scooter
Gold Meritorious Patron
Went into a MacDonalds today with my daughter and marvelled how similar it was to every other Maccas I’ve been in. It’s “standardized.” It’s got the same range of food so that what you taste here is the same as what you’ll taste anywhere else. Predictable. So if you like (or dislike) something here, you know what you’ll get at any other Maccas – the same thing.
It’s the formula for a “successful organism.” “It works so let’s do exactly the same so that every customer will have the some experience.”
And that was the aim with the Scientology “franchise” – do it exactly the same everywhere on the planet. Give every customer the same experience. Use the same staff training courses and the same sales techniques and the same advertised goals.
I used to believe it was because Hubbard had a “standard” technology that would work if you did it exactly the same each time. But human beings are so wildly different from each other that this approach just can’t cut it.
So maybe it was just a franchise activity. Get a standardized framework so that the same business model could be duplicated everywhere. Scientology in Tel Aviv, Moscow, Hong Kong, Chicago, London – all the same and recognizably the same.
Since Hubbard’s departure, David Miscavige has taken this even further. Less human contact with people and more audio-visual salesmanship. Drills on studied materials that teach there is only one answer to every question. Demanding staff are trained even more so in a central location at Flag on EVERY course that’s released. Even promoting that everybody does their auditing at Flag.
And of course having every org an “Ideal Org.” Shiny, acceptable to celebrities who walk in (which they seldom ever do) and little human contact to ruin the continuity of the experience. Staff who all sell the same commodities to their customers and do little else. And who have to look the same – “upstat” as determined by Miscavige.
And then there’s the events – so that every Scientologist is on the same page as I once heard Miscavige say.
And all of it approved and planned by him so that the only face people see is his. The Ronald MacDonald of “religious” movements.
To Hubbard’s “Colonel Sanders?”
It’s the formula for a “successful organism.” “It works so let’s do exactly the same so that every customer will have the some experience.”
And that was the aim with the Scientology “franchise” – do it exactly the same everywhere on the planet. Give every customer the same experience. Use the same staff training courses and the same sales techniques and the same advertised goals.
I used to believe it was because Hubbard had a “standard” technology that would work if you did it exactly the same each time. But human beings are so wildly different from each other that this approach just can’t cut it.
So maybe it was just a franchise activity. Get a standardized framework so that the same business model could be duplicated everywhere. Scientology in Tel Aviv, Moscow, Hong Kong, Chicago, London – all the same and recognizably the same.
Since Hubbard’s departure, David Miscavige has taken this even further. Less human contact with people and more audio-visual salesmanship. Drills on studied materials that teach there is only one answer to every question. Demanding staff are trained even more so in a central location at Flag on EVERY course that’s released. Even promoting that everybody does their auditing at Flag.
And of course having every org an “Ideal Org.” Shiny, acceptable to celebrities who walk in (which they seldom ever do) and little human contact to ruin the continuity of the experience. Staff who all sell the same commodities to their customers and do little else. And who have to look the same – “upstat” as determined by Miscavige.
And then there’s the events – so that every Scientologist is on the same page as I once heard Miscavige say.
And all of it approved and planned by him so that the only face people see is his. The Ronald MacDonald of “religious” movements.
To Hubbard’s “Colonel Sanders?”