4 ways to build a human company in the age of machines | Tim Leberecht

翻译人员: Yangyang Liu 校对人员: Lin Ye

Half of the human workforce is expected to be replaced

未来二十年内，一半的人类劳动力

将会被软件和机器人取代。

by software and robots in the next 20 years.

And many corporate leaders welcome that as a chance to increase profits.

一些企业家把它视为 增加利润的好机会，

Machines are more efficient;

因为机器更高效，

humans are complicated and difficult to manage.

而人类更复杂且难于管理。

Well, I want our organizations to remain human.

而我希望我们的组织保留人类，

事实上，我希望它们变得更美。

In fact, I want them to become beautiful.

由于机器可以取代我们， 并且更高效地工作，

Because as machines take our jobs and do them more efficiently,

soon the only work left for us humans will be the kind of work

很快，留给人类解决的就会只剩那些

需要美感而非效率的工作。

that must be done beautifully rather than efficiently.

To maintain our humanity in the this second Machine Age,

要在第二次机器时代维持人的作用，

we may have no other choice than to create beauty.

我们别无选择，只能创造美。

Beauty is an elusive concept.

美是一个难以捉摸的概念。

For the writer Stendhal it was the promise of happiness.

作家司汤达说美是一种幸福的承诺。

For me it's a goal by Lionel Messi.

而对我来说，美是梅西的一记进球。

(Laughter)

（笑声）

So bear with me

所以，请容许我

as I am proposing four admittedly very subjective principles

提出四个相当主观的原则，

that you can use to build a beautiful organization.

它们可以被用来建立美的机构。

First: do the unnecessary.

第一，做不必要的事。

[Do the Unnecessary]

[做不必要的事]

A few months ago, Hamdi Ulukaya,

几个月前，哈姆迪·乌鲁卡亚，

the CEO and founder of the yogurt company Chobani,

Chobani 酸奶工厂的 创始人和 CEO，

made headlines when he decided to grant stock to all of his 2,000 employees.

为他2000名全体员工授予了股份， 并因此上了头条。

Some called it a PR stunt,

有人说这是公关噱头，

others -- a genuine act of giving back.

有人认为这是一种慷慨的回馈。

But there is something else that was remarkable about it.

但还有些更不寻常的值得注意之处。

这个消息突如其来，

It came completely out of the blue.

没有市场或股东的压力，

There had been no market or stakeholder pressure,

and employees were so surprised

员工们也非常意外，

that they burst into tears when they heard the news.

以至于他们听到消息时喜极而泣。

Actions like Ulukaya's are beautiful because they catch us off guard.

像乌鲁卡亚这样的行为就是美的， 它瞬间击中人心。

They create something out of nothing

他们凭空创造了一些东西，

而这些东西看起来完全没有必要。

because they're completely unnecessary.

我曾在一家

I once worked at a company

由一家大型IT外包公司

that was the result of a merger

of a large IT outsourcing firm and a small design firm.

和一家小设计公司 合并而成的公司工作过。

We were merging 9,000 software engineers

我们要把9000名软件工程师和

with 1,000 creative types.

1000名创意工作者整合在一起工作。

And to unify these immensely different cultures,

为了融合这两种截然不同的文化，

we were going to launch a third, new brand.

我们要建立一个全新的品牌。

And the new brand color was going to be orange.

新的品牌商标是橙色的，

我们在讨论品牌推广预算时，

And as we were going through the budget for the rollouts,

we decided last minute

在最后一分钟，

to cut the purchase of 10,000 orange balloons,

我们决定砍掉购买 一万只橙色气球的计划，

which we had meant to distribute to all staff worldwide.

我们本想把这些气球发给全球员工。

They just seemed unnecessary and cute in the end.

这件事看起来没有必要， 只是为了好玩。

I didn't know back then

当时我并不知道，

that our decision marked the beginning of the end --

我们的决定预示了结局——

that these two organizations would never become one.

两家公司不可能顺利合并。

And sure enough, the merger eventually failed.

果然，合并以失败告终。

Now, was it because there weren't any orange balloons?

就因为当时没买气球吗？

No, of course not.

不，当然不是。

But the kill-the-orange-balloons mentality permeated everything else.

但是这种砍掉气球的心态 弥漫到了其他所有事情上。

你可能不会意识到， 但在你砍掉“不必要”的时候，

You might not always realize it, but when you cut the unnecessary,

you cut everything.

