Organizational Design

To succeed in the coming decade, companies must capitalize on the synergies inherent in human–machine collaboration. That means crafting a new kind of enterprise, one that combines technology and people in ways that bring out the best in each.

The topic’s importance is not about to diminish as digital technology reshapes the notion of the workplace and how work gets done. On the contrary, the leadership role becomes increasingly demanding as more work is conducted remotely, traditional company boundaries become more porous, freelancers more commonplace, and partnerships more necessary. And while technology will solve a number of the resulting operational issues, technological capabilities soon become commoditized.

Team composition is the starting point. The team needs to be kept small—but not too small—and it’s important that the structure of the organization doesn’t dictate the team’s membership

It’s one thing to get the right team composition. But only when people start working together does the character of the team itself begin to be revealed, shaped by team dynamics that enable it to achieve either great things or, more commonly, mediocrity.

he results are remarkably consistent and reveal three key dimensions of great teamwork.

The first is alignment on direction, where there is a shared belief about what the company is striving toward and the role of the team in getting there.

The second is high-quality interaction, characterized by trust, open communication, and a willingness to embrace conflict.

The third is a strong sense of renewal, meaning an environment in which team members are energized because they feel they can take risks, innovate, learn from outside ideas, and achieve something that matters—often against the odds.

Top-team meetings should address only those topics that need the team’s collective, cross-boundary expertise, such as corporate strategy, enterprise-resource allocation, or how to capture synergies across business units. They need to steer clear of anything that can be handled by individual businesses or functions, not only to use the top team’s time well but to foster a sense of purpose too.

Many teams benefit from having an impartial observer in their initial sessions to help identify and improve team dynamics. An observer can, for example, point out when discussion in the working session strays into low-value territory.

<h3 class="sidebar-header"><div class="sidebar-title-wrapper">The ‘bike-shed effect,’ a common pitfall for team effectiveness </div> <a href="javascript://" class="sidebar-skip-link"> <span class="mck-radial-plus-icon"> </span></a> </h3> <div class="sidebar-content-wrapper"> <div class="sidebar-content"> The tendency of teams to give a disproportionate amount of attention to trivial issues and details was made famous by C. Northcote Parkinson in his 1958 book, Parkinson’s Law: Or The Pursuit of Progress. As the story goes, a finance committee has three investment decisions to make. First, it discusses a £10 million investment in a nuclear-power plant. The investment is approved in two-and-a-half minutes. Second, it has to decide what color to paint a bike shed—total cost about £350. A 45-minute discussion cracks the problem. Third, the committee addresses the need for a new staff coffee machine, which will cost about £21. After an hour’s discussion, it decides to postpone the decision. Parkinson called this phenomenon the law of triviality (also known as the bike-shed effect). Everyone is happy to proffer an opinion on something as simple as a bike shed. But when it comes to making a complex decision such as whether or not to invest in a nuclear reactor, the average person is out of his or her depth, has little to contribute, and will presume the experts know what they are doing. </div></div>

While it is important to incorporate the core practices like automated testing, continuous integration, refactoring, simple and evolutionary design and collective ownership, it is also imperative that the organization understand and incorporate the ‘core values’ that these practices are based on - fast feedback, clean code, simplicity and repeatability.

Business owners like you and technology experts like me are witness to the evolution of every organization into a digital organization. This movement is born out of the realization that technology is not just a supporting software function but is at the core of every transforming business.

The technical utopia that can sustain these business ‘ideals’ can only exist within an extremely sound engineering organization or an organization driven by an exceptional engineering mindset.

Martin Fowler, Chief Scientist at ThoughtWorks and renowned author, software consultant and speaker confirms that an organization’s Tech Excellence has never been as crucial as it is today. Creating a technology strategy that allows businesses to not only deal with, but take advantage of the increasingly rapid pace of change separates successful organizations from the obsolete ones.

McKinsey talks about how, “Small, independent teams are the lifeblood of the agile organization.”

These teams have the following qualities:

Directly connected to the business

Action a clear business investment

Trust and collaboration between team members

Low dependencies

The objective here is to craft a working environment that is fluent enough so that we can get from business idea to the production as quickly and seamlessly as possible

<strong>Simplicity</strong> – This fundamental principle can unbundle work loads down to micro units, based on the fact that smaller chunks of work are easier to get into production. It is also a key attribute to observe when scaling solutions.

<strong>Openness</strong> – Consistent collaboration thrives in an open work environment. A survey by a leading co-working operator found the happiest and most productive employees are those who regularly team up with people both outside and within the office. Such an environment ensures that every idea or problem can be augmented through diverse perspectives.

<strong>Resonance</strong> – The increasing degree of uncertainty requires organizations to develop a responsive delivery approach. Components of such an approach include building feedback into the development cycle, breaking down silos towards better collaboration, enabling collective team ownership of the solution and extensive automation.

<strong>Collaborative ecosystems</strong> – Engineering-centric organizations profit from building, nurturing and leveraging strong ecosystems. An ecosystem is built on the back of a common business objective tying everyone’s efforts together towards qualitatively superior inter-organizational communication.

<strong>Iterative models or approaches</strong> – These are a forward-facing investment of time and resources. Building simplified, observable solutions that can be automated means businesses can hit the market midway, can keep learning and deliver value.