GALT Consulting LLC

There is a revolution coming in the world of organizational design.  In recent years, the debate has raged hotter than ever... how do you design a growing organization?  Traditional organizational development has 2 ways to design your organization...

1) Hierarchical - This is the traditional organizational structure with supervisors overseeing several employees.  As the organization gets bigger, managers oversee several supervisors, and then directors oversee managers.  The advantage of this structure is that it provides clearly defined positions, roles, and even career paths.  The disadvantage of this design is that it doesn't always put people in areas where their strengths are best and that it isn't handle a dynamic world very well. 

2) Flat - This is the "new" organizational structure where networked teams of workers all solve problems together with very little hierarchy.  As the organization gets bigger, the teams are organized into groups with minimal levels.  The strength of this approach is that it allows the best ideas to be heard and vetted regardless of position.  It is also very dynamic and allows for creative solutions to problems presented by an ever changing world.  The disadvantage of this structure is that it is confusing to the employees and prone to chaos.  There is no clear job path or even clear responsibilities.  There is high potential to allow details to slip through the organization.

So what is the right solution?  I say do BOTH.  It's called People-Centric Planning and here is how it works.

Imagine an organization with a traditional structure.  It has clean job descriptions and everyone in the organization has clear responsibilities.  As you move up in the organization, your responsibilities require more oversight and vision.  This is the traditional model and it DOES work.

Now imagine taking that same organization and pulling out a cross-functional team that represents the centers of influence within the company.  This team would contain a variety of roles, levels, experience and knowledge.  Now task this team with looking at opportunities and problems within the organization.  The team brainstorms around these opportunities and launches projects where people within the organization solve problems or take advantage of opportunities.  In essence, this team becomes the change agent for the organization.  Meanwhile, the organization itself manages the day to day operations efficiently.

This seems simple, but does it work?

Just saying "yes" is an understatement.  This continuous system takes advantage of clear roles and responsibilities while moving quickly and nimbly to take advantage of opportunities.  The best part of People-Centric Planning is that it utilizes the resource that Edwards Deming once said was most wasted in American industry... people. 

People, not just Management, become engaged in driving change in the organization.  This not only creates an organization that is smarter than any one person, it also creates automatic buy-in because the people have a voice and a roll in creating the change.

For my next few articles, I will start sharing stories about companies that have implemented this approach in their business and the DRAMATIC impact it has made.

You say you want a revolution?  People-Centric Planning is here.