Dwapara Yuga - Command and Control Management

The command and control style of management evolved from the battle plans of old fashioned conflicts with a few leaders holding all the levers of command and all the information directing expendable soldiers. The best example would be staff officers ordering thousands of men to run at machine guns in WWI. This style of management is the embodiment of Kali Yuga.

In WWII, great losses forced Britain to use their men more wisely, developing the idea of special forces and new tactics recognizing implicitly the value and capabilities of each soldier. The SAS, Britain's elite special force, used just a few highly trained and well informed men in land rovers to destroy Germany's air power in North Africa on the ground -- a management style reflecting the ideas of today's superstar businesses in investment banking, hitech and biotech.

In some 'modern' companies, the old command and control structures still exist with their modern day machine gun charges of thoughtless layoffs and uncoordinated outsourcing to gain efficiencies that could have been built by addressing basic needs of employees in Dwapara Yuga:

• Equity: To be respected and to be treated fairly in areas such as pay, benefits, and job security
• Achievement: To be proud of one's job, accomplishments, and employer
• Camaraderie: To have good, productive relationships with fellow employees

The recent, best-selling book - It's Your Ship - describes a US Navy Commander applying these principles in the military by simply valuing and training his crew and outperforming the old command and control methods.

A similar example can be had in the recent movie - Outsourced () - where a US Manager moves to India and is forced to consider the value of employees in the call center business and simultaneously calls into question his Kali style mindset of exploitation and waste.