Segmentation of Power
Power made visible, weighed, reviewable.
Decisions are made where the knowledge sits. Whoever measures is not measured. And for every decision you know why you are allowed to make it.
Inside the letter S
Segmentation of Power makes power something you can look at. Every decision gets a weight in the Gravity Decision Model: Feather, Stone, Boulder, Mountain. Light decisions everyone makes themselves, heavy ones are shaped with those affected and recorded in the decision log. And governance reviews the system: coolly and with numbers, never against the person. What it finds becomes a signal. S draws the consequences, L provides the support, and the two stay separate. The hardest rule of the whole model is here: measurement, review and assessment never sit in the hands of the measured.
The trap
Invisible power concentrates. The big decisions are made by whoever happens to be in the room, and later nobody can retrace why. And in almost every company the CEO reviews the system he built himself. That is not a review.
Mechanics
- 01The Segmentation of Power Steward sets the guardrails for governance, strategy, finance as well as assessment and pay. They make concentration of power and role conflicts visible and never sanction themselves.
- 02Gravity Decision Model: Feather everyone decides themselves. Stone is decided by whoever holds the competence at Mastery level. Boulder and Mountain are shaped with those affected and recorded.
- 03Governance as its own Anchor Core Job: challenges and ratifies Core Jobs, handles signals, measures and steers. Reviewable like any other Core Job, under the four-eyes principle.
- 04Factual conflicts between jobs are decided by an HGD of those affected. Interpersonal matters go into support at L. Governance findings remain findings about the system.
Rooted in research
Each source with a short sentence on what it actually says.
- Ostrom (1990), Governing the Commons
Complex systems are steered best in several clearly defined decision arenas, not by one central authority. Decisions belong at the level that has the knowledge and feels the consequences.
What this does not settle: researched on common-pool resources; transferring it to companies is analogy.
- Montesquieu (1748), Separation of Powers
Long-lived institutions distribute rule-setting, execution and review across different bodies. The same logic stabilises companies.
What this does not settle: political theory, not empirical research about companies.
- Laloux (2014), Reinventing Organizations
Documents real cases of distributed decisions and the price that missing structure costs.
What this does not settle: case studies; many of these companies dissolve leadership, FLAIMS keeps it visible.
- Note: FLAIMS-specific constructs such as Steward, Anchor Core Job, Core Job, Joblet, FlowCoach, Gravity Decision Model and the learning chain are developments of the model out of practice, not cited research.
In practice
You know which decisions are yours, who reviews them and why. Power is no longer a secret, and nobody assesses themselves.