Being over the hump and into the 2nd half of my chemistry career, I find that more and more of my time is spent dealing with systems issues. Not fighting existing systems. Synthesizing new ones. One of the things I have come to appreciate is the value and necessity of at least some level of bureaucratic structure as an organization grows. Really, it has been an awakening.
My current project involves receiving and organizing a massive stream of diverse information. It is a taxonomic nightmare. How does one organize critical and confidential information in such a manner that it can be accessed for future reference? It is more than a matter of profligate use of file folders. I have drawers and drawers of file folders with commercial and scientific information in them, but I have lost track of what I already have. What has to shake out of my current task is a bureaucratic mechanism.
I have come to be viewed as a “resource”. This is a euphamism for “keeper of obscure information”, or more to the point, “he who knows where the bodies are buried”.
Getting back to the matter of systems generation, a problem organizations may develop is one in which valuable, painful, and expensive lessons get lost over a relatively short interval. People naturally like to get on with things. Problems in the past are just that- in the past. We overcame a challenge and now we are on to bigger things. But what folks underestimate is that past problems are often the result of habits of thought and poor adaptation to change.
It is easy to get bewildered in a conceptual space where there are no sharp edges or crisp boundaries. In the chemical business world, you find that the crowd naturally divides into science/technical people and business people. There are always a few cross-over people (freaks like myself) who defy tidy categorization. But for the most part, when the tray stops shaking, the people settle into particular positions.
Business-types like to deal in the binary world of yes and no. Science-types accept that this is possible only from a great distance from the problem. Business-types use the tool and toss it when done. Science-types can become enchanted with the tool and will try to make it better.
One of the tricks to system development in an organization is to define what constitutes a normal condition. Once this is defined, an off-normal condition can be recognized and SOP’s can be written to deal with it. As a psycholgical precaution, this is where you begin to get insights into the deep-seated insecurities of your colleages. Many long-time acquaintances can reveal control-freak behaviour or authority issues. The generation and implementation of systems in an organization always involves greater control and loss of degrees of freedom for individuals. People will see this coming and things may get contentious.
As more people become involved in any endeavor, complexity inevitably arises as failure modes are uncovered and people learn to game the system. Good leadership can go a long way towards helping people keep perspective as things become more complex.
Lamentations on Chemistry 
A couple of uncorrelated replies:
1) “Business-types use the tool and toss it when done.” You’ve never worked in a Six-Sigma corporation, have you. Six Sigma is a nice tool, but GE, 3M… have used it obsessively in areas without any value (and now their stock price shows it!).
2) “One of the tricks to system development in an organization is to define what constitutes a normal condition. Once this is defined, an off-normal condition can be recognized and SOP’s can be written to deal with it.” This to me is where the danger lies and the downfalls begin. For reasons unknown, I’ve noticed that a certain personality is drawn into setting up SOP’s, one that shortly becomes obsesses with making them perfect and covering every possible concern. If these people lived their personal lives like this, I could be fabulously rich by selling them “property damage from a herd of charging wildebeest” insurance, “emotional distress from being tortured by alien lifeforms” insurance and “losing an eye from a paper airplane” insurance.
Accept it. No matter what, some unexpected bad thing will happen. Is it really worth destroying the vibrancy of an organization in order to try and (unsuccessfully) prevent it?
Worse yet,you see this becoming more and more the norm in everyday life. Too many people seem to want NO RISK, and want the government to prevent it and/or cover it when it does happen. Both sides of the aisle are guilty of this too. (Republicans make great gains and lousy laws by whipping up fear of another terrorist attack.)
Hi John,
I have been blissfully separated from Six Sigma. I pity those who get engulfed by it.
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/comprom.htm
No centrally micromanaged system can succeed. Decisions must occur at the user level where choices are black and white because necessary compromises are few. Effective management rides herd off to the side.
Hardcopy structured data storage is not efficiently searchable (hence the size of dead tree library card catalogs and CAS). Digitize, random storage, then search engine.
Really good propylene -> propylene oxide oxidation catalysts were 100% rejected for producing mostly CO2 and water. The wet behind the ears sucker newly assigned to the project looked at what had been massively done and came up empty. He designed a thin film ultra-high space velocity reactor to do “studies” about reaction intermediates (stay employed shielded by bafflegab). He only found one intermediate: propylene oxide. Proper management would have fired him for for cause/insubordination. His job was to make new catalysts not new reactors.
R&D people generally do hate systems as feel impedes their desired freedom and can resist even basic required changes for progress. I have been a a number of places that transitioned from control by researchers/academic types to being a more business/product focused with huge complains about having/following budgets and getting approvals for purchases (because never had before). At the same time seen business type institute over the top policies to rane in a few abusers to detriement of everyone esle. In a Science based company there needs to be balance or a few poeple with feet in both worlds (translators).
Once a system becomes where only means to get things actually done in through work arounds then it is useless (and have seen such many times).
A favorite quotation of mine on leadership came from Jim Collines who said “Smart people instinctively understand the dangers of entrusting our future to self-serving leaders who use our institutions.. whether in the corporate or social sectors.. to advance their own interests.” In our highly political times his thoughts are well worth consideration.