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Freedom from Command and Control
This is a management book that challenges convention and aims to appeal to a wide target audience. Seddon argues that while many commentators acknowledge command and control is failing us, no one provides an alternative. His contention is the alternative can only be understood when you see the failings of command and control by taking the better - systems - view. There is little in the book that you would find in a normal management curriculum. Seddon is scathing and controversial about leadership theorists, maintaining that leadership is being able to talk about how the work works with the people who do it. The book provides practical advice and examples of how to put this into place. Packed with illustrations of the unintended consequences of command and control thinking, you will be amazed that management of our organizations should be so appalling. You will see how customer service is poor and carries high costs and that changing the way the work is designed and managed will result in lower costs and better service. But, as Seddon points out, these are things managers cannot "see" from their current position. Managers don't know what they don't know. Seddon's case is that taking this view teaches managers to change their thinking, and he shows how the very observations they make when understanding what he calls "the what and why of current performance as a system" become the building blocks of the systems solution. And also illustrates the solutions for the cases he uses.
244 pages, Paperback
First published October 1, 2003
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Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews
January 31, 2018
Treat everything as a system and then optimise the system don't manage the people. Work on removing waste and enhancing the quality of what the system is doing which is measured by the customer and not by management. Make sure the system is delivering value to the customers. Ask them what they want and then give it to them. Measure the right things and use data to drive decisions. Use capability charts to show data - plot the data and then show max and min. Look for the signal, not the noise. How can you remove waste and enhance predictability whilst moving up or down as required towards the target as required? Managers should be managing the system and remove blockers etc for people. Empower people to work on the system and take guidance from those in the system about how to optimise.
May 22, 2008
“Freedom from Command and Control”
A Review of the book by
John Seddon
John Seddons Book “Freedom from Command and Control” catches the eye immediately with the promise in the title.
Can there be such a thing as Freedom from Command and Control?
The workforce have longed to be liberated from the directive, destructive “Command and Control” that has passed for management strategy for such a long time.
In the title of Johns book we see the possibility.
From the word go John tells us that “Command and Control is failing us, there must be a better way to design and manage work. He shows us through his use of real life examples how management, by their disengagement from the shop floor, are frequently incapable of appreciating the nature of the real value added work and are therefore in the very worst position from which to Command or Control.
But they go ahead anyway causing untold damage through their assumption that they are in charge and that the workforce will do what they are told.
He tells us that adding resources to a wasteful system simply compounds those efficiencies, that a better way to progress is to seek out the waste and remove it.
The problem is that for many organisations it is the “waste” who decide on the changes that are required to produce savings.
John sites the example of the National Health Service which successive governments have thrown huge amounts of money at to convince the voters that they are a caring socially responsible government.
John points out that despite this increase in investment it is becoming increasingly apparent that the expected return in improved service is simply not happening.
The “waste” is absorbing the extra investment while the value provided by the Health Service professional is being made increasingly difficult to deliver due to the lack of resources, leading to further reductions in the level of service provided.
To get out of this destructive loop John insists that we must change management thinking, we must stop believing that inspection controls quality.
We have to get away from measuring activity which results in people being active to achieve their measures rather than accomplishing the purpose for which they were employed.
This book reveals why, and what we have to do to initiate this change in behaviour.
This would be enough for most authors to include in a single volume but John goes on to take a considered look at several other management white elephants.
Customer Relations Management,
“Just because CRM software can do something does it mean that thing adds value?”
Seminars on “Culture”, that “generate quagmires of pseudo-intellectual and psuedo-emotional nonsense.”
ISO 9000,
“An economic disease for which the UK should be ashamed.”
Investors in people,
“Instead of investing in people we should be investing in the re-education of management.”
Balanced Scorecard,
“I have yet to see an example of the balanced scorecard that passes the test of a good measure.”
Six Sigma,
“The most important criticism is that there is no requirement for management to change the way that it thinks.”
IT,
“Managers are sold a dream that becomes a nightmare, full of features that suit the Command and Control view of management, but are they benefits?”
Public Service Investment
Massive investment in public services that are not being matched by results.
