Comments on: Cognitive surplus and organizational slack

By: Wardlaw

Wardlaw — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 11:23:27 +0000

Carve out the surplus from passive experience – Redeploy.
I think we’re talking permission marketing, permission lifestyles…

By: Dave L

Dave L — Sat, 03 May 2008 22:04:53 +0000

The long-running Dilbert study would seem to support that!

More seriously, I remember the study that posited that the reason managers live longer than non-management level workers is due to greater autonomy, and less ceding of control to others.

By: Jon Husband

Jon Husband — Sat, 03 May 2008 00:17:54 +0000

The motivation question is an interesting one … the rise in the use of variable compensation as a widespread organizational practice seems, from my vantage point, to correspond roughly with the beginnings of observable decreases in the change in the employment social contract, pride in employer, pride in work, etc.

Yes, I know I am making vast generalizations and in a sense mashing up MacGregor’s Theory X and Theory Y stuff.

That said, I believe it’s clear that there’s a generalized search from meaning regarding the place of work in peoples’ lives that wasn’t manifest in the same way(s) 15 or 20 years ago. I was around and working as an HR / organizational consultant back when variable compensation was the exception as opposed to the rule and organizations were really just beginning to experiment with variable compensation (the jargon is “pay at risk”).

I am curious as to whether some degree of self-actualization as motivation can be mashed up with greater freedom to work with information with less direction and supervision … there are a reasonable number of studies that correlate less freedom to act with lower motivation at work, greater stress, greater absences. How can the notion of organizational culture be related to the notions of creating and using cognitive surplus in the workplace ?

By: Jim

Jim — Fri, 02 May 2008 18:03:43 +0000

An excellent point. Shirky pretty much ignores motivation entirely, which is too bad. We’re opening up more possibilities and opportunities to create, but we probably need to do a better job of helping them understand why they might want to.

By: Dave L

Dave L — Fri, 02 May 2008 17:22:36 +0000

Watched the video and read the transcript. I don’t think Shirky addresses motivations directly enough. People will take up self-actualization opportunities, but lots of people have dreams they’d like to fulfill, but watch TV instead.
Self-actualization opportunities sometimes need to be made more visible before people will take them up, otherwise the “cognitive surplus” continues.