Anarchy in the Office

I heard an interesting alternative for managing human resources in a project execution environment that sounds like so much havering, but might actually be worthwhile to try as an experiment and perhaps refine into a more viable model.

The basic idea is that traditional management is threat-based: a person is in a position of authority because they have the ability to do harm to others, and his directives are backed by threat (termination of employment) and workers are coerced into complying with his orders for that reason alone - not because he is making sound decisions.

This seems a bit melodramatic, but it cannot be denied that it is always to some degree true.  The modern practice of management may pay lip-service to using logical persuasion and having empowered employees, but so long as the employee is threatened into following orders with which he disagrees, the element of coercion remains.

The proposed change was to do away with management structures altogether and create a network of truly empowered employees who have the ability to submit their ideas for solutions, the ability to persuade (without manipulation or coercion) other employees to assist, and the right of each employee to accept or reject invitations to involve themselves in projects.

There would be no reprisal for rejecting an invitation to work on an effort, and employees commitment to work on an effort could be withdrawn at will, such that if an idea was misrepresented or the project's scope changed, they could still walk away.

There would be no rank nor threat-based leadership.   The work of a team would be directed by the employee who proposed the idea.  In that way the "management" would be temporary rather than permanent, and people who had good ideas would regularly find themselves in leadership positions, while those who had bad ideas would not gather followers.

In a situation free of rank and threat, employees could determine which projects had merit and could benefit from their skills.   A bad idea would not get implemented because, presumably, its badness would be recognized and people would not lend their support to it.

This seems to make sense in expert environments, where workers contribute to developing solutions rather than merely executing orders.  A worker with the ability to develop a solution is more qualified to assess the viability of the solution than a manager who dictates by threat and has no subject-matter expertise.

All the same, I do not expect that a completely anarchic system is viable, as there are many issues that could arise without oversight.

• Staff would flow to projects that seem interesting or glamorous, but  there are many necessary and even critical efforts that are not attractive.
• Workers could use their "right to refuse" to shirk- to refuse all projects and goldbrick, or to do less than they are capable
• Support would not necessarily be for the merit of the idea, but the popularity of the proposer - rather than a meritocracy, it would become a popularity contest.
• Also related to popularity, an unpopular person with a good idea may not be able to attract followers to support the idea
• There is also the problem of favoritism and cronyism, which would be pronounced in an environment where there is no formal authority to discourage these practices.  
• There is no oversight to ensure that the people are matched to the jobs, such that a person could volunteer for work he is incapable of doing competently and could not be thrown off a project where he is useless or even obstructive
• There is no oversight to ensure that an adequate number of people with the right skills are available at any given time - and in fact there would be skilled people who were idle because none of the teams happened to need his skill at the moment.

I'm likely clutching at straws - the entire model seems notional and assumes the best-case scenario in which a good idea is always recognized, workers are willing to apply themselves in earnest and adequately, resources of the right kind are available in adequate supply, and so on.   The premises of the anarchic office seem good and rather attractive, but there is likely much to be worked out to make the idea viable.