Beyond Leadership: Balancing Economics, Ethics and Ecology, Revised Edition

An Overall Picture of the Third Phase

The phase of integration is based on a conception of the human being which rests on the conviction that every person is able to (and wants) to develop, and that real work satisfaction is connected with the question of whether any personal fulfillment can be achieved in the work situation.

Such a situation is approached when the organization allows individuals as well as groups to act intelligently in accordance with the objectives of the totality. For this the objectives must be known, and the resulting individual sub-objectives must be visible. Furthermore, there must be a policy known to everybody which depicts the style and the standards according to which the objectives are realized in the company concerned (“This is the way we do things here”). Finally, a continual training program is required, to ensure that people can carry their new responsibilities.

With regard to the execution of tasks, efforts should be made to leave some of the planning (micro-planning) to groups and individuals (no one-best-way regulations, but objectives with a margin for initiative and self-control).

All this becomes possible if there is a change of attitude in management. As mechanization increases and islands of automation begin to form toward the end of the second phase, it becomes increasingly difficult for those at the top to cut Gordian knots by power of command. Complex problems are already increasingly solved by joint consultation among experts. These ...