Misconception 6:
​Control is bad

Category: (Mis-) understanding self-management

This is another tragic misunderstanding I see happening again and again. We so much resent the old, bureaucratic, life-sapping, top-down systems of control that we come to see control as a bad thing.

Here is the predictable thing that then happens... people get rid of all the control mechanisms and say "from now on, we just operate on trust". And then things don't quite go as expected! Wait... what does that mean? Were we wrong to trust? 

Trust is absolutely essential, but not sufficient. We need to reframe the conversation. Control is not a bad thing. A system wants to be in control to be healthy! But not through the old top-down control mechanisms. But then... how?

The answer, in one two words: self-correction! There is no self-management without self-correcting mechanisms that replace the old top-down control mechanisms

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