The Second Cycle

I am working on a whitepaper on a new paradigm for business in the 21st century. The key argument is that our current model for doing business was created about 100 years ago to help transform small-scale craft into large-scale industry. It served this purpose well, but facing a completely different challenge, transformig large-scale industry into knowledge business, there must be a better answer.

I have dedicated the next few years to find that new answer and to share it with others.

Here is a brief summary of the current paradigm (the industrial business model):

1. The purpose is profit and the yardstick is return on equity, assets, sales or some other factor.
2. The primary assets are buildings, land, machines, stock, debtors and intellectual property rights.
3. The legal framework is the limited company in which investors, directors and employees are three separate groups.
4. The employees are a production factor, which is bought at the lowest possible cost - just like other production factors such as equipment and energy.
5. The organization is the functional hierarchy where jobs are defined by combinations of functions (e.g. manufacturing) and levels (e.g. middle manager).
6. The management is based on power and professional skills.

I invite you as a reader of this page to participate in a co-creation process by commenting one or more of these six points (please refer to their numbers in vour comments), in particular to suggest what you believe the new paradigm could be. For exaple you may argue what sort of organization should substitute the functional hierarchy (point 5 above). Feel free to comment on other people’s comments. You may also add new aspects and invite comments from others. Your contribution is most valuable to me if you write under your full and correct name instead of just a pseudonym.

Let us share ideas!

At this website you will find information about the book: “The second Cycle - Winning the War against Bureaucracy”: You are welcome to write comments on the book, which I will read and - in some cases - comment upon below.