, etc. Especially as they scale. (And no AI won't render them obsolete.) Finding the balance between productivity and bureaucracy is the hard part.

[xmprt]

It's true that large orgs need all that bureaucracy. But is it still true that productivity needs large orgs? We see a lot of massive hits coming from small teams - whether it's startups, movies, indie games, etc.

[DrewADesign]

With almost no exceptions, movies are never made by small teams beyond the student film level. Even then, dozens of people are usually involved in some way. Writing, acting, score, foley, editing, distribution, graphic design, color grading, wardrobe, effects, lighting, cinematography, scheduling, props, location scouting, set decoration, casting, mixing… the list goes on. Any one of those things sucking badly enough can make the whole movie suck. And that’s kind of the point with a lot of this stuff. I know from having plenty of experience on both sides of the fence that tech folks often don’t realize that most non-tech roles are as-or-more difficult than tech roles, many requiring years of hard-won expertise, and directly contribute far more to the outcome than they imagine.

[Forgeties79]

Not to mention smaller (successful) production teams are often comprised of veterans of the industry who have worked on large scale productions and bring that knowledge set with them. Same with many indie games. You have to play with the big dogs to understand what is and isn’t necessary for a product. You can’t just walk in with a plucky attitude and a dream unless you want to waste a lot of time and money.

The part that is also usually glossed over is how exploitative the production is (low pay/awful hours), even if it’s sometimes self-inflicted.

[DrewADesign]

> bring that knowledge set with them

Not just knowledge but personal connections for favors. “Hey, [talented editor] it’s [famous DP], do you think you could tame a crack at this scene in your spare time? I’m trying to make something out of nothing and I’m positive you’ve got the chops.”

I don’t think anyone could reasonably call any of the exploitation self-inflicted. You have to take shit work a lot of times because a) nothing else is available and you still need to eat, or b) that’s the only way to get your foot in the door for the chance of being slightly less exploited. Unfortunately the industry collapsed when I graduated school as a career switcher getting into Houdini simulations. The software skill set is utterly devalued on the open market. I couldn’t get exploited if I wanted to. Now I’m a union tradesman. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Forgeties79]

I worked in the industry for over a decade and unfortunately it is very exploitative :/ i’ve watched line producers pressure production assistants, the lowest of the low on set, into lying about their hours so they don’t have to pay them OT under the guise of “being team players.” Lots of nonsense like that, mostly on non-union gigs.

The self-inflicted comment is a bit tongue in cheek because they do it to their own production to effectively “crunch” (to use video game parlance) but they also crunch themselves in the process. Difference is they have way more to gain. The sound mixer on an indie darling isn’t getting much out of it.

[xmprt]

When I say small I'm referring to anything under 50 people. Maybe you could go as high as even 100 without needing a ton of bureaucracy. I think a lot of indie films have teams under 100.

[duffydotsvg]

Totally agree the hits are coming. But from the POV of someone at a large and still growing org that's fully embraced AI, it's so obvious to me where the limitations are (and might always be). The nuances/complexities of leadership, decision-making, strategy, creative marketing, sales, comms, etc., feel too abstract to be replaceable. As the hard skill means of production are commodified, whatever alpha is left will lie in the soft skills. In other words, the models would be A+ STEM students, but they don't have the sauce for liberal arts.

[pseudalopex]

There are 3 web engines generally useful. Each produced by 100s of people. Small teams have not matched their output. How would you explain this?

[j-bos]

The issue is that most dedicated to caring for the bureaucracy tend to overvalue the organization and undervalue the mission.

[heresie-dabord]

"The bureaucracy will expand to meet the needs of the expanding bureaucracy." -- paraphrase of C. Northcote Parkinson [0]

[0] _ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parkinson%27s_law

[ekianjo]

> in any bureaucratic organization

So are there any exceptions?

[Eisenstein]

There are also:

* People who understand that the existence of the organization is necessary for the goals of the organization

[AnthonyMouse]

That is rarely true. If an organization ceases to exist but people still have the same goal then they create a new organization or act individually without an incorporated bureaucracy.

On the contrary, the existence of a mismanaged organization nominally dedicated to a given purpose often prevents its nominal goal from being achieved, because people assume giving time or money to that organization will be the best way to further the goal. Then the organization squanders them when those resources would otherwise have gone to some other organization or people with greater effectiveness towards the goal.

