Corporate Structure and the Technological Singularity.

[swestrup]

As humankind approaches the Singularity, the rate of progress will increase exponentially. I've had lively conversations with folks about how that might affect business. A freelance programmer may sell futures in a given product, and whoever owns the futures when the product ships gets the royalties. You may find that you've been bought and sold a dozen times between your first cup of coffee and your lunch break, especially if you have a couple of innovative products under your belt.

Still, I've wondered what will happen to the big multinational corporations. They have a lot of power, and a lot of money, and a certain amount of inertia. Obviously they will have to undergo a sea-change of some kind to survive to the singularity (We all will, several times), but I've been unable to imagine what shape that change may take. So, I've been watching for the first hints of what it may be. Today, I saw those hints. Lemme quote you something that showed up in my email today:

"With experimental markets, workers are betting on their company's
future — and moving in on the boss's domain."

"The end of management just might look something like this. You show
up for work, boot up your computer and log onto your company's
Intranet to make a few trades before getting down to work. You see how
your stocks did the day before and then execute a few new orders. You
think your company should step up production next month, and you trade
on that thought. You sell stock for the production of 20,000 units and
buy stock that represents an order for 30,000 instead. All around you,
as co-workers arrive at their cubicles, they too flick on their
computers and trade.

Together, you are buyers and sellers of your company's future. Through
your trades, you determine what is going to happen and then decide how
your company should respond. With employees in the trading pits
betting on the future, who needs the manager in the corner office?"

http://www.time.com/time/insidebiz/article/0,9171,1101040712-660965,00.html

See also:
http://divedi.blogspot.com/2004/07/end-of-management.html

I have a gut feeling that this is NOT the shape of things to come, or not exactly so. But it is the first signs of which direction to look for that future.