Creating Organization Structure – Strategy, Operations and People

  

There are so many views about how does one create structure for an organizations that usually it boils down to ones conviction about what will work and what will not work. Given the far reaching impact of structure on delivering strategy, unfortunately this can have unpredictable implications. In addition due to the lagging effect and gestation period, it’s too late by the time one discovers if the structure designed is working well or not.

 

While structure is such an interesting point of view based exercise at times, there isn’t any laundry list of dos and don’ts for an effective exercise; in my experience some of the following factors impact the same in one way or another:

 

-          Strategy (future scenario) and Process (operations management) are two key levers in any situation. However it’s very critical to understand the trigger for the exercise. Basis the strategy and trigger the relative focus on the two levers could change.

 

-          A very deep process view based exercise is usually triggered by productivity and efficiency enhancement kind of strategies, which is only one of the possible strategies. Basis whether the business strategy is of growth, returns, diversification, product focus, market focus, efficiency focus, productivity focus etc. the approach to the exercise could be drastically different. High level phases might read the same though to naked eye.

 

-          Broad dimensions of structure are Product, customer and geography/market. Even though these elements will remain in any structure, depending upon how the interplay of these dimensions plays out at various levels in the organization, number of structure options is almost endless.

 

-          Matrix structure is more articulation of reporting relationships and MIS and not so much of structure. This is more about how one wants the operations to flow in terms of people interactions and decisions.

 

-          MECE (Mutually Exclusive and Cumulatively Exhaustive) is a very simple but important concept that every structure options must qualify. This in itself can ensure better traction and growth compared to a rather convoluted structure.

 

-          In most cases distortion happens when you start to map people and make adjustments due to ‘sensitivities’… but that’s the reality of every organization.

 

-          Structure, MIS, Variable pay can impact behaviors and culture in a desired direction

 

 

~~Rohit~~

 

 

Key to Success

 

1. Never walk down the hall without a document in your hands. People with documents in their hands look like hardworking employees heading for important meetings. People with nothing in their hands look like they’re heading for the cafeteria. People with the newspaper in their hands look like they’re heading for the bathroom. Above all, make sure you carry loads of stuff home with you at night, thus generating the false impression that you work longer hours than you do.

2. Use computers to look busy. Any time you use a computer, it looks like work to the casual observer. You can send and receive personal e-mail, calculate your finances and generally have a blast without doing anything remotely related to work. These aren’t exactly the societal benefits that everybody from the computer revolution expected but they’re not bad either. When you get caught by your boss –and you will get caught–your best defense is to claim you’re teaching yourself to use the new software, thus saving valuable training dollars. You’re not a loafer, you’re a self-starter. Offer to show your boss what you learned. That will make your boss scurry away like a frightened salamander.

3. Messy desk. Top management can get away with a clean desk. For the rest of us, it looks like you’re not working hard enough. Build huge piles of documents around your workspace. To the casual observer, last year’s work looks the same as today’s work; it’s volume that counts. Pile them high and wide. If you know somebody is coming to your cubicle, bury the document you’ll need halfway down in an existing stack and rummage for it when he/she arrives.

4. Voice mail. Never answer your phone if you have voice mail. People don’t call you just because they want to give you something for nothing – they call because they want you to DO work for THEM.

That’s no way to live. Screen all your calls through voice mail. If somebody leaves a voice mail message for you and it sounds like impending work, respond during the lunch hour. That way, you’re regarded as hardworking and conscientious even though you’re being a devious weasel. If you diligently employ the method of screening incoming calls and then returning calls when nobody is there, this will greatly increase the odds that they will give up or look for a solution that doesn’t involve you.

The sweetest voice mail message you can ever hear is “Ignore my last message. I took care of it.” If your voice mailbox has a limit on the number of messages it can hold, make sure you reach that limit frequently. One way to do that is to never erase any incoming messages. If that takes too long, send yourself a few messages. Your callers will hear a recorded message that says, “Sorry, this mailbox is full” a sure sign that you are a hardworking employee in high demand.

