
Semco – Insanity That Works - cpeterso
http://www.freibergs.com/resources/articles/leadership/semco-insanity-that-works/
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joseakle
Ricardo Semler's is indeed a true visionary, he started applying the
principles of democracy and trust to industrial production decades ago, his
first book Maverick[1] was written in 1995, it is full of interesting
anecdotes on how he implemented his ideas in his father's business. I find his
methods very similar to what is now being called Holocracy [2].

[1] [http://www.amazon.com/Ricardo-
Semler/e/B000APW260](http://www.amazon.com/Ricardo-Semler/e/B000APW260) [2]
[https://hn.algolia.com/?query=holocracy&sort=byPopularity&pr...](https://hn.algolia.com/?query=holocracy&sort=byPopularity&prefix&page=0&dateRange=all&type=story)

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codyb
I worked for a brief time for a company which was very inspired by Semler.
Autonomy! Great! Wrong. Phone calls at all times of day and night and working
from home in NYC where my room was also necessarily my office left me burnt
out super quick.

Also, plenty of meetings I didn't need or want to be at (unneccesary context
switches constantly) as an engineer conducted over google hang outs because of
the "flat" hierarchy.

In the end the openness of seeing the companys finances didn't work for me
because in the end, what do I care?

I burnt out quick there and moved on.

That being said this was a super small start up suffering growing pains and
working across major time zone differences, so in the end, YMMV, and I'm sure
as they continue to work out the kinks and can pay their engineers in NYC an
engineer in NYC's salary (in Amsterdam software engineers don't appear to make
as much, which is where they were primarily based), the experience for their
workers will improve.

And trying to work through the NYC summer in a room with no air conditioning
is just awful and I don't recommend it. The lack of meaningful social
interaction, your body sticking to your chair with sweat. An office set up
fund needs to be provided for all remote workers at the end of the day, and
that was not the case here (to be fair, they liked the idea and once funding
and the bank account were both fuller I'm sure they'd do it).

The two founders worked for a year without salary to get it going so there
were definitely people with skin in the game.

Now I have a strict 9-5 with a nice office in Midtown. I get the requisite
amount of social interaction required for my neurons to maintain a happy state
and the quiet of an office for when I want to get into the zone and get things
done.

My coworker is pretty uninspired... But that's a story for another day.

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cpeterso
Do you think the experience would have been better if people were working in
the same office? Meetings would be easier or less necessary and wouldn't
require phone calls at all hours of the day. Working remotely with people in
different time zones is already a challenge when using traditional management.
:)

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codyb
Yea the plan was to move to Amsterdam but after a while I didn't really want
to go anymore.

Also, consulting work for small businesses is pretty boring from an engineer's
perspective (or maybe just mine). There's really only so many cool things to
do to a small website (and then repeat with the next one).

