Until 100 years ago, almost everyone on earth lived with shortages.

While a few were rich, most people seldom even had enough to eat. The 20th century was incredible. We acquired the ability to produce food and goods to satisfy the needs of everyone on earth, though we did not make them available to everyone.

We have had two major power struggles during the 20th century. At the beginning, production was ‘difficult’, so those who could produce were able to ‘call the shots’. WW II was a war of production and it was won by the side that was able to produce the most bombs and bullets.

Since then, productivity has continued to improve. Production is no longer the ‘hard part’. The challenge during the past few decades has been to convince people to buy. Hence marketing has become king. Between 3rd world labor and automation, production costs have fallen dramatically. For most products, the major costs are Marketing & Distribution and R&D.

But the smart folks have recognized that the 21st century will be even more unsettling than the 20th century. Computer controlled extraction of natural resources and production (including nanotechnology) can drive manufacturing costs to almost zero. (Go read ‘A for Anything’ , by Damon Knight) With the Internet, we will be able to distribute the knowledge of how to produce. This will eliminate most of the challenges associated with distribution (since it will be possible to do most production locally) so there will be little money to be made there either, unless artificial controls and impediments are implemented.

This is why there’s such a fight for intellectual property rights. Only by controlling the knowledge of how and what to produce can power be maintained by those who value it. By the middle of the 21st century, the major cost of any material item will be the ‘intellectual property’ charge.

With production automated, almost everyone who is employed will be working in service jobs by 2050. And then it gets more interesting.

As AI research progresses, we will be able to build robots capable of doing service jobs. The health care crisis will be ’solved’ during the second half of the 21st century. Robots will replace, not only orderlies and nurses, but physicians and surgeons, too. The cost of producing these robots will be minimal. The valuable commodity will be the knowledge of how to program them to do what you want them to do.

By the end of the 21st century, creativity — the creation of intellectual property — will be the only currently known role that will still be the domain of us humans. And the control of that creativity is what is being fought for now.

That’s the power struggle going on now. It’s just started.

One more thing. By the end of the 21st century, molecular genetics will have progressed to the point where most people will be able to live almost forever. Imagine living forever in a world where production and services basically cost nothing. The only thing of value will be control of the intellectual property behind it all. Imagine a world where material items sell for a dollar each and services are provided for ten cents an hour. It could be paradise if you have the money to pay for what you want. But if you don’t, how do you compete against such prices?

The challenge as we approach the 22nd century will be to rethink the issues of access. How will we reward innovation while making it possible for most people to survive and live reasonably good lives?

Because, if most people cannot pay for those goods and services, there will be a revolution. If that revolution succeeds, those who were on top will be gone. If the revolution fails, the whole economic system will collapse from lack of customers.

Hang onto your hat. It’s going to be a wild ride.

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Let’s start with an easy one. It’s one that I think is really quite obvious and yet Managers at most place I’ve been employed have either deliberately or unconciously failed to respect their staff.

Respect in this context is more than just the respect you afford to the person in the street. Respect for your staff should run much, much deeper. After all, it is your staff that singularly have the ability to make you look good… or bad.

You wouldn’t employ someone who obviously didn’t respect you during the interview process. Now ask yourself why. What does it mean to lack respect for someone?

I’m posing rhetorical questions because nothing annoys me more than having to read through text where someone is spoonfeeding me. I guess I’m giving you a bit of respect and assuming you know what I mean. If you don’t, you’re on the Internet and I’m confident you can go do some more research

So how do I demonstrate respect for my staff?

First, I appreciate their individuality. Not everyone is like me. Not everyone has the same goals or desires and hardly anyone is in the same financial situation. Very few have had the same experiences.
I try to enjoy their different viewpoints but I absolutely lay on the line what my expectations are and what I believe our responsibilities are to each other.

Second, I provide encouragement. Some call this coaching or mentoring but I find that a bit to patronising. I try to find out the ambitions and motivations of the people I work with and find ways to help them achieve. But stop right there Mister. Do not be insincere in regards to this. You must really hold this ideal to be true. If you genuinely and sincerely help your staff acheive, help them grow and help them love their job – it makes your job as a Manager that much easier. Never be scared of a person who might outshine you. That’s for the best as well. Help them go where they want to go and maybe one day they’ll return the favour.

Third, share responsibility and authority. It’s an absolute nightmare to have to do the same task day after day like a robot. Assembly-line work scare the bejeezers out of me. If you have a set of tasks that you undertake regularly – such as reports for senior management, delegate it to one (or more) of your staff, give them some guidance and assistance and them leave them to it. DO NOT micromanage it! Similarly, authorise your staff to make some decisions on your behalf. You’ll be amazed at the quality of the decisions you’ll see when you give your staff the opportunity to shine.

Fourthly, we’ve already touched on micromanagement – but it’s worth mentioning on its own. Don’t do it. Set the task, set the expectation, set the timeframe and expect the best. You only need to performance manage if they don’t deliver but that has yet to happen for me. People enjoy being trusted. Make sure you set concrete targets and provide any assistance required.

Lastly – and this really goes without saying – provide positive feedback all the time. Pat them on the back, go out and do lunch occassionally, set challenges and celebrate achieving them, publicise successes wider than just the team and give ALL credit to the team members responsible.

As long as you keep in mind that your staff are your arms and legs. You can only succeed with their assistance. Mutual trust and respect is absolutely essential.

Happy to hear your thoughts…. I’ll touch on another aspect of what I believe to be good management before next Sunday.

I certainly don’t want to turn this into a boring blog about management theory – especially when it’s not academic theory and certainly not based on detailed research.

I do want to talk about my experiences and what has worked for me in the many places I’ve been employed.

I encourage readers to jump in and correct me when they think I’m wrong because I note from my referrers that the bulk of my visitors come here for one of three reasons… bukkake (which we’ve covered previously), low-carbohydrate diets and most often a tiny little posting I made almost a year ago on “Managers vs. Leaders”.

Odd really, I can usually see the keywords that brought a visitor here from a search engine and people are actually searching on “managers vs leaders”. I’d really like to know why! Feel free to post a comment.

We have all been present at discussions (or arguments) in which one of the combatants attempts to clarify or strengthen a point by comparing the subject at hand with another item or situation more familiar to the audience or opponent. More often than not, this stratagem instantly results in the protest that “you’re comparing apples and oranges!” This is generally perceived as being a telling blow to the analogy, since it is generally understood that apples and oranges cannot be compared. However, after being the recipient of just such an accusation, it occurred to me that there are several problems with dismissing analogies with the comparing apples and oranges defense.

It appears Scott scientifically determined that apples and oranges are, in fact, very similar indeed.

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