“Police in one area as a result of investment in the new Command and Control IT technology report that a domestic disturbance (A husband and wife fighting) is now reported as two assaults, each on the other, recorded as detected with no further proceedings. It does wonders for their detection rate, but is it effective policing.”
John Seddon, in this book has presented us with a well argued tour de force.
Management by Command and Control, does not work.
Telling people what to do, does not work,
Setting targets, does not work
It may have been a defence for this kind of behaviour in the past that managers simply did not know any other way to behave.
John Seddon in “Freedom from Command and Control” has shown the way.
After reading this book there can be no excuse for continuing to think of management in terms of strategies for Command and Control, unless the purpose of that management is to destroy the enterprise it is supposed to be managing.
Peter A Hunter
www.BreakingtheMould.co.uk .
A Review of the book by
John Seddon
John Seddons Book “Freedom from Command and Control” catches the eye immediately with the promise in the title.
Can there be such a thing as Freedom from Command and Control?
The workforce have longed to be liberated from the directive, destructive “Command and Control” that has passed for management strategy for such a long time.
In the title of Johns book we see the possibility.
From the word go John tells us that “Command and Control is failing us, there must be a better way to design and manage work. He shows us through his use of real life examples how management, by their disengagement from the shop floor, are frequently incapable of appreciating the nature of the real value added work and are therefore in the very worst position from which to Command or Control.
But they go ahead anyway causing untold damage through their assumption that they are in charge and that the workforce will do what they are told.
He tells us that adding resources to a wasteful system simply compounds those efficiencies, that a better way to progress is to seek out the waste and remove it.
The problem is that for many organisations it is the “waste” who decide on the changes that are required to produce savings.
John sites the example of the National Health Service which successive governments have thrown huge amounts of money at to convince the voters that they are a caring socially responsible government.
John points out that despite this increase in investment it is becoming increasingly apparent that the expected return in improved service is simply not happening.
The “waste” is absorbing the extra investment while the value provided by the Health Service professional is being made increasingly difficult to deliver due to the lack of resources, leading to further reductions in the level of service provided.
To get out of this destructive loop John insists that we must change management thinking, we must stop believing that inspection controls quality.
We have to get away from measuring activity which results in people being active to achieve their measures rather than accomplishing the purpose for which they were employed.
This book reveals why, and what we have to do to initiate this change in behaviour.
This would be enough for most authors to include in a single volume but John goes on to take a considered look at several other management white elephants.
Customer Relations Management,
“Just because CRM software can do something does it mean that thing adds value?”
Seminars on “Culture”, that “generate quagmires of pseudo-intellectual and psuedo-emotional nonsense.”
ISO 9000,
“An economic disease for which the UK should be ashamed.”
Investors in people,
“Instead of investing in people we should be investing in the re-education of management.”
Balanced Scorecard,
“I have yet to see an example of the balanced scorecard that passes the test of a good measure.”
Six Sigma,
“The most important criticism is that there is no requirement for management to change the way that it thinks.”
IT,
“Managers are sold a dream that becomes a nightmare, full of features that suit the Command and Control view of management, but are they benefits?”
Public Service Investment
Massive investment in public services that are not being matched by results.
“Police in one area as a result of investment in the new Command and Control IT technology report that a domestic disturbance (A husband and wife fighting) is now reported as two assaults, each on the other, recorded as detected with no further proceedings. It does wonders for their detection rate, but is it effective policing.”
John Seddon, in this book has presented us with a well argued tour de force.
Management by Command and Control, does not work.
Telling people what to do, does not work,
Setting targets, does not work
It may have been a defence for this kind of behaviour in the past that managers simply did not know any other way to behave.
John Seddon in “Freedom from Command and Control” has shown the way.
After reading this book there can be no excuse for continuing to think of management in terms of strategies for Command and Control, unless the purpose of that management is to destroy the enterprise it is supposed to be managing.
Peter A Hunter
www.BreakingtheMould.co.uk .
February 9, 2016
Definitely a book you must read when you are working with service organizations. Also interesting when you want to know more about leaving traditional management behind. Personally, I found it a bit hard to read and it required some discipline to finish the book.
