Comments on: Designated Control Freak

By: Noël Lynne Figart » Blog Archive » Flying Solo

Noël Lynne Figart » Blog Archive » Flying Solo — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 01:42:47 +0000

[...] household magic, and everyone will decide to be as concerned with keeping the house clean as the DCF. It [...]

By: Noël Lynne Figart » Blog Archive » Being in Charge

Noël Lynne Figart » Blog Archive » Being in Charge — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 14:36:51 +0000

[...] who really were getting stuff done. I find myself a little glad I never knew the concept of the Designed Control Freak at the time. I might have been foolish enough to try to explain it to [...]

By: Edward Martin III

Edward Martin III — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 23:56:36 +0000

“The only occasional difficulty for us is getting an initial proposal on the table for someone to disagree with.”

The goal is not to produce disagreement.

If no one has strong feelings against whatever’s going on, then that’s not a bad thing at all.

“It also breaks down when the person who wants something done a particular way is not physically able to do the job (or maybe only with great difficulty so that it would not be fair to them to require that they do the chore).”

It doesn’t “break down.” It’s simply the wrong tool for the job.

If someone is incapacitated, then you help them. I mean, if someone’s heart stopped, clearly they have a vested interest in the heart being restarted, yet it should be obvious that it would be inappropriate to expect them to do it (well, assuming they aren’t Tony Stark).

“…we have to reach compromises between what she would like to happen and how much we are willing to do things her way.”

I guess it comes down to the difference between actual physical needs (as in she needs medication) versus wants (she only wants FROSTED Pop-Tarts). Needs are good to meet, but people who are incapacitated (and I have applied this to myself many times) are just gonna have to live with the fact that other people might do things differently and be grateful their NEEDS are being met.

By: karloff

karloff — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 17:59:17 +0000

Without specifically stating it, this is exactly the sytem we use. What I really wanted to comment about though, was the use of the ringworld reference. nice.

By: Ember

Ember — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 20:36:26 +0000

It has worked well at our house for years now.
We have all have designated freakstations that mostly correspond
with our areas of expertise, since they are what is important to us each.
The division of labor is not Precisely equal, but once you have overworked
yourself on too many freakstations for a while , priorities level out a bit and
one learns to accept the different standard in some places to achieve relief.
It is a marvel of social dynamic.

By: fla_sunshine

fla_sunshine — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 03:41:34 +0000

I noticed that the three of us already use this system when trying to chose a restaurant. Thanks for naming it for us. The only occasional difficulty for us is getting an initial proposal on the table for someone to disagree with.

It also breaks down when the person who wants something done a particular way is not physically able to do the job (or maybe only with great difficulty so that it would not be fair to them to require that they do the chore). In fact, one of the people in our family is (temporarily we hope) less than ablebodied, so we have to reach compromises between what she would like to happen and how much we are willing to do things her way.

By: Edward Martin III

Edward Martin III — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 02:28:18 +0000

You be surprised at how powerful it is for NON-trivial applications. Most of the chores in our household are handled using DCF. Most of the big financial decisions have been made using the DCF technique. ;)

By: Hel

Hel — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 00:09:59 +0000

This theory sounds awesome, and then I started to imagine how it’d work in our apartment, and realized that things either would only get cleaned like every three months when trash achieved sentience, or I’d do everything, or we’d get evicted. Maybe all of the above! We definitely need chore division. Tho this sounds like a potentially good way to solve where to eat and such.

By: Femetal

Femetal — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 22:15:39 +0000

Excellent! I can see this working really well!

We experience a lot of decision-making stress, regardless of how many people are involved in the decision. This would be a fantastic thing to try, because it seems logical and elegant.

Thanks!