Comment by patcon
5 hours ago
> But if you think that the courage that Dario has regularly shown would be possible with a conventional "best practices" structure, I think you're kidding yourself.
With respect to OP (who has a unique vantage from inside), I do agree with this on principle. When there are uncommon outcomes, there must be uncommon structure imho. A "good structure" is like oxygen, water, or peace: When it's well-maintained and well-distributed, one might not even notice it's there, nor spend much time being grateful for it. It's banal, but "what do you mean? isn't this just how things would always have been?" is both beautiful and tragic.
Imho if we could figure out how to have a "loud peace" (in all the ways that this might mean), we'd have figured out an important way of sustaining the world and ourselves.
The structure requires maintenance and that is done by an individual or individuals. The real reasons a good company stays good is because the leadership stays good. When the leadership begins to disengage or leaves or changes in some way then the structure will begin to break down. You can't fix it with a "better" structure. It will decay over time unless someone is actively maintaining it.
What you say is true, but there is more to it. Decay is not the only thing that can happen to a structure. It also can be actively destroyed from the outside. Rather than ask whether a structure is right or wrong, good or bad, we instead need to learn to ask whether it is strong or weak.
I think I agree..!
I get the sense you were feeling at odds with my framing? I wonder if it's that you're picking up that I believe "structure" is above any one person or set of people. In my conception, leadership is just part of structure, a key maintainer. Leadership are pieces of the structure, but subordinate in scale. They sometimes seek outside help in shaping structure (e.g., ppl like eries), and the structure becomes like another passive actor, not simply "leadership's doing". Leadership are key players taking care of the structure, but they are just one set of players, and in some structures, non-leadership employees play an outsized role (often because leadership knew enough to step back). Sometimes the role of leadership if "fucking right off" in certain domains. Regardless, the structure then guides behaviour of all within it, and hopefully the structure also maintains us, at least as much as we maintain it.
I'm stating the above as if it's universally true, but it's just my take. I'd be curious to know if any parts give you strong YES or NO feelings, if you are open to share your gut reaction. Blunt responses welcome
(Fwiw I lean heavily on the ideas of Christopher Alexander -- the Pattern Language guy -- in regards to my beliefs on "structure": https://dorian.substack.com/p/at-any-given-moment-in-a-proce... )