January 29, 2020
The concepts and learnings in this book are fantastic. I did however find this book a chore to read and it took a lot of discipline to finish. Whilst the content is great it does get a bit repetitive and sometimes I'm not sure if we've gone off on a tanget or I just lost concentration.
September 4, 2017
This is a book about a better way to make work work. The focus of the book is on the translation of the principles behind the Toyota Production System for service organizations.[1]
The better way has a completely different logic to command-and-control, and that, perhaps, is the reason it is difficult to understand. People interpret what they hear from their current frame of reference, so what they hear is not necessarily what is meant.[2]
The cornerstone of command-and-control is the separation of decision-making from work. Command-and-control is based on top-down hierarchies where managers manage people and money. Managers make decisions on budgets, targets, and so on.[3]
The command-and-control management pioneers were Frederick Taylor (scientific management), Henry Ford (mass production), and Alfred Sloan (management by numbers). The issue is not that command-and-control was without value, but that we have not continued to learn. The problem is a problem of thinking.[4]
Taiichi Ohno at Toyota developed a radically different approach the management of work.[5] Instead of top-down command-and-control management, Toyota uses local control at the point where the work is done.[6] This philosophy is fundamentally different. The attitude is no longer to make the numbers, but to learn and improve.[7] It requires power-with, rather than power-over, and runs counter to the underlying hierarchical command-and-control philosophy.
People who work in a command-and-control environment become cogs in the machine. Management makes the decisions and manages the scheduling, planning, reporting and so on. It's an environment that works with information abstracted from work.[8] Integrating decision-making with the work produces a totally different management infrastructure.[9]
Measures are usually derived from the budget in command-and-control organizations. Moreover, connecting work to arbitrary measures creates the need to have additional people scheduling work, reporting on work, and making demands on those who do the work. Separation of decision-making from the work is the defining logic for command-and-control-management.[10]
Integrating the information needed with the work itself changes the point of control, from external to internal, and, consequently has a positive impact on motivation. Optimizing the flow leads to lower costs because you only do what you need. Moving the locus of control to the worker makes it possible for him or her to perform different work depending on what is needed.[11] Moreover, if something goes wrong it can be seen and corrected at once.[12]
In manufacturing you 'get away with' command-and-control because the products you make are standard. Traditional command-and-control responds to variety by establishing procedures, standards, and the like. The consequence is enourmous amounts of waste when applied to service organizations.[13] Maximizing the ability to handle variety is central to improving service and reducing costs. This can only be done by intelligent use of intelligent people, where workers are connected with customers in self-organizing relationships.[14]
Diversity of flow is the hallmark of good service. In managing flow the work itself is the information, and this in turn comprises the information required to direct operations in the work. It is an unquestioned assumption in command-and-control that managers should have and set targets and then create control systems to ensure the targets are met. In Toyota these practices simply do not exist. To make service organizations work better, they need to be taken out.[15]
The Toyota system exemplifies economies of flow, which is a step beyond economies of scale. The concepts associated with the economies of scale have governed management thinking for the last century and more.[16] Economies of flow represent a challenge to current beliefs. It is a challenge of of such a scale that this becomes the most important hurdle for managers to get over. The ideas themselves are simple, logical, and practical. However, they are different, unfamiliar, and, as a consequence, often perceived as a threat. They are certainly counterintuitive to the command-and-control mindset.[17]
The management principles that have guided command-and-control are logical – but it's the wrong logic. The better way has a different logic. John Seddon uses the entire book to eloquently explain this better logic.
Notes:
[1] John Seddon, Freedom from Command and Control: A Better Way to Make the Work Work (Vanguard Consulting Ltd, 2005, 2nd edition), p.23.
[2] Ibid., p.8.
[3] Ibid., p.8.
[4] Ibid., p.9.
[5] Ibid., p.15.
[6] Ibid., pp.15--16.
[7] Ibid., p.16.
[8] Ibid., p.17.
[9] Ibid., p.19.
[10] Ibid., p.19.
[11] Ibid., p.20.
[12] Ibid., p.21.
[13] Ibid., p.21.
[14] Ibid., p.22.
[15] Ibid., p.22.
[16] Ibid., p.22.
[17] Ibid., p.23.
