So I finished the book this morning - and it's great - certainly I recommend to anyone wondering about buying it. Best accessible write up of VSM I've come across and an excellent application of it to highlight the blind spots in economics.
My ebook of The Unaccountability Machine has inconveniently shown up on the exact same day as the package containing the textbooks I was recommended here a while ago, so now I need to exercise extreme self-discipline and save it for after I've done my homework.
Parramore's Quantitative Methods in Finance is exactly what I was looking for in terms of a convenient stack of formulae, explanations and rules of thumb, thank you immensely for saving me quite a lot of searching (and congratulations on the book!).
I'd always love to, but realistically Doug has something of an oversupply of news and needs people who can talk to current events. I might pitch him when something financial happens that I can contribute on.
As an aside, the attentuation mechanism Beer describes always shows up in my head as an analogy from one of Stephen Jay Gould's columns in "Natural History". He wrote about a bird that laid its eggs in a guano nest. If any of the chicks hatched and wandered out the nest it was considered lost to the mother and would starve. I've always thought of knowledge flows in organizations as collections of guano nests.
Copy ordered. Re: information systems & feedback loops, I am reminded that early on someone told me that the principal reason Goldman was so consistently successful was its unmatched ability to share relevant info across the bank, largely without fear or favour, so that it was always half a turn smarter than the rest of the street. Of course, only a terrible cynic would suggest that occasionally, in the bad old days, the odd Chinese wall might have been unintentionally scaled …
this is definitely something that GS executives will boast about (at least partly because it's a technique of internal control, giving star Goldman bankers a bit of impostor syndrome that they're only doing well because of Goldman). An even more terrible cynic might wonder about the advantages of having a culture very much based on voicemails and "let's take this offline" rather than easily searchable text-based messaging formats.
I’m halfway through the book right now and it is terrific. I wish there was a publication that interpreted the world along the lines that you describe. Does it already exist?
not really - management cybernetics is really quite dead (in the sense that it's more like Scots Gaelic than like Welsh, there are plenty of enthusiasts and students studying it but no real community that uses it as part of their daily life to achieve goals that aren't directly related to it itself). I'm trying to turn this substack into one, I guess.
Ha! I guess the political question is whether it is evocative enough that some sort of revival is overdue or if this is a case where the ideas should just be treated as something new.
So I finished the book this morning - and it's great - certainly I recommend to anyone wondering about buying it. Best accessible write up of VSM I've come across and an excellent application of it to highlight the blind spots in economics.
thanks so much!
My ebook of The Unaccountability Machine has inconveniently shown up on the exact same day as the package containing the textbooks I was recommended here a while ago, so now I need to exercise extreme self-discipline and save it for after I've done my homework.
Parramore's Quantitative Methods in Finance is exactly what I was looking for in terms of a convenient stack of formulae, explanations and rules of thumb, thank you immensely for saving me quite a lot of searching (and congratulations on the book!).
Do you plan on going on Doug Henwood’s radio show/podcast?
I'd always love to, but realistically Doug has something of an oversupply of news and needs people who can talk to current events. I might pitch him when something financial happens that I can contribute on.
Excited to read the book!
As an aside, the attentuation mechanism Beer describes always shows up in my head as an analogy from one of Stephen Jay Gould's columns in "Natural History". He wrote about a bird that laid its eggs in a guano nest. If any of the chicks hatched and wandered out the nest it was considered lost to the mother and would starve. I've always thought of knowledge flows in organizations as collections of guano nests.
I love that example and will steal it
Copy ordered. Re: information systems & feedback loops, I am reminded that early on someone told me that the principal reason Goldman was so consistently successful was its unmatched ability to share relevant info across the bank, largely without fear or favour, so that it was always half a turn smarter than the rest of the street. Of course, only a terrible cynic would suggest that occasionally, in the bad old days, the odd Chinese wall might have been unintentionally scaled …
this is definitely something that GS executives will boast about (at least partly because it's a technique of internal control, giving star Goldman bankers a bit of impostor syndrome that they're only doing well because of Goldman). An even more terrible cynic might wonder about the advantages of having a culture very much based on voicemails and "let's take this offline" rather than easily searchable text-based messaging formats.
I’m halfway through the book right now and it is terrific. I wish there was a publication that interpreted the world along the lines that you describe. Does it already exist?
not really - management cybernetics is really quite dead (in the sense that it's more like Scots Gaelic than like Welsh, there are plenty of enthusiasts and students studying it but no real community that uses it as part of their daily life to achieve goals that aren't directly related to it itself). I'm trying to turn this substack into one, I guess.
Ha! I guess the political question is whether it is evocative enough that some sort of revival is overdue or if this is a case where the ideas should just be treated as something new.
Ordered my hard copy yesterday 😁
Congrats on the publication and reviews Danny!