BBC随身英语(MP3+中英字幕) 第181期:群龙无首的公司

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The company with no boss
What would work be like if you had no boss? Imagine you could make all your own decisions and no one told you what to do.
One company decided to find out if it could work. The staff at Crisp, a Swedish software consultancy, chose to get rid of their CEO and create a completely flat organisation. Having trialled several different management structures, the firm agreed to take the radical step of having no single leader.
 

First, they needed to establish what a CEO actually did. Then they shared those duties out amongst staff and board members. Employee Yassal Sundman told the BBC: "When we looked at it we had nothing left in the CEO column, and we said, 'all right, why don't we try it out?'".
 

Which is exactly what they did. And Crisp employee, Heinrik Kniberg, believes it's been a good move. He says the company can now act faster: "If you want to get something done, you stand up and start driving that". Kniberg also claims workers are more motivated. Crisp regularly measures staff satisfaction, and say they average over four out of five.
Any big decisions are made during the company-wide four-day meetings several times a year. They do still have a board: it's a legal requirement. But the board can be used as a last resort to resolve tricky issues.
So, if it's working out for Crisp, could this model become more widespread? Online retailer Zappos tried out a similar plan but had mixed results. Almost a fifth of Zappos staff decided to leave, and chief executive Tony Hsieh admitted that "self-management is not for everyone".
Founder of file-sharing service Dropbox, Drew Houston, believes that a leaderless structure is too chaotic.
"Often infinite freedom like that can be pretty disorientating. It doesn't always feel good, because you no longer know what you're supposed to do, what's important and you're bumping up against other people," Mr Houston says.
So, what is the perfect balance? How do you keep accountability in a company without hierarchy? Would you like to work somewhere with no boss?
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