One Way to Re-humanize the Workplace

Better supply chain management unchains the potential for good working community.

I have a good friend who’s a hazmat responder in a UPS warehouse. He inspects the weird and dangerous things people ship to each other:

Dead cats. Draino. Deer heads. White powder of indefinite origins. That sort of thing.

Working at UPS gives him a clear view of the invisible processes that move or constrict the global economy. Working at UPS also shows the double-binds that choke many workplaces today—like when his managers yell, Hurry the eff up! and then add desperately, And—be safe!

This podcast conversation seeks openings in the stuck places of organizational culture.

So it might seem strange for us Mode/Switchers to talk with a couple of supply chain experts, Professors Phil Johnson (Calvin University) and Hannah Stolze (Baylor University). But the processes they analyze help the rest of us analyze what’s going wrong in workplace culture today.

Call these processes logistics. Call them fulfillment services. Call them supply chains. Whatever you call them, they’re integral to doing workplaces better.

Better attention to supply chains creates more generous attention to, and care for, working communities.

In order to rehumanize organizations, we have to rethink our relationship with the more-than-human. That means developing a richer attention to systems, technology, infrastructure—not to mention a lot of planes, ships, and trucks.