Arsonists or firefighters?

I work with people from all different kinds of organizations—different sizes, different industries, different countries and cultures and processes—but everyone I’ve ever worked with talks about how their organization is, in myriad ways, busted. I come back often to this piece from Lane Becker about how all human systems are enormous trash fires—that every time people come together to make something, things start to blaze, in one way or another. The question to ask yourself, as Becker does, is “Am I surrounded by a team of firefighters or a team of arsonists?”