Signals: Comfort is Trumping Excellence

Some signs that comfort is trumping excellence:

• Efforts to achieve greater efficiency and productivity are ignored or even ostracized.
• Superficial actions which give the appearance, but not the substance, of serious action are favored.
• There is a cultural emphasis on not rocking the boat.
• Positions that have the potential of rocking the boat are filled with individuals who lack the ability or proclivity to do so.
• Office politicians are rewarded regardless of merit.
• Executives and managers receive generous compensation regardless of their performance.
• The inner circle has many perks.
• There is a well-populated Siberia.
• Reform efforts are sidetracked with frequent reorganizations and reassignments.
• The dependent are kept and the independent nudged out.
• There are committees stacked upon committees and yet nothing significant ever seems to get done.
• Accountability and urgency are rare.
• Official documents are works of fiction.
• The polished skills of spin doctors can be found at several levels of the organization..