Organizational Structure and the Culture of Creative

Note