In Praise of Simple Competence

After working with Stanford's bureaucracy for month and months to try to get a scholar appointed and paid (we have the money, that is not the problem), and still not having luck, I was reminded of a lovely and rather obscure article by James March   It was based on an address that he gave to academic administrators at the University of Illinois in 1980.  This excerpt seems especially appropriate at the moment:

"The importance of simple competence in the routines of organizational life is often overlooked when we sing the grand arias of management, but effective bureaucracies are rarely dramatic.... Much of what distinguishes a good bureaucracy from a bad one is how it accomplishes the the trivia of day to day relations with clients and day-to-day problems in maintaining and operating its technology.  Accomplishing these trivia may involve considerable planning, complex coordination, and central direction, but is more commonly linked to the effectiveness of large numbers of people doing minor things competently. As a result, it is probably true that the conspicuous differences around the world in the quality of bureaucratic performance are due primarily to variance in the competence of the ordinary clerk, bureaucrat, and lower manager, and to the effectiveness of routine procedures for dealing with problems at a local level.  This appears to be true of armies, factories, postal services, hotels, and universities."

Right now, some simple competence sounds pretty damn good to me. As you may have gathered, March is not much of a fan of heroic leaders, he believes more in well-designed systems filled with competent people.  His quote also reminds me of one I heard from the folks at the Institute for Health Improvement (they credited the Army Corp of Engineers): Strategy is for amateurs;execution is for professionals. 

 The above quote is from "How We Talk and How We Act: Administrative Theory and Administrative Life," which March published here. For a general tour of his work, check out Decisions and Organizations and The Pursuit of Organizational Intelligence.

P.S. The post is dedicated to that very patient scholar!

Comments

[Don Burkins]

FYI - A 1980 lecture-transcript version of Dr. March's article is available as a pdf with intro and respondent comments at:
www.uic.edu/depts/oaa/ddh/ddhlectures/Lec7.pdf.

[Wally Bock]

If you have a great system in place, such as Toyota or the Roman Army, you don't have to depend on great leadership. But you still need simple competence to make what you sell, put it in boxes, send it out and bill for it. You still need simple competence to order the materials, train where it's needed and sell things. If you do not have a system that supports the people doing that basic work, it rarely matters what sort of leadership you have.

[JT]

H.L. Mencken said it more succinctly and colorfully: “The older I get the more I admire and crave competence, just simple competence, in any field from adultery to zoology.”

[John Phillips]

Not sure what kind of scholar you're looking for, but give me a call if you need someone who's mature, experienced, bureaucracy-tested, outspoken, knowledgeable about everything by my own admission, and, oh yes, patient.

Have a good new year, and keep up the good work.

[Ashish]

So how should "idea people" - who may not be "effective bureaucracy people" - best contribute to the success of an organization, or to society?

[Tim Berry]

Glad to see another James March fan here. A great teacher, great thinker. I quoted him on education vs. creativity in: http://blog.timberry.com/2007/06/do_business_sch.html

[LivePaola]

I am a member of the Jim March Fan Club, if there is one.