In sum, the challenge of providing protection as a means to establish and maintain harmony of interest requires the attention and energy of a large percent of those working in management systems and, more recently, HRD systems. Providing “integration”, these members of an organization serve as a buffer between those owning the business or serving in a leadership position and those doing labor in this organization. While managers are hired to do the bidding of ownership, they also (under the best of circumstances) are expected to support and protect from abuse those whom they supervise.
Thus, in modern organizations, the harmony of interest is often assigned (with considerable contradiction and tension) to the mid-managers and others providing integrative services (such as HRD practitioners). This integration is strained as the organization grows larger and older, with those at the top of the organization having less direct contact with those at lower levels of the organization—and as a result are less likely to fully appreciating the interests held by these providing the direct services of the organization. Protective services must be installed and expanded–especially in large and old organizations (and communities).
Invitation to the Table
There is an even greater challenge, as the organization not only grows larger but also as the interests of those employed in the organization become more diverse. Greater integration and protection are needed because of the inevitable friction that exists among the various members of the organization who are sitting at the table where diverse interests are being addressed. As far back as the mid-19th Century, Anonymous observed that: “The discords so frequently existing between the employer and the employed, the capitalist and the labourer, the banker and his customers, may all, as I think, be traced to one and the same cause, and if that can be removed, harmony and good feeling may be restored and maintained.” (Anonymous, 1849, vol II, p. 1). This cause has to do primarily with the profit motive. Anonymous is optimistic that the profit-related discords can be resolved, believing that the inherent natural proclivity toward interdependence provides the glue leading to a harmony of interests. Through recognition of the interdependency, harmony of interests can be found among those sitting at the table.
This optimism might not always be warranted, given the enduring push toward profitability, along with the expanded list of interests that I have already identified. Furthermore, there are several fundamental questions that has not yet been addressed. Is everyone invited to the table? Specially, who is invited to the table? Only representatives of the labor union? Only those from HR who are serving as policy police? What about those not invited to the table? Where is the harmony for them? Those not at the table have often been ignored by those observing the workplace in America during the past two centuries.
Following the lead of better-known observers, such as Charles Dickens, Anonymous often writes in glowing terms of the quality of work, the thriving of those working in the mills, and the accompanying financial success of the mid-19th Century New England mill owner. (Anonymous, 1849, vol II, p. 6). Yet the working conditions of those running the looms was horrendous. The Mill Girls and other working in the mills found few invitations to the table. They had little to say regarding their own working conditions or even the conditions of their residency in the nearby dormitories (Sun and Bergquist, 2021). Furthermore, the amount these Mill Girls paid for meals and lodging in the dormitories was often less than the amount they earned working in the mill. Thus, their debt grew, leaving them with no freedom to leave their exhausting and unhealthy job in the New England mills. For these women there was nothing but wage slavery—as is often case in production facilities found throughout the world during the past two centuries (Chomsky, 2008).
