A ruler is isolated by his own officials, and needs independent channels of information more than he needs advice.
Nizam al-Mulk, vizier to two Seljuk sultans, wrote the Siyasatnama in 1091 on how a state is actually held. Its recurring theme is informational: officials filter what reaches the ruler in their own interest, so the ruler must maintain postmasters and informants reporting outside the chain of command, and must hear petitioners directly at fixed times.
In practice
- A chief executive who only hears from the executive team learns of the failing division from a journalist.
- A board that sets a skip-level meeting each quarter hears in year one what it would have heard in year three.
- Further reading
- Wikipedia
- Subject
- Law & Politics
- Essay
- Rules that restrain power, and advice on using it