It is tempting to create a great strategy but one should be concerned about the possibility of implementing that strategy.
It is nothing fundamentally wrong in selecting a weak CA as long as management is aware of pros and cons. There is money to be made also in the weak CA on the short term. One may say that “in the long term we are all dead”.
Different strategies come with different resource requirements. We must identify the required resources and see the resources gaps. One can not implement a strategy without a clear plan about how to fill the resource gaps.

Chris Argyris article reminds me of “Preserve the core/Change everything else” of Jim Collins. The article is about to instill a culture of discomfort. People should have the drive to move. The harmony in an organization is like “thermal death of the universe”: everything is stopped; no molecule or atom is moving. The harmony is the biggest enemy of an effective organization.

I am applying it everyday. In my organization, I maintain a certain degree of conflict. I encourage people to question each and every “sacred cow”. I encourage them to challenge every proposal and every decision including my own. Everybody knows he must fight for his ideas. Of course, the degree of conflict must be controlled. Personal attacks are strictly forbidden.

“Esprit du corps” must balance this perpetual conflict state. Everybody must feel like belonging to an elite organization, must be very proud of being part of the organization.

I know it is a difficult balancing act but is the only way I found to create an agile and alert organization.

One of the best quotes about software:

“Software can easily rate among the most poorly constructed, unreliable and
least maintainable technological artifacts ever invented by man — with perhaps
the exception of Icarus’ wings. “

You have to check this Dilbert cartoon. Another PHB stroke of genius.

Gee, I always waited for the day when my mom will call me to put a service pack to her fridge. Oh, joy the day is here.

With very few dragons and no “damsels in distress” modern knights faces a serious challenge: finding a challenge.

Pieter Hintjens is a happy knight: he found his challenge. Peter fights to retire the CAPS LOCK key.

Peter says: “And so I have launched CAPSoff, a campaign to change the world, one key at a time. We’re going to start with the CAPS LOCK key, which is fat and useless and has no friends, so should be an easy target. Maybe after that we can gang up on the SysRq key.”

Yes, we have to change the world, and we have to start one-step at a time. And getting rid of CAPS LOKS key looks like a good, small starting point.

I wonder how many moths (or days) would last a company managed like public administration before going bankrupt?

It looks like the last century of management research pass through public administration without leaving any traces. There are so many low-hanging fruits to be picked!

I compared the web dynamics for CIO and Romania. For the general interest I use Google Labs Trends and for the blogs I use IceRocket.

While in web searches “Romania” tops “CIO” (see this page), in blog posts it is almost a draw: in the last 3 months there were 22,545 posts with CIO and 25,658 with Romania (see this page). Only a 14% difference!

I prefer to post only the link to queries, due to possible copyright issues with the original charts.