你其实砍掉了所有。

Leading with beauty means rising above what is merely necessary.

追求美，意味着超越单纯的必需。

So do not kill your orange balloons.

所以，不要砍掉你的橙色气球。

第二个原则：

The second principle:

create intimacy.

创造亲密感。

[创造亲密感]

[Create Intimacy]

Studies show that how we feel about our workplace

研究表明，我们对工作的感受，

very much depends on the relationships with our coworkers.

很大程度上取决于 我们和同事的人际关系。

And what are relationships other than a string of microinteractions?

除了每天简单的交流， 人际关系还包括什么呢？

我们每天在公司 有几百次这样的机会，

There are hundreds of these every day in our organizations

that have the potential to distinguish a good life from a beautiful one.

可以让普通的一天变成美丽的一天。

The marriage researcher John Gottman says

婚姻研究者约翰·戈特曼说，

that the secret of a healthy relationship

健康关系的秘密，

不在于伟大的姿态或崇高的承诺，

is not the great gesture or the lofty promise,

而在于细小的展现人与人关系的瞬间。

it's small moments of attachment.

In other words, intimacy.

换句话说，就是亲密感。

在我们网络化的组织中，

In our networked organizations,

we tout the strength of weak ties

我们更加青睐弱连接的关系，

but we underestimate the strength of strong ones.

但我们同时低估了强连接的力量。

We forget the words of the writer Richard Bach who once said,

我们忘记了作家 Richard Bach 说过的话：

“亲密感——

"Intimacy --

not connectedness --

不是连通——

intimacy is the opposite of loneliness."

亲密感，是孤独的反义词。”

So how do we design for organizational intimacy?

所以我们该如何设计 才能增进组织的亲密性？

The humanitarian organization CARE

一个叫 CARE 的人道组织

wanted to launch a campaign on gender equality

想要在印度北部的村庄

in villages in northern India.

发起性别平等运动。

但他们很快意识到，

But it realized quickly

that it had to have this conversation first with its own staff.

他们首先需要同内部成员展开交流。

So it invited all 36 team members and their partners

所以他们邀请了 36位团队成员和他们的搭档，

去了克久拉霍的一个庙宇，

to one of the Khajuraho Temples,

known for their famous erotic sculptures.

这个庙宇因色情佛像而闻名。

And there they openly discussed their personal relationships --

在那里，他们与同事和搭档一起，

坦诚地讨论他们的私人关系——

their own experiences of gender equality

with the coworkers and the partners.

他们自己对性别平等的体会。

这令参与者们深受启发，

It was eye-opening for the participants.

Not only did it allow them to relate to the communities they serve,

这不仅帮他们在自己 与服务的社区之间建立了连结，

it also broke down invisible barriers

更打破了无形的障碍，

and created a lasting bond amongst themselves.

在他们之间建立了持久的团结。

Not a single team member quit in the next four years.

结果，在接下来的四年中， 没有一个成员退出。

So this is how you create intimacy.

所以，这就是建立亲密感的方法，

No masks ...

没有面具，

or lots of masks.

或者，有很多面具——

(Laughter)

（笑声）

When Danone, the food company,

在达能食品公司想要

把新的公司宣言落实为产品计划时，

wanted to translate its new company manifesto into product initiatives,

it gathered the management team

他们召集了管理团队

and 100 employees from across different departments,

和来自不同部门、不同层级和地区的

seniority levels and regions

100名员工，

举办了为期三天的战略会议。

for a three-day strategy retreat.

And it asked everybody to wear costumes for the entire meeting:

他们要求每个人都这么打扮：

wigs, crazy hats, feather boas,

假发、夸张的帽子、羽毛围巾、

huge glasses and so on.

大眼镜，等等。

And they left with concrete outcomes

他们都热情高涨，

and full of enthusiasm.

并且实现了了很实质性的成果。

我问一位女士，谁设计了这个方式，

And when I asked the woman who had designed this experience

为什么这么有效，

why it worked,

她随口说道： “永远不要低估搞笑假发的力量。”

she simply said, "Never underestimate the power of a ridiculous wig."

（笑声）

(Laughter)

(Applause)

（掌声）

Because wigs erase hierarchy,

因为假发消除了层级，

而层级会扼杀亲密感——

and hierarchy kills intimacy --

both ways,

不管对CEO还是实习生

for the CEO and the intern.

