John Linton .........where fifty-one percent of the people may take away the rights of the other forty-nine. (Thomas Jefferson).
I don't know why that particular piece of insightfulness leapt in to my mind earlier this morning as it had nothing to do with what I was thinking or working on at the time. However it must have been 'retrieved' for some reason and I suppose it was because I was becoming concerned with some aspects of Exetel that the advantage of absence, even though it was only a week, often allows to occur.
Personally, I agree with a similar quote attributed to WSC that:
"Democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried "
There are several major defects in the theory of universal suffrage among which are:
1) 50% of all voters in Australia are below average in mental abilities
2) 70% of all votes in Australia are meaningless as they are cast in "safe" electorates that always return a member from the same party
which means that the government of the country is elected by less than 30% of voters, half of which would be rated as of below average intelligence.
(the only realistic explanation for the choices made by the Australian electorate since Federation)
However the way a small private company is managed doesn't have any relation in any way to the way a government operates or is chosen. The most startling and obvious difference is that you need no experience nor any real ability to be be elected to a parliament where you will be involved with the 'dispersal' of thousands of billions of dollars and the making or breaking of millions of people's lives whereas you will only get to a position of 'authority' in a small private company by having a great deal of experience or some very real ability.
I wasn't thinking about government but small private company management and, seeing I'm beleaguered by other people's thoughts at the moment a comment by Theodore Roosevelt:
"The only time you really live fully is from thirty to sixty. The young are slaves to dreams; the old servants of regrets. Only the middle-aged have all their five senses in the keeping of their wits."
As someone who is now past 60 and feels his own physical and mental inadequacies more acutely each day (and regrets a great many things a great deal) I have been looking in to the future, as much as that is ever possible, to find ways of better managing Exetel and, perhaps because of the inadequacies of thinking clearly that come as Roosevelt' describes them I am struggling to find sensible solutions.
Unlike 'government' democracy is not only useless in commercial management ( irrespective of the drivel that has been spewed out in academia, and quasi businesses, for the past three to four decades) "consensus" management is as pernicious as democratic management for a small company in a competitive and changing marketplace(s).
I suppose I was driven to contemplating this airy fairy theorising because of what I saw (I hesitate to use the word 'sensed') on my return to Exetel's North Sydney offices yesterday and the unease that caused - although I can't explain, even to myself, what that was.
In practical terms it's going to be necessary to change many aspects of the ways that Exetel is managed to make the plans for the new financial year become a reality. Perhaps I have to face up to the 'fact' that Roosevelt was correct in his observation and people over 60 simply aren't as effective as they need to be and it's past time to find someone younger. I have tried to do that in the past and failed - quite possibly from egotism in the belief that no-one could possibly know how to manage things better than I can.
I don't need yet another very difficult decision to make right at this moment so I'm going to content myself with taking Rupert Murdoch as an example of 'exceptions proving the rule'.
However we will need to find ways of making our current inexperienced management come to grips with the concepts of not only taking responsibility for more of the key decision making but understanding that co-operating with and helping each other is an essential element of running a company or any part of it.
As Scipio the elder used to say at the conclusion of every address he made to the Senate: "Carthago delenda est" - substitute Carthage for noun of your choice and destroyed for adjective of your choice.