John Seddon and freedom from command and control
John Seddon is the inventor of The Vanguard Method. The Vanguard Method is a way of helping organizations move from command and control towards systems design. Seddon is the author of books such as Freedom from Command and Control and The Whitehall Effect. He’s currently working on a book titled Beyond Command and Control. Seddon’s work has provoked a lot of thought and has significantly deepened my understanding of how organizations function. We talk about organizations as systems, value and failure demand, incentives, system conditions, budgeting and how the system drives behavior.