When writing #BeyondtheRules back in November 2020, we highlighted that “many of the challenges that we look to create different outcomes around — whether it be obesity, climate breakdown, rates of depression, or gender pay gaps — are symptoms of multiple deeply interconnected and complex adaptive systems. The picture is constantly moving, the pieces and their relationships constantly adapting”.

Managerialism and fixed hierarchies aligned to pay  - as organising structures - actively hinder us from addressing some of our biggest challenges ahead, as we seek to meet the social needs of all within planetary boundaries (see more on this by Kate Raworth).

• Working in complex systems with an intent of shared good isn’t in its reality questions that are bounded or that can be wrapped up into parcels of responsibility. The boundaries we create between us are artificial and create inefficacy, rather than (or even when alongside) the intended efficiency
• Working in complex systems for shared benefit requires cross-disciplinary collaborations where everyone’s different areas of knowledge contribute towards broad shared goals in plural ways. This requires ways of valuing everyone’s knowledge and skills without seeking to inherently order them into a hierarchy of value.
• Complex systems need enabling structures that allow people to pick up and drop roles based on their ability and perception to try something, and this to some degree can break the traditional pay relationship between fixed role/hierarchy and pay pegged to that role/hierarchy.
• Working in complex systems isn’t piecemeal and the impact of work cannot be known in advance or measured by the simple unit of time spent. It requires different approaches to pay for time, how we budget for work, and our accounting systems

Enabling ourselves the agency to show up for these challenges means discovering (from what already exists, has existed and might exist) ways of organising that break from the entrenched norms of the hierarchical managerial organisational chart and its associated ladder of pay.

<aside> <img src="/icons/info-alternate_blue.svg" alt="/icons/info-alternate_blue.svg" width="40px" /> Managerialism described by Lumen Learning as “the belief in or reliance on the use of professional managers in administering or planning an activity”. David Graeber’s ‘Bullshit Jobs’ is an insightful exploration into the socioeconomic phenomenon of managerialism

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