[RobotToaster]

> On the contrary, the existence of a mismanaged organization nominally dedicated to a given purpose often prevents its nominal goal from being achieved

This gives rise to another type of person within an organisation. Someone opposed to the goals of the organisation, and who understands this all too well.

[Eisenstein]

You think that it is practical for teachers to abolish school districts and create their own?

[2b3a51]

In the UK we have a variety of arrangements for schools. Some are local authority managed, some are 'academy status' which means that they are self managed but often with a cluster of schools sharing a management layer to save money. There are also 'free schools' which are community run with often an 'alternative' ethos. And there are religious schools, run by churches (and other religious organisations). All of those are state funded using a funding formula, and they have to teach the national curriculum, and are subject to inspections. Academy status schools used to get a bit extra but not any more, they can however employ staff who are not qualified teachers (Qualified Teacher Status is a defined set of training and experience requirements).

There are also private schools (some famously called public schools like Eaton or Harrow, but most actually just private companies often with charitable status).

Schools are usually fairly small organisations and generally the management have risen through the ranks as teachers, year heads, and so on. It isn't a sector in which fortunes are made.

So, yes, I think a range of funding and organisational models are possible. But note the role of regulation (direct inspection of what happens in classrooms on a regular basis without much in the way of warning).

[AnthonyMouse]

You seem to be questioning the possibility of private schools existing when they obviously do. Moreover, you could have publicly funded education without having a state-operated school bureaucracy, or without that bureaucracy having a monopoly on the funding.

[Eisenstein]

Perhaps I am confused about what you mean by bureaucracy. Can you define it?

[AnthonyMouse]

A bureaucracy is an organization or subdivision with a multi-level hierarchical structure.

[Angostura]

I hate this. It basically takes as axiomatic that anyone in an administrative position in an organisation has zero interest in the goals of the organisation -and that those at the coal-face have no interest in the organisation and that there is little or no overlap in interest. Its reductionist, divisive and stupid.

[rafaelcosta]

I don’t think that it is reductionist at all. The examples provided are either qualified with “dedicated” or “many of”. It’s also not surprising at all that people who have an interest in driving the goals of the organization usually gravitate more to operational roles and people who have no interest in it at all gravitate towards organizational roles – but that’s not a rule.

I would totally be pissed as someone in an “organizational” role of someone reduced me to someone “not interested in the goals of the organization”, but magpi3 didn’t do that. They correctly stated a pattern. If you are around organizational/administrative people, ask yourself honestly if the pattern isn’t the least bit accurate…

[zipy124]

That's not what it says though? There is no reason type 1 people can't be in an administrative position. It's merely hypothesising that since it is not their primary goal (but it is for type 2 people) that they will eventually be out-competed by type 2's for management type positions.

[deredede]

I don't have that reading at all. The phrasing even seems (carefully?) chosen to avoid this interpretation: it's "Examples are many of the administrators [...]", not "Examples are the administrators [...]".

[simtel20]

I see it as a pointed observation that the people who focus on a goal will accomplish that goal. There are organizations with administrative-focused people who work in alignment with the mission-focused people, and that also follows this law as well. It's just that the same dynamic can cause organisations to spiral into an extractive, stale, ossifying, change-resistent focus instead.

[AnthonyMouse]

The premise of the rule is that the second one is the end state.

The essential problem is that if one person spends their time e.g. fixing bugs in the code and another person spends their time weaseling their way onto the budget committee because they want to divert resources to their cronies, it's the second person who ends up on the budget committee. Then the first person gets laid off so their salary can be redirected to the cronies.

There are various ways to try to inhibit this with varying levels of effectiveness, essentially checks and balances. But the kleptocrats will be constantly trying to circumvent, weaken and vilify the things designed to constrain them. It's the sort of thing in the same nature as "the price of freedom is eternal vigilance".

[duffydotsvg]

I agree. It's a false binary. I'd never heard of this one before, but even if the premise is reductive there's some truth in it. If nothing else, it might be a helpful lens for evaluating an org.

[magpi3]

It takes the view that anyone in an administrative position will put the survival of the organization as their primary goal, while lower-level employees (who are far less invested in the organization) can remain invested in the organization's ostensible goals.

I find it to be very true after almost 30 years in the working world, and I always keep it in mind wherever I work.

[SilverSlash]

damn! then what's happens at the EU where the "goals of the organization" are themselves to increase and champion bureaucracy?