The better way has a completely different logic to command-and-control, and that, perhaps, is the reason it is difficult to understand. People interpret what they hear from their current frame of reference, so what they hear is not necessarily what is meant.[2]
The cornerstone of command-and-control is the separation of decision-making from work. Command-and-control is based on top-down hierarchies where managers manage people and money. Managers make decisions on budgets, targets, and so on.[3]
The command-and-control management pioneers were Frederick Taylor (scientific management), Henry Ford (mass production), and Alfred Sloan (management by numbers). The issue is not that command-and-control was without value, but that we have not continued to learn. The problem is a problem of thinking.[4]
Taiichi Ohno at Toyota developed a radically different approach the management of work.[5] Instead of top-down command-and-control management, Toyota uses local control at the point where the work is done.[6] This philosophy is fundamentally different. The attitude is no longer to make the numbers, but to learn and improve.[7] It requires power-with, rather than power-over, and runs counter to the underlying hierarchical command-and-control philosophy.
People who work in a command-and-control environment become cogs in the machine. Management makes the decisions and manages the scheduling, planning, reporting and so on. It's an environment that works with information abstracted from work.[8] Integrating decision-making with the work produces a totally different management infrastructure.[9]
Measures are usually derived from the budget in command-and-control organizations. Moreover, connecting work to arbitrary measures creates the need to have additional people scheduling work, reporting on work, and making demands on those who do the work. Separation of decision-making from the work is the defining logic for command-and-control-management.[10]
Integrating the information needed with the work itself changes the point of control, from external to internal, and, consequently has a positive impact on motivation. Optimizing the flow leads to lower costs because you only do what you need. Moving the locus of control to the worker makes it possible for him or her to perform different work depending on what is needed.[11] Moreover, if something goes wrong it can be seen and corrected at once.[12]
In manufacturing you 'get away with' command-and-control because the products you make are standard. Traditional command-and-control responds to variety by establishing procedures, standards, and the like. The consequence is enourmous amounts of waste when applied to service organizations.[13] Maximizing the ability to handle variety is central to improving service and reducing costs. This can only be done by intelligent use of intelligent people, where workers are connected with customers in self-organizing relationships.[14]
Diversity of flow is the hallmark of good service. In managing flow the work itself is the information, and this in turn comprises the information required to direct operations in the work. It is an unquestioned assumption in command-and-control that managers should have and set targets and then create control systems to ensure the targets are met. In Toyota these practices simply do not exist. To make service organizations work better, they need to be taken out.[15]
The Toyota system exemplifies economies of flow, which is a step beyond economies of scale. The concepts associated with the economies of scale have governed management thinking for the last century and more.[16] Economies of flow represent a challenge to current beliefs. It is a challenge of of such a scale that this becomes the most important hurdle for managers to get over. The ideas themselves are simple, logical, and practical. However, they are different, unfamiliar, and, as a consequence, often perceived as a threat. They are certainly counterintuitive to the command-and-control mindset.[17]
The management principles that have guided command-and-control are logical – but it's the wrong logic. The better way has a different logic. John Seddon uses the entire book to eloquently explain this better logic.
Notes:
[1] John Seddon, Freedom from Command and Control: A Better Way to Make the Work Work (Vanguard Consulting Ltd, 2005, 2nd edition), p.23.
[2] Ibid., p.8.
[3] Ibid., p.8.
[4] Ibid., p.9.
[5] Ibid., p.15.
[6] Ibid., pp.15--16.
[7] Ibid., p.16.
[8] Ibid., p.17.
[9] Ibid., p.19.
[10] Ibid., p.19.
[11] Ibid., p.20.
[12] Ibid., p.21.
[13] Ibid., p.21.
[14] Ibid., p.22.
[15] Ibid., p.22.
[16] Ibid., p.22.
[17] Ibid., p.23.
November 12, 2014
Seddon's book provides a useful approach to applying systems thinking to solve business problems. The examples and clear, no-nonsense wording are easy to follow and illustrate his points effectively.