都是如此。

Wigs allow us to use the disguise of the false

假发让我们能依托一种伪装，

to show something true about ourselves.

来展示真实的自己。

在我们日常的工作中 是不容易做到的，

And that's not easy in our everyday work lives,

because the relationship with our organizations

因为我们的组织中的人际关系，

is often like that of a married couple that has grown apart,

经常像日渐疏远的夫妻一样，

suffered betrayals and disappointments,

充满背叛和失望，

and is now desperate to be beautiful for one another once again.

现在不顾一切地想要重修旧好。

And for either of us the first step towards beauty involves a huge risk.

对我们每个人来说， 通向美的第一步都隐含巨大的风险。

The risk to be ugly.

变丑的风险。

[Be Ugly]

[变丑]

现在很多组织想要 设计美丽的办公区，

So many organizations these days are keen on designing beautiful workplaces

that look like anything but work:

让它们看起来像度假区、咖啡店、 游乐场、大学校园，

vacation resorts, coffee shops, playgrounds or college campuses --

而偏偏不像是用来工作的。

（笑声）

(Laughter)

Based on the promises of positive psychology,

基于积极心理学的考虑，

we speak of play and gamification,

我们把工作变成玩耍、游戏，

and one start-up even says that when someone gets fired,

甚至有创业公司在解雇员工的时候，

they have graduated.

说他们是“毕业”了。

(Laughter)

（笑声）

That kind of beautiful language only goes "skin deep,

这些美丽的语言是“肤浅的，

but ugly cuts clean to the bone,"

但丑陋却可以深入骨髓，”

as the writer Dorothy Parker once put it.

这是作家多萝西·帕克的原话。

To be authentic is to be ugly.

坦白事实，就意味着丑陋。

It doesn't mean that you can't have fun or must give in to the vulgar or cynical,

这不是说你不能开心， 或者必须向庸俗和自私妥协，

but it does mean that you speak the actual ugly truth.

而是你应该说出丑陋的事实。

Like this manufacturer

就像这位想要改善

他经营不佳的业务的企业家。

that wanted to transform one of its struggling business units.

It identified, named and pinned on large boards all the issues --

他们把所有的阻碍业绩的 问题归类、命名，

and there were hundreds of them --

并钉在大白板上，

that had become obstacles to better performance.

有几百项之多。

They put them on boards, moved them all into one room,

他们把这些白板搬到一个房间，

which they called "the ugly room."

被他们称为“丑陋之屋”。

这些丑陋被暴露在灯光下——

The ugly became visible for everyone to see --

it was celebrated.

每个人都可以看到。

And the ugly room served as a mix of mirror exhibition and operating room --

这个房间变成了 镜子展厅和手术室的结合——

a biopsy on the living flesh to cut out all the bureaucracy.

用来切除官僚主义的手术室。

The ugliest part of our body is our brain.

我们身体中最丑陋的部分是大脑。

Literally and neurologically.

不仅看上去很丑陋，

还会创造人们不熟悉的丑陋的东西，

Our brain renders ugly what is unfamiliar ...

modern art, atonal music,

现代艺术，无调音乐，

jazz, maybe --

爵士乐，也可能——

VR goggles for that matter --

还有VR眼镜——

strange objects, sounds and people.

奇怪的东西、声音和人。

But we've all been ugly once.

但我们每个人都曾丑陋过，

We were a weird-looking baby,

我们曾经是外表奇怪的婴儿，

a new kid on the block, a foreigner.

街区新来的小孩，或一个外来者。

And we will be ugly again when we don't belong.

我们离去时也会再次变得丑陋。

The Center for Political Beauty,

柏林一个叫“政治美好中心”的

an activist collective in Berlin,

社会活动团体，

recently staged an extreme artistic intervention.

近期上演了一个极端艺术事件。

With the permission of relatives,

经过家属同意，

他们掘出在欧洲边境 溺水身亡的难民遗体，

it exhumed the corpses of refugees who had drowned at Europe's borders,

transported them all the way to Berlin,

运送到柏林，

把他们葬在德国首都的中心。

and then reburied them at the heart of the German capital.

The idea was to allow them to reach their desired destination,

这个计划想让他们 抵达曾经渴望的目的地，

即便是在他们死去之后。

if only after their death.