 

~~Rohit~~

Impact of Blip in Growth

 

 

As I have mentioned in my blog before also, these are some very interesting times. There are different ways to look at the current fiscal. One set of opinion might say we are in a slow down, yet another would point to the fact we are yet amongst the 3 fastest growing economies globally. 7-8% growth in slow down times is something many economies would take without blinking an eye.

 

Now that apart, it means some interesting set of things:

-   At the very outset, its time for them to look more inwards than outwards

-   Organizations would be under pressure for margins. Cost structures in many cases are aligned to higher growth which may not happen for an indefinite future. Several organizations might shift their priorities from top line growth to margins

-   Cost management would become paramount as a consequence of above point. Slow down in hiring and salary increases is an immediate visible impact

-    While in absolute terms everyone would gain, in relative terms most of them would be in red. Increments less than inflation, business growth less than planned etc

-    Its time when many organizations would carry out internal consolidation initiatives, which otherwise were not able to find time in tight management calendars. Since many of these organizations have over grown their systems, processes and structures, these will be times when some of these will be very closely looked at

-    From HR point of view, tightening of Structure and Performance will find prominent presence in corporate agenda for majority of organizations

 

Let’s take Real Estate industry as an example.

In times of exponential growth in past 3-4 years, several organizations grew more than their internal capacities. In case of real estate they small and mid players would often exhaust their internal capacities in acquisition phase of life cycle itself. Just launch of project itself would result in booking of sales and in process creating resources for moving the project forward. It was almost that they were making money for project management skills. Taking money from consumer to create what they need was fantastic.

 

However in times like this many of them would struggle. They will struggle to make meet ends and would be under severe pressure for resources. These are times that will push them to do the following:

-          Align growth to internal capabilities and not external opportunities

-          Sell out for players who simply can not finish projects which are in work in progress stage

-          For large players it would mean concentrating on setting the house in order

 

 

In end like they say nothing is white or black…there is a lot of grey. Basis how an organization had planned in the past in terms of solidity of that plan, and basis how they plan now, different organizations will go through very different set of motions.

 

~~Rohit~~

Circus of 360 Degree for Performance Evaluation

  

Now it is very uncommon to come across learned professionals talking about 360 degree evaluation mechanism as the way to go “once an organization reaches maturity” as they would say.

 

For non HR professionals like me, it’s something that is really astonishing. This is a system I have seen been deployed by some of the most “mature” organizations who are seen as thought leaders in their respective verticals.

 

So 360 degree is a “open system” wherein one receives feedback on their performance against set goals from peers, subordinates and seniors. Unlike the evaluation been done by just your manager, everyone directly working with, gets an opportunity to impact and hence reducing any manager bias. The system in itself is very good and mature indeed…but for performance evaluation?

 

Shouldn’t performance by evaluated automatically by the databases and MIS instead of “opinions”. One can understand there are possibly measures for which numerical data does not exist (typically that is what MIS and databases support), but does that mean a Performance Management System that primarily runs on 360 degree.

 

How many times do you come across such quantifiable and established “beyond doubt” measures that do a merry round in a 360 degree environment for rating on a scale by multiple people. Some interesting real life examples are follows:

 

Objective: To achieve defined sales for Product X in the next 12 months

Objective: Ensure desired level of profitability

Objective: Collections of all debtors outstanding in time

 

What purpose does it achieve by having people give ratings on these when you don’t need any individual judgment really? At the end of the day manager will get feedback from 5-6 individuals with different ratings, he will then in all probabilities take the median and finalize the rating. My bet is in these “mature organizations” this final rating with then also go for normalization…..I guess its only god who knows if there is any sense in whatever comes out of this circus J

In the end what could have helped in measuring “some” qualitative measures and help largely in developmental needs, has become “the system” in several organizations.

 

 

~~Rohit~~

Consulting Network

 

Some of us who have been attached to consulting in various capacities for a long time now have started a community called Consulting Network. This was initiated by young and energetic Mohit few months back through Linked In and few of us joined in later.

 

This is an attempt to create a networking and information exchange for consulting community (existing and aspiring) in India. In last few months the idea seems to have clicked quite a few other folks and we have very quickly got almost 1000 members and members from various business schools joining the bandwagon.

 

Visit and register at the following link if the same is of interest to you…We are soon going to be out with our website which is under construction J

 

~~Rohit~~