When complexity becomes virtue, academics serve Tzeentch—the god of strategic plans that generate more strategic plans. Change without progress.

Tzeentch does not arrive like a conqueror. He arrives like a consultant, embedded in the strategic frameworks you thought were yours.

This episode examines how academia's governance complexity creates Tzeentchian worship: the proliferation of committees that oversight other committees, the curriculum reviews that trigger more curriculum reviews, the strategic planning cycles that produce plans for more planning. We explore how individual academics learn to perform sophistication through process engagement, how departments dissolve into overlapping working groups, and how universities mistake elaboration for improvement.

Tzeentch offers the pleasure of feeling intelligent—acknowledging complexity demonstrates expertise. But complexity compounds. IRB applications that obscure actual research. Citation networks manipulated for h-index gains. Every reform introduces new problems that justify further reform.

From the labyrinth of reporting structures to the prophecy of "transformational change" that never arrives, this episode traces how adaptation becomes performance—until nothing actually changes, but everyone is perpetually planning.

The god of necessary change ensures motion without destination.

More details are available in the book, https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0GCFWD29C

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