Separate what changes from what stays the same

To sustain themselves, organizations must grow effectively and healthfully. Growth is caused by tension between what stays the same and what changes; what stays the same acts as a limit or foundation against which the pressure to make change exercises itself. Without a constant, change is meaningless; without change, habits form and become ineffective over time. Inertia—the tendency of things to remain the same unless changed by some outside force—is not automatically sustained in any organization. Newton’s laws do not apply to groups of people and their shared goals, because the world outside the group is constantly undergoing change.

The pressure to change things pushes against the limits of what stays the same, and the limits of what stays the same pushes back against the pressure to change things. This dynamic tension creates growth, because it is irregular and arrythymic over time; change is not constantly trying to occur, and limits are not always aligned against a desired change.

How can we take advantage of this principle explicitly in the design of our organization? How can we make sure that there is never ‘dead weight,’ that there is never an unhealthy resistance to change while we also ensure that there is never an unhealthy reckless change? How can we balance between changing things and keeping what works? How can we make sure that we are always pushing against our limits while we honor what is useful about them?

The Division of Roles

Every staff role at Bucketworks is divided into two parts and two people, one of whom should Principles/KeepWhatWorks and one of whom should Principles/StartGrowth. Together, their dynamic tension makes their role grow, causing the results of their role to grow as well. For every keeper there is a maker.

KeepWhatWorks: Sustaining the Best

The Keeper part of a role is responsible for knowing the limits, defining the boundaries, and making sure that things Principles/EndUpDone. Consistency and quality are the concerns of the Keeper. Followup, providing accurate service, making sure goals are met, making sure contracts are satisfied; measuring effectiveness. The Keeper is like the gardener pulling weeds, raising beds, protecting the garden from pests, and measuring the seasons.

MakeChange: Discovering What’s Better

The Maker part of a role is responsible for pushing against the limits, driving new business and new ideas into the role, and creating new goals for the role. The Maker wants to Principles/StartChange. The Maker plants new vegetables in the garden, sells the harvest in the market, and comes up with new salad recipes; the Maker changes the arrangement of the flowers in the vase to make it more appealing.

Compensation

Finding a fair method to compensate a role that changes and stays the same is a challenge. The Keeper is trying to make sure that things come to successful conclusions. They want it to Principles/EndUpDone. The Keeper’s compensation wants to come from the number of things that they bring to a close.

The Maker is constantly pushing for new beginnings. They want to Principles/StartChange. The Maker’s compensation wants to come from the number of new changes they introduce.

You can see that this can cause a problem. If the Maker changes too much, the role will fail to sustain because nothing consistent will stay the same. Chaos is costly. If the Keeper limits change too much, the role will fail because there will be no growth; eventually, the function of the role will be rendered useless by the surrounding context of change, which we cannot control.

The key to solving this problem is compensating the role as a whole, not the individuals who perform it. This causes them to work together: if they can keep achieving the goal of the role while they exceed the goal, the role will sustain itself; the goal is then changed to reflect the new capabilities of the role. The goal can move backwards and forwards depending on the surrounding context of the role over time. Compensation is then a reflection of the performance of the role as a whole: The Keeper and the Maker are paid together based on how well they Principles/EndUpDone while they Principles/StartChange. If the role meets its target once, it receives no compensation. If the role achieves its goal repeatedly, it receives its base compensation. If the role exceeds its target, it makes a bonus. Each role will agree together on its sustainability goals and its growth goals. These will be taken as a whole when compensation is calculated.

Sustainability

Each of the functions of our business must generate a certain amount of revenue to sustain itself without changing, which is used to pay its fixed costs. The sustainability goal of each role is tied to the costs of operating its area of focus, and is relatively fixed: whatever it costs to sustain the function of the role without any change or growth in a given time period is the sustainability goal for that role. This includes maintaining fixed assets, but not adding new ones; this includes paying the rent on the space we have, but not adding new space.

Growth

The growth goal of each role is tied to its area of focus in a different way. Because growth can occur in both directions—in other words, the growth of a role can mean that the role costs less and gets smaller in addition to meaning that it costs more and gets bigger. Both can be considered growth, because ThingsChange: it might be better to make a goal smaller because of the circumstances in which the business finds itself. You can grow by making things cost less as well as by selling more things.