Much of what makes an organisation work is discretionary behaviour outside any job description and outside any reward system.
Organ named the category in 1988 for helping colleagues, tolerating inconvenience, and going beyond role requirements. Because it is unrewarded by definition, it is also unprotected: it is the first thing withdrawn when people feel unfairly treated, and its withdrawal is invisible to every measurement system while being obvious in the building.
In practice
- A team that stops helping each other meets every stated target and stops functioning.
- A work-to-rule requires nobody to break a rule and halts the organisation.
- Further reading
- Wikipedia
- Subject
- Organizations & Bureaucracy
- Essay
- How organisations behave when nobody is steering