Why Are There So Many "Useless People" and "Useless Companies"? — Understanding Organizational Rigidity Through Chaotic Management

I. The Phenomenon of the "Useless People Cycle" in Modern Enterprises

1. Structural Incompetence

• Case Study: Minutes from a middle management meeting at a tech giant reveal that 60% of the time is spent "explaining why innovation is not possible" rather than solving problems.

• Data: A Harvard study indicates that under traditional KPI systems, employee performance only reaches 42% (2023 survey).

  
  

2. Fear-Dominated Culture

• Tokyo University Experiment: Teams strictly adhering to Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) exhibited decision-making errors three times more than autonomous teams when faced with market changes.

• Taiwanese Corporate Example: After the second-generation successor in a traditional industry promised not to lay off senior staff, the digital transformation was delayed by five years.

  
  

3. Self-Reinforcing Rigid Systems

• Before Satya Nadella's Reforms at Microsoft: The Windows division took 18 months to approve a simple button color change.

• The Economist Data: Bureaucratic costs consume 15-30% of corporate revenue (2024 global report).

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II. Solutions from Chaotic Management

Three Levers to Eliminate "Useless People"

1. Non-Linear Replacement Mechanisms

   • Dutch ING Bank Practice: Quarterly analysis of "skills heat maps" forces the bottom 15% of employees into a three-month "war room"; failing to meet standards results in reassignment.

   • Tools: AI behavioral analysis systems (e.g., SAP SuccessFactors' Mutation Adaptability Index).

     
     

2. "Violent" Innovation by Autonomous Teams

   • Tesla's "Skunk Works" Model: Allows engineers to bypass hierarchy to directly tackle battery defects, reducing development cycles by 60%. In 2025, Musk returned to this model after stepping back from politics.

   • Taiwan Semiconductor Case: A leading firm used an "internal venture capital" mechanism, incubating five new business units in three years, eliminating 32% of rigid managers.

3. Failures as Motivation

   • Amazon's "Learn-It-All" Bonus: Employees can redeem training resources based on failure reports.

   • Data: Companies implementing this approach have seen their iteration speed increase by 2.4 times (McKinsey 2024 Digital Transformation Report).

     
     

III. Survival Manual for Executives

1. Power Knife

   • Mandate a quarterly reshuffle of 10% of management positions (referencing Microsoft's "Refresh" program).

   • Establish a "New Legacy Board" composed of employees under 30, with veto power.

2. Data Guillotine

   • Implement "Contribution Value Chain Analysis" to quantify each position's actual impact on customer experience.

   • Example: Citibank used this tool to reduce administrative positions by 27% over three years.

     
     

3. Cultural Vaccination

   • "Anti-Fragile" Training: Simulate company failure scenarios to observe employee adaptability.

   • Implement "Malicious OKRs": Intentionally set absurd goals to test breakthrough thinking.

     
     

IV. A Harsh but Necessary Choice

• New Definition of "Useless People": Not individuals lacking ability, but those "unable to create order in chaos."

• Transformation Cost Formula:

  
  

  "If the cost of tolerating rigidity exceeds the pain of reform multiplied by three, the enterprise has entered a death spiral."

  
  

(This article is a rewrite of a key report from the 2024 Global Organizational Development Forum, with cases disclosed under corporate authorization.)

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