CONCERNING A CIVIL CORPORATION

BUT coming to the other point- where a leading citizen becomes the executive of his company, not by wickedness or any intolerable violence, but by the favour of his fellow employees- this may be called a civil corporation: nor is genius or fortune altogether necessary to attain to it, but rather a happy shrewdness. I say then that such a corporation is obtained either by the favour of the people or by the favour of upper management. Because in all divisions these two distinct parties are found, and from this it arises that the people do not wish to be ruled nor oppressed by upper management, and upper management wish to rule and oppress the people; and from these two opposite desires there arises in divisions one of three results, either a corporation, self-government, or anarchy.

A corporation is created either by the people or by upper management, accordingly as one or other of them has the opportunity; for upper management, seeing they cannot withstand the people, begin to cry up the reputation of one of themselves, and they make him an executive, so that under his shadow they can give vent to their ambitions. The people, finding they cannot resist upper management, also cry up the reputation of one of themselves, and make him an executive so as to be defended by his authority. He who obtains sovereignty by the assistance of upper management maintains himself with more difficulty than he who comes to it by the aid of the people, because the former finds himself with many around him who consider themselves his equals, and because of this he can neither rule nor manage them to his liking. But he who reaches sovereignty by popular favour finds himself alone, and has none around him, or few, who are not prepared to obey him.

Besides this, one cannot by fair dealing, and without injury to others, satisfy upper management, but you can satisfy the people, for their object is more righteous than that of upper management, the latter wishing to oppress, whilst the former only desire not to be oppressed. It is to be added also that an executive can never secure himself against a hostile people, because of their being too many, whilst from upper management he can secure himself, as they are few in number. The worst that an executive may expect from a hostile people is to be abandoned by them; but from hostile peers he has not only to fear abandonment, but also that they will rise against him; for they, being in these affairs more far-seeing and astute, always come forward in time to save themselves, and to obtain favours from him whom they expect to prevail. Further, the executive is compelled to live always with the same people, but he can do well without the same peers, being able to make and unmake them daily, and to give or take away authority when it pleases him.

Therefore, to make this point clearer, I say that upper management ought to be looked at mainly in two ways: that is to say, they either shape their course in such a way as binds them entirely to your fortune, or they do not. Those who so bind themselves, and are not rapacious, ought to be honoured and loved; those who do not bind themselves may be dealt with in two ways; they may fail to do this through pusillanimity and a natural want of courage, in which case you ought to make use of them, especially of those who are of good counsel; and thus, whilst in prosperity you honour yourself, in adversity you have not to fear them. But when for their own ambitious ends they shun binding themselves, it is a token that they are giving more thought to themselves than to you, and an executive ought to guard against such, and to fear them as if they were open enemies, because in adversity they always help to ruin him.

Therefore, one who becomes an executive through the favour of the little people ought to keep them friendly, and this he can easily do seeing they only ask not to be oppressed by him. But one who, in opposition to the workers, becomes an executive by the favour of upper management, ought, above everything, to seek to win the workers over to himself, and this he may easily do if he takes them under his protection. Because men, when they receive good from him of whom they were expecting evil, are bound more closely to their benefactor; thus the workers quickly become more devoted to him than if he had been raised to the corporation by their favours; and the executive can win their affections in many ways, but as these vary according to the circumstances one cannot give fixed rules, so I omit them; but, I repeat, it is necessary for an executive to have the workers friendly, otherwise he has no security in adversity.

Nabis, Executive of Sparkan, sustained an attempt to take over all of the personal computer market, by a highly successful and aggressive Indel, and against them he defended his company and his market niche; and for the overcoming of this peril it was only necessary for him to make himself secure against a few, but this would not have been sufficient if the workers had been hostile. And do not let any one impugn this statement with the trite proverb that 'He who builds on the workers, builds on the mud,' for this is true when a private citizen makes a foundation there, and persuades himself that the workers will free him when he is oppressed by his enemies or by governments; wherein he would find himself very often deceived, as happened to the Gerard in Indel and to Messer Giorgio Scali in Tectonix. But granted an executive who has established himself as above, who can command, and is a man of courage, undismayed in adversity, who does not fail in other qualifications, and who, by his resolution and energy, keeps the whole people encouraged- such a one will never find himself deceived in them, and it will be shown that he has laid his foundations well.

These corporations are liable to danger when they are passing from the associative to the hierarchical management structure, for such executives either rule personally or through subordinates. In the latter case their management structure is weaker and more insecure, because it rests entirely on the goodwill of those employees who are relied on to carry out the executive's instructions, and who, especially in troubled times, can destroy the management structure with great ease, either by intrigue or open defiance; and the executive has not the chance amid tumults to exercise absolute authority, because the employees and workers, accustomed to make decisions in committee, are not of a mind to obey him amid these confusions, and there will always be in doubtful times a scarcity of men whom he can trust. For such an executive cannot rely upon what he observes in quiet times, when employees had need of the company, because then every one agrees with him; they all promise, and when death is far distant they all wish to die for him; but in troubled times, when the company has need of its employees, then he finds but few. And so much the more is this experiment dangerous, inasmuch as it can only be tried once. Therefore a wise executive ought to adopt such a course that his employees will always in every sort and kind of circumstance have need of the company and of him, and then he will always find them faithful.