Along the way, Seddon calls out the shortcomings he sees in many other approaches: TQM, Six Sigma, tools-first Lean practices, and ISO9000, to name a few. It's hard to argue with his reasoning. He also is not arguing from ignorance of these practices. He heavily quotes both Deming and Ohno, while decrying those that turn their ideas into rote scripts that must be slavishly followed.
The main message throughout the book is the need for leaders to stop focusing on managing workers and start focusing on managing systems and the work they produce. Seddon argues that 95% of performance issues are due to the system. So why is there so much focus on strict performance management instead of improving the overall system?
While this book is particularly useful for those new to systems thinking, there is something here for everyone. Highly recommended.
Along the way, Seddon calls out the shortcomings he sees in many other approaches: TQM, Six Sigma, tools-first Lean practices, and ISO9000, to name a few. It's hard to argue with his reasoning. He also is not arguing from ignorance of these practices. He heavily quotes both Deming and Ohno, while decrying those that turn their ideas into rote scripts that must be slavishly followed.
The main message throughout the book is the need for leaders to stop focusing on managing workers and start focusing on managing systems and the work they produce. Seddon argues that 95% of performance issues are due to the system. So why is there so much focus on strict performance management instead of improving the overall system?
While this book is particularly useful for those new to systems thinking, there is something here for everyone. Highly recommended.
September 2, 2013
A great book. John Seddon knows what he's talking about and fills the book with many examples from the field. Reading this book should be mandatory for everybody working in the public sector, or in service companies. However the book lacks in structure and editing: I often found myself getting back "oh wait, he said something REALLY important here!". Content would be five stars.
January 17, 2010
Amazing book! Learning to see service organisations as Systems, John Seddon really drives Vanguard's simple method of Systems Thinking home with many great case studies.
January 15, 2011
It's not possible to give a succinct summary of this excellent book - changes your thinking for ever and reveals all the sins of command & control.
September 30, 2021
This is a pretty good book, although it has not much of a new information for people who already familiar with systems theory and systems thinking.
In a nutshell, the author criticizes the dominant management methods that are based on analytical thinking and on the principals of classical division of labor.
Analytical thinking implies the possibility of dividing an object into separate parts that can be changed or improved in isolation from one another!
At best, vertical connections/relationships between the levels are taken into account, but not horizontal ones.
It is thus implied that local optimization of the parts, in sum, leads to optimization of the whole.
The entire management system of most companies, our education, and so on is built on these principles and assumptions.
Systems thinking, in turn, implies that no one part can be optimized in isolation from another, because they are all interconnected in a network.
Thus, a change of one part must always be carried out taking into account the impact on the other parts, thereby any change requires a prior coordination among all of the parts!
Moreover, the optimization of the whole is sometimes achieved through the REDUCTION of certain part's properties!
An example for this is the use of operational research methods, where optimization is achieved by raising/lowering certain values of some parts in a system of equations!
Now imagine that, you have two separate manufacturing places who produce each a different type of a product. Each of them is measured separately from each other by the amount of products how much they can produce in a day, and obviously get paid for that in same way.
All of a sudden you come to a conclusion that, you have to lower the production volume of one manufacturing facility and raise the volume of another one, in order to gain maximize the overall profit.
No need to be a genius to understand that, you will get a conflict between the facilities because, one of them gets more volume at the cost of another one, and Because, they are not being measured by the amount of extra profit which is being generated, but by the amount of products which each of them can produce ( local optimization)!
What that means is that, management should be guided by the goals of the whole, not its parts! This is the basis of the systems approach and its different types such as process management, etc.
The author gives some examples where improvement was achieved by changing the system = the process itself and ways of measuring it (process objectives instead of objectives of individual activities of the process).
The problem is that, to move to system management, everything from control systems to motivation systems needs to be fundamentally reorganized.
And obviously, nobody wants to hear in a company that, they need to change everything from scratch, because what they were doing all that time is wrong.
For those who are interested, I advise to start reading the works of system theorists like Alexander Bogdanov (Tectology), Russell Ackoff, etc.
In a nutshell, the author criticizes the dominant management methods that are based on analytical thinking and on the principals of classical division of labor.
Analytical thinking implies the possibility of dividing an object into separate parts that can be changed or improved in isolation from one another!
