Corporate rebels event report {Eindhoven}: meet the local rebels with a global cause

You remember, 4 months ago, we started the work to go through the ecosystem of the shared governance, liberating structures, and teal organisations. Thanks to the “reinventing organisations” forum, we soon met 2 guys from the Netherlands who had started an inspiring initiative in the same mindset as ours : to explore, understand and live the transformation of organisations at the side of the most innovative people & initiatives.

So last week, we hit the road to meet these 2 fiery explorers and attend to their first event in Eidhoven, their native city. We wanted to share with you what we saw, heard, felt and cross it with some convictions and lessons we learn from these people we meet in our works… In english for the very first time ツ.

Who are these guys ?

Joost Minnaar and Pim de Morree, are two radical work idealists who launched a movement called “The Corporate Rebels” embracing the mission to make work more fun. They left their corporate jobs in November 2015, tired of being frustrated and constrained by high levels of hierarchy and outdated mindsets. Pim is a former service sales engineer in industry in the Netherlands and Joost worked as a scientist in Barcelona. From the “bucket list” they have built, they started in January 2016 to visit and meet the most innovative people and organizations who shape the future of work and collaboration modes starting with their organizations, people like Traci Fenton, Isaac Getz or Jean Francois Zobrist. And a first good surprise : the presence of many french people in this list, indeed, we have a very interesting scene here. Please be proud of it… We are !

What was this day about?

After a year of exploring their bucket list and visiting more than 50 people around the world, this event was the first of a series across Europe to share their findings and “ignite a spark of change” in the way people work in their organizations. Not only a presentation but also an ensemble of workshops to think, share and discover paths to activate and convert the change into action. After an intensive presence on Parisians movements and organisations who walk the talk, Bertrand and I also needed to feel what the atmosphere is like outside of the french boundaries and meet new people, new mindsets.

The Corporate Rebels presented 8 key trends that match pretty well with what we felt as emerging and game changing in today’s work environments, they enriched it with concrete examples and a list of best practices. A very good job to be honest, let’s ride them’ all !

“Ignite a spark of change”

TREND 1 — From profit to purpose & values

Our profit based era has now reached a limit where profits can’t be a purpose in essence. Beyond the myth of the Y generation and its needs for meaning on their job, this trend today touches the whole spectrum of the collective in today’s organizations as they mention it on their blog : “From the pioneers {…} to companies that are in (desperate) need of improvement. The purpose is clearly the major issue that affects the power to motivate. How is it built, where does it come from and its conversion into actions for each individual on his job. The challenge : to empower and convert the 21st century employee into an entrepreneur on his workplace.

The kind of best practices they propose is to start with building a (common or individual) dream, take feedback and measure impacts, progresses, adapt it and make it visible by awarding behaviors in line with the companies values and translating it at all levels : departments, teams, individuals .

To illustrate with an example we have morning Star, the world’s largest tomato processor (600 employees & 4000 seasonal workers). This american company is fully self managed, one founder, no boss. It has set its overall mission statement, based on which each single department finds its own. A self management system based on 2 principles as founder Doug Kirkpatrick says :

“First rule, people should not use force against others; all interactions should be voluntary. And second rule, people should honor the commitments they make to others. Self-management without these principles is doomed to fail”.

TREND 2 — From hierarchical pyramid to network of teams

In line with the complexification of our world, our organizational systems are also tending to be multicellular. From Spotify’s agile model by squads to FAVI and Buurtzorg’s autonomous teams, the Rebels developed the idea that today’s most advanced organizations found their natural path by giving autonomy to small responsible teams. About the size of these teams they recommended the (suggestive) number of 15 regarding the theory of Dumbar whereby relationships need familiarity and within a group of about 150 friends, there will be different levels of familiarity. 150 is the maximum we can keep a stable relationship with, 15 people to whom we could feel close, and 50 to whom we could speak regularly. So beyond the theories the practical advice we grabbed is not to hesitate to split teams when they grow too big.

Pim, Joost & Freek also promoted the interdisciplinarity of the teams to generate dialogue, emulation, boost ideas and this helped for example with micro decision making process like the advice process or the Marshall Rosenberg’s non violent communication approach.

TREND 3 — From directive leadership to supportive leadership

Is the manager dead or not ? One force clearly pulls the management beyond its dispositions for controlling people, its the role of leader as a catalyst for teams. The identified traditional role is somehow adding complexity where not needed, referring to Peter F. Druckers quote

“Management is doing things right; leadership is doing the right things”

Some tips to explore this trend : destroy the ivory tower by getting rid of the symbols of power and status (offices, parking and other privileges) they creates distance and useless sclerosis in the decision making processes. Example with famous Jean François Zobrists’s FAVI who gave up on his own privileges as a CEO in a couple of days.

