Archiv der Kategorie: Various

In this area you can find additional topics.

30 years since the Fall of the Berlin Wall

The walls of Babylon were one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. The Chinese wall secured China for several centuries against the rest of the world. Even today walls are still important. Within more than twenty years, the Berlin Wall became an important part of the global memory – especially due to its fall on November 9, 1989.

Mauerfall

These 160 km that had surrounded the western part of Berlin plus the over 1300 km of border between the GDR and the FRG were a critical line of fracture between East and West – the German part of the iron curtain. Altogether at least 626 humans died in the attempt to cross this border. In the forty years of the GDR, estimated two hundred thousand detained were locked up in prison for political reasons. Three to five million people left the GDR between 1949 and 1989 (see in German http://ow.ly/DY8Zd). Over decades hundreds of nuclear missiles were ready to be launched in order to transform Germany into a nuclear desert. The damage that many people suffered cannot be undone. History will never forget these victims.
The fall of the Wall on November 9, 1989, ended the division of the world into East and West, the excessively bureaucratic and dictatorial system of the GDR as well as the latent nuclear threat for Europe. The credit for this goes to the reform movements in Poland, Hungary and Czechoslovakia and, above all, to many people of the former GDR, who fled into the embassies and demonstrated for freedom in the Monday Demonstrations. Thus, the November 9, 1989, is a turning point in world history removed the sword of Damocles of nuclear elimination 25 years ago. No gratitude of the world can properly meet this achievement.

After 25 years the separation should be overcome. Hopefully, the vanished border is not pulled up again from the west by populist propaganda.

All the best for the thirtieth!

What remains?

Still today, walls and fences exist between different ideologies, belief and economic systems. The Demilitarized Zone separates the North from South Korea. Between the US and Mexico a fence of 4m extends over 3000km. Peace lines separate Catholics from Protestants in Belfast. Europe has mainly natural borders, but in some places border installations are installed, e.g. the Spanish city Melilla is separated from Morocco by a 6-meter-high fence. A new form of border is Frontex (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frontex).This organization secures the external borders of Europe. What does it actually take to learn from history?

N-legged

Seats differ from each other depending on the use. There is no one and only solution, because the requirements deviate from each other in each case. This becomes evident with the one-legged milking stool that is fastened with a belt and that provides maximum mobility. In contrast, the office chair comes along on five legs and offers maximum stability despite the rollers. Accordingly, businesses need in each case a certain number of pillars in order to fulfill the purpose of the enterprise.

The equivalents of the supporting legs are in business the responsibilities for projects, tasks, products, organizations and similar, which are assigned under one roof. The following thoughts are intended to stimulate the consideration of this question.

  1. The one-legged approach concentrates on one purpose. The project manager, who is responsible for one project, concentrates just on it and ensures that nothing goes wrong. The available capacity is fully assigned to the project.
  2. Stability rises, as soon as a further pillar is added. On two legs, it suits better than on one. Employees, who settle two tasks, do not need to give everything. They have thereby a larger variety at work.
  3. The three-legged approach secures the stable condition. A responsible person has healthy variety with three products. The diversification prevents harmful routine and enables skillful distribution of the available resources. Three main points are within our cognitive abilities and therefore well workable.
  4. From another leg, arise four sides that topple more easily. Accordingly, organizations that consist of four areas reach a complexity that is still manageable, but already reach an increased risk.
  5. The five-legged approach has a manageable complexity and stands stable. However, the attention per topic is limited to 20% – in other words four days a month or one and a half hours a day. Thus, the limits of manageability are reached.
  6. More legs increase the complexity and become less manageable and eventually become too much of a risk. The attention is always absorbed by the “squeaking wheel”. One can take care of the other areas, if they create bigger problems than the others do. The consequence is a swinging back and forth between the areas.

Bottom line: Stability is best achieved from three to five pillars. Keep the number of tasks, products or organizations that are in one responsibility, within this range. As soon as the number continues to rise, the (cell)division into new units is recommended.