At best, vertical connections/relationships between the levels are taken into account, but not horizontal ones.
It is thus implied that local optimization of the parts, in sum, leads to optimization of the whole.
The entire management system of most companies, our education, and so on is built on these principles and assumptions.
Systems thinking, in turn, implies that no one part can be optimized in isolation from another, because they are all interconnected in a network.
Thus, a change of one part must always be carried out taking into account the impact on the other parts, thereby any change requires a prior coordination among all of the parts!
Moreover, the optimization of the whole is sometimes achieved through the REDUCTION of certain part's properties!
An example for this is the use of operational research methods, where optimization is achieved by raising/lowering certain values of some parts in a system of equations!
Now imagine that, you have two separate manufacturing places who produce each a different type of a product. Each of them is measured separately from each other by the amount of products how much they can produce in a day, and obviously get paid for that in same way.
All of a sudden you come to a conclusion that, you have to lower the production volume of one manufacturing facility and raise the volume of another one, in order to gain maximize the overall profit.
No need to be a genius to understand that, you will get a conflict between the facilities because, one of them gets more volume at the cost of another one, and Because, they are not being measured by the amount of extra profit which is being generated, but by the amount of products which each of them can produce ( local optimization)!
What that means is that, management should be guided by the goals of the whole, not its parts! This is the basis of the systems approach and its different types such as process management, etc.
The author gives some examples where improvement was achieved by changing the system = the process itself and ways of measuring it (process objectives instead of objectives of individual activities of the process).
The problem is that, to move to system management, everything from control systems to motivation systems needs to be fundamentally reorganized.
And obviously, nobody wants to hear in a company that, they need to change everything from scratch, because what they were doing all that time is wrong.
For those who are interested, I advise to start reading the works of system theorists like Alexander Bogdanov (Tectology), Russell Ackoff, etc.
January 7, 2019
It is not a bad book at all. It is actually good to learn what doesn't work in a service business. But after properly argument about the methods that doesn't work, the author starts to talk in circles and almost always suggest that the best way to improve a service company and apply correctly the "systems thinking" is to hire his consultancy firm. So that is how i felt about this book: A lot of useful insights about the flaws of the current methods, but the solutions are not really present at the book, which at this point turn into a way to sell the other businesses of the author.
October 2, 2019
In summary this book can be a tad difficult to stick with - however it changed everything for me, I now coach teams the principles in this book. It really is a game changer! He's pretty arrogant but that does not matter - his views are spot on!
If someone recommends you read this book and you're in the service industry, you will be thanking them for years to come. The results you get are outstanding, not to mention the people who do the work are so much happier!
Happy reading!
If someone recommends you read this book and you're in the service industry, you will be thanking them for years to come. The results you get are outstanding, not to mention the people who do the work are so much happier!
Happy reading!
August 31, 2019
Too repetitive and sometimes hard to understand. Concepts and logic are sometimes taken as granted and are not explained sufficiently. While on the whole I find this book interesting and useful, it could have been done in a much shorter format and with clearer explanation of everything.
February 25, 2020
I loved the content: the evidence is convincing and feels generalisable to most contexts. The format is rather poor: some paragraphs are really hard to understand and a fair amount of typos doesn't help either
January 18, 2019
Fascinating overview of systems thinking.
April 12, 2023
Excellent comments on the issues of targets and quality standards. A great guide to thinking differently about service organisations and what matters to the end user.
July 13, 2019
Great ideas to improve service organisations, but would have benefited from a better editor. Repetitive and ranting.
September 7, 2014
interesting assessment of lean thinking in public sector. does get a bit fundamentalist though - can err towards the hectoring "why would you not do this? surely this is obvious? there is no other way"
still useful...
still useful...
June 15, 2010
A great book, well reasoned arguments with evidence to back up what the author has put forward.
April 1, 2013
A great read if you want to understand more about the "why" behind the process/ continuous improvement movement in corporate environments today.
October 14, 2023
Very useful. If you’ve ever wondered why it seems so hard to adapt lean manufacturing methods to service organizations, read this book.
February 5, 2017
Great insight not just for services contexts, especially in first few chapters
Displaying 1 - 22 of 22 reviews