How to start? Sometimes it comes from the bottom, in a mentioned company I forgot the name, employees paid holidays to their boss to show him how he wasn’t essential in the organisation. What are you waiting for to do the same ?

At the best you can, do it, honestly walk the talk on purpose and values. It’s all about continuity, trust and authenticity. Easy to say but it really starts with a collective mindset so listen up and Let it go!

TREND 4 — From plan & predict to experiment & adapt

We truly believe in this : “try, fail, learn, try again” and we try to stick to this mindset (even if it’s sometimes hard, we confess it). From the beginning we want to go beyond the books, theories of processes and methods to experiment the reality of the field by living the ongoing experimentations, testing our hypotheses and talking with the ones who failed enough to understand how to get stronger and have an impact in building the organisations of tomorrow.

By reading our last interview with Monia Ben Larbi you’ll see how important it is not to be attached to a model even if they can be reassuring when you are jumping into the unknown.

« We don’t have a model » (Spotify)

The example of ING, mentioned in the audience is the perfect illustration when they tried to apply the tribes & squads organization I talked about earlier in the article. It has been a massive fail. Again, it’s not to give any lessons but sharing what we are aligned with. :)

TREND 5 — From rules & control to freedom & trust

When talking about our main area of work : shared governance, this trend catch all our attention. Because we’re preachers of overtaking the notion of control, and because the question of rules is a technical and crucial point when you consider that freedom & trust isn’t no rules and anarchy.

In this section, the rebels quoted companies like Netflix whose vision is the following :

If you don’t want to take responsibility, you can’t have freedom either (Netflix)

The two notions come together or they go together. If you shun responsibility, you have to accept control in some way or other. Giving freedom is enhancing responsibility and vice versa. An example with the Belgian ministry of social security and its now famous job innovation of creating the 1st chef happiness officer in public organizations. One of their principles : work where, when and how you want (69% of the employees took the teleworking 1 to 3 days a week for example). The results : the turnover rate dropped by 75%, absenteeism by 26% and productivity increased by 20% and unsolicited applications by 500% ! They are result driven and as Cyberclick, they celebrate moments when a target is reached. The Spanish digital advertising & marketing agency goes beyond expectations by offering every employee their own training budget that can be spent on whatever they want. “Even for scuba diving or surfing”. To quote the interview Joost & Pim conducted in Barcelona a year ago, Cyberclick believes that as long as it’s good for personal development, it’s good for the company, underlined with the following answer :

Another best practice to enrich this trend is to look at the path companies like Incentro took whom Managing Director John de Koning presented the “Incentronauts culture” (#1 medium sized great place to work). The Dutch company proposes self-set salaries with peer calibration for the base pay,

Step 1, they introduced their people on finance and general management of the company (how it is run, managed…).

Step 2, They sent an online anonymous survey with 2 simple questions :

• “What salary percentage (raise) would you suggest for 2015 (in percentages)?”
• “What is the motivation of your choice?”

Step 3 : They organized a second collective meeting to discuss the results anonymously. Many people weren’t blocked to be fully transparent on their situation and share it collectively, “Even those who wanted a huge raise (between 9–12%)!”

Step 3, They ended with discussions around “what’s best for me or for Incentro”. “Some lowered their percentage, others increased it” and the final percentage of salary increase was about 4,9%.

The side effects of this trust and transparency initiative were, according to John from the same rebels article) :

• A better understanding of “how Incentro works”
• Employees feel even more empowered,
• And the happiness score has never been so high (measured by the Great Place to Work® institute).

TREND 6 — From centralized authority to distributed authority

We organized last week our second Meetup on shared governance and the implications on middle management. Today’s dominant models are built on hierarchical structures where authority is centralized in management roles. The rebels 6th trend was in line with our intuition on the fact that sharing responsibilities and unleashing decision making processes empower people and dynamise the structures.

They highlighted 3 moves : to liberate employees of control mechanism, to free and decentralize decision making, and to pre-approve (say yes and trust before it started) . To illustrate them, we were particularly been touched by the unprecedented experimentation of Captain David Market, former commanding officer in the USS Santa Fe submarine in one of the most rigid environments : a U.S. Navy nuclear-powered submarine. This story is a stunning example, beyond what we’re used to in management articles. He operated counter-culture, redefining leadership in his teams and taking lots of risks with his hierarchy in the process. After years of telling people what they need to be told and wasting time and energy earning a legitimacy on each decision, he decided not to take any orders anymore.

The only decision he kept was moral. To have the final word on launching a missile that could affect human beings lives.

David Market started by negotiating with each team a new rules repository and new performance metrics that come from the people on the field.

