In Bureaucracy = Death, Seth Godin talks about bureaucracy related to 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina, and presents a nice, but unworkable, idea to bust bureacuracy.

Seth’s Analysis: “Very little remarkable comes out of bureaucracies for a simple reason. The members of the bureaucracy seek to be beyond reproach. Reproach is their nightmare, their enemy, the thing to avoid at all costs. And the remarkable feels like a risk.”

Seth’s Idea: “Appoint a CNO—chief no officer. No longer can someone say no to an idea and leave it at that. If you want to turn something down, you’ve got to pass it on to your boss. Then either he says yes or gives it to his boss. For a ‘no’ to be official, it’s got to be approved by the chief no officer and countersigned by every manager along the way.”

Unfortunately, it’s hard to bust bureaucracy with more, umm, bureaucracy. Better to empower people with ideas to “just do it!” Encourage them. Back them up. Eliminate approvals. Create many Chief Yes Officers!