Such acts of beautification may not be pretty,

这种美化行为可能不太优雅，

但它们很有必要。

but they are much needed.

Because things tend to get ugly when there's only one meaning, one truth,

因为如果只有一种意义，一个真相， 只有答案，没有问题的话，

only answers and no questions.

事情就会变得丑陋。

Beautiful organizations keep asking questions.

美的组织会持续提出问题。

They remain incomplete,

它们保持不完整的状态，

which is the fourth and the last of the principles.

这是第四个，也是最后一个原则。

[Remain Incomplete]

[保持不完整]

Recently I was in Paris,

最近我去了趟巴黎，

and a friend of mine took me to Nuit Debout,

我的一个朋友带我去了 Nuit Debout，

which stands for "up all night,"

意思是“不眠之夜”，

the self-organized protest movement

始于为反对法国劳动法提案而产生的

that had formed in response to the proposed labor laws in France.

一个自发抗议运动。

Every night, hundreds gathered at the Place de la République.

每天晚上， 几百人聚集在共和国广场，

Every night they set up a small, temporary village

每天晚上，他们都会搭建起一个临时村庄，

to deliberate their own vision of the French Republic.

讨论他们自己理想中的 法兰西共和国。

这个组织的核心是一个全体大会，

And at the core of this adhocracy

was a general assembly where anybody could speak

在会上，每个人都可以用

一种特别设计的手语来交流。

using a specially designed sign language.

Like Occupy Wall Street and other protest movements,

就像占领华尔街 及其他抗议运动一样，

“不眠之夜”也是在面对危机时诞生。

Nuit Debout was born in the face of crisis.

它很混乱——

It was messy --

full of controversies and contradictions.

充满争论和矛盾。

But whether you agreed with the movement's goals or not,

不管你是否认同他们的抗议诉求，

every gathering was a beautiful lesson in raw humanity.

每次集会都是一次 原旨人权的大课堂。

And how fitting that Paris --

巴黎——

这个理想之城，美好之城——

the city of ideals, the city of beauty --

was it's stage.

正是最合适他们的舞台。

It reminds us that like great cities,

它提醒我们，就像伟大的城市一样，

the most beautiful organizations are ideas worth fighting for --

最美好的组织， 是值得为之奉献理想的——

even and especially when their outcome is uncertain.

即使，也恰是， 当它们的结果不确定的时候。

They are movements;

它们是运动，

they are always imperfect, never fully organized,

它们永远不完美， 永远不会组织完整，

所以它们可以避免变得平庸。

so they avoid ever becoming banal.

They have something but we don't know what it is.

它们有一些无以言状的东西。

它们保持神秘，让我们无法忽视。

They remain mysterious; we can't take our eyes off them.

我们发现它们很美。

We find them beautiful.

So to do the unnecessary,

所以，做不必要的事，

创造亲密感，

to create intimacy,

to be ugly,

变丑，

to remain incomplete --

保持不完整——

these are not only the qualities of beautiful organizations,

它们不只是美的组织的特征，

these are inherently human characteristics.

它们也是人类固有的特征。

And these are also the qualities of what we call home.

更是我们称之为“家”的特征。

And as we disrupt, and are disrupted,

我们在干扰或被干扰时，

the least we can do is to ensure

我们至少可以确保

that we still feel at home in our organizations,

自己在组织中就像在家一样，

and that we use our organizations to create that feeling for others.

确保我们在组织中 为他人营造同样的感受。

Beauty can save the world when we embrace these principles

当我们拥抱这些原则并为之努力，

and design for them.

美会拯救这个世界。

在人工智能和机器学习面前，

In the face of artificial intelligence and machine learning,

we need a new radical humanism.

我们需要一种全新的彻底的人文主义。

We must acquire and promote a new aesthetic and sentimental education.

我们必须学习并发展 新的审美和感性教育。

Because if we don't,

因为如果我们不这么做，

we might end up feeling like aliens

最终我们可能在遍布智能机器的、

in organizations and societies that are full of smart machines

不懂得欣赏美的组织和社会中，

that have no appreciation whatsoever

像局外人一样疏离地活着——

for the unnecessary,

对不必要的事、

the intimate,

对亲密感、

the incomplete

对不完整、

and definitely not for the ugly.

当然也对丑陋，无动于衷。

Thank you.

谢谢。

（掌声）

(Applause)