What makes us intelligent, able to make decisions based on our surrounding and pdictions of the future is not that we have an emmense amount of knowledge packed into our brains. Rather, what makes us different as human beings is that we have a great deal of nerves and nerve connections. It is these connections that is what makes us able to operate in. Different mode than the other animals around us.
Without these fundamental building blocks of connections, we would simply not be able to make the decisions we make. The same can be said for governance. Armed with only knowledge, we can make decisions based on some preferences, but armed with knowledge and connections through a network, we can make decisions based on probable outcomes.
I constantly see governance bodies that are made up of senior HR VPs who operate based on what they know as a senior body. Acting without the help of lower level working groups or sub governance teams, they don’t have the benefit of connections and networks that would help them be more successful.
Its not that we can’t make decisions ourselves, but that in complex organizations, just as in complex organisms, a single body simply can’t discover all of the nuances and have all of the information it needs on its own. In today’s businesses with multiple systems, multiple HR functions, business functions, divisions, political factions, etc involved, having appropriate inputs to help decipher what is really going on and deciding what decisions are actionable and important becomes critical.
And the fact of the matter remains: that managers and executives don’t really ever hear the bad stuff. People are actually afraid of poorly stat using their projects and functions, and often it’s too late for executives to act by the time they catch wind that something has gone sideways. While discussing projects with peers within governance sub teams, clear discussions can be had, and realizations that often the issues are more cross functional in nature rather than the fault of a particular person can be recognized.
Indeed, even our projects are so interdependent upon each other that governance sub groups and working groups are absolutely essential to the proper functioning of our programs. Take talent management for example. Thinking that performance can live in a vacuum can only lead to trouble. Functional processes must be coordinated with learning, compensation, succession, staffing, and others. At the executive decision level, they must integrate with the executives from the same functions to ensure that strategic level adherence is maintained.
Regardless of the topic, governance and decision making is all about coordination and networking. Its an impossibility to think in todays HR technology world that any of us can live on an island without others, but also that we can be independent of others and still have a complete understanding of our environment.