His main consideration was that centralizing decisions was the most foolish thing ever. It actually can’t resist in front of this alternative vision that consists in letting individuals autonomously have the freedom to take initiative, create and think on any decision they consider important at their level. By moving authority where information is and to create an environment for thinking, without big brothers eye on your head. He got revolutionary results within a few months : from a crew affected by low morale, low performance, and the worst retention in the fleet, he reversed the indicators to reach the highest grade of evaluations the USS marine had ever seen.

David Market preaches for giving control and creating leaders versus taking control and attracting followers. This notion of creating an environment is the hardest thing Market identified for a leader because it detracts from what a historical leader is usually told to do : take decisions, act and control. For more details and tips to start on this path, have a glance at the advice process on the reinventing organizations wiki (rich and clear :)).

And last but not least (oh nope!…). We wanted to end with the called “pre-approve, say yes and trust before it started” tip. we liked the highlight of this point because it reminds us the testimony of Dominique Pon, director of the Pasteur clinic in Toulouse. He had 2 sentences to define his management : “I say yes” and “I tell people that I trust and love them”. Approve what people are going to do, don’t control by telling them what they should do. Be here for advice and let go. Again, it’s not a question of complacence but a real matter of survival in a context of employee disengagement and the difficulties for managers and leaders to adapt their management in this complexity era. When properly applied, these methods of organization are sufficiently mobilizing for companies on crucial organizational and financial questions. Although media coverage is still in a niche, there are many examples of businesses that were restored after a move to a shared governance. We’ll continue to relay them, trust us !

TREND 7 — From secrecy to radical transparency

Another deep move into cultural business and management habits. If transparency is a heavy buzzword in politics, advertising and corporate landing pages, inner decisions from a few innovators are making more and more noise to our ears (and probably yours too). We’re talking here about radicalism in transparency. You are or you are not. If yes, it is on salaries, expenses, decisions, evaluations,… not everything at a time but on the kind of informations people traditionally lobby hard to get. This maintains frustration, reinforce conflicts and inhibit any kind of spontaneity in who you are and can spontaneously bring to the collective.

Beyond incantations of exemplarity and right thinking lessons, some examples of simple initiatives are easy to follow. Agile and Lean practices of visual management , internal social media like communications channels, townhall meetings or examples like removing external signs of hierarchy (parking spots, bosses office and other visual privileges). How to do his? Ask your team what they want to know and give it to them !

We wanted to make a quick focus on the so called Open Book Management, a practice that opens any relevant operational and financial information to anyone in the company. It starts by explaining basic things like “how do we get money, how do we spend it, what’s left over and what do we want to do with it”. In this video (also available on the rebels article), Steve Baker, vice president of The Great Game of Business, explains why disclosing your company financials to employees will help them understand your business and improve their productivity as they understand the real meaning of any decision and act in consideration of it. Companies like Finext or BvdV already made that kind of move with success.

And if this concerns the internal structure, solutions that implicate your ecosystem of suppliers, universities or competitors were also considered, an open data state of mind that many companies are working on, especially to fight hacking :)… if there’s nothing else to hack anymore.

TREND 8 — From job descriptions to talents & mastery

Do you still believe in the job description card? We don’t (and aren’t the only ones). People traditionally ask at the end of a interview who you really are, what are you good at and what makes you happy in life. No we don’t hire just a smile and need technical or intellectual skills, but yes organisations and teams need engaged people who give their best, both in terms of expertise and willingness to learn new things.

The general feeling on this trend was an encouragement for all of us to make a shift on our usual behaviors and move work to a mindset that helps us move from questionings like “what am I supposed to do ?” to “what I’d love to do”. From “who were you ?” (and what is written on your curriculum) to “who do you want to be by our side ?”. From “Here’s who we need at this position” to “what can you bring to this mission ?”.

To finish this report we wanted to end with some key outputs from this very rich Dutch experience :

• Don’t copy — paste (find your own model and don’t try to implement what already worked in other businesses)
• Wellness criteria aren’t the same for everybody (I’m personally not happier if my food is fully organic :) )
• Happiness is a transversal mindset to build with your teams and is not about material or physical improvements (with nice workplace for example)
• Do what’s in your people’s & company’s interest (Netflix)
• Let people be themselves and encourage initiatives, really. If they want to, why killing the energy ?

This isn’t an exhaustive list but a sharing of the good work of 2 passionate and courageous guys mixed with some convictions from our vision on how organisations could be ruled peacefully. A mix enriched by inspiring people, great attendants and an incredible energy. We hope you can pick what talks to you the most.

Want to go beyond? Learn some processes or test yourself? We’re here to help founders, managers, teams and organisations get ready to move. Let’s chat !

Many thanks for reading.

Stay positive !

Talla — Bertrand // La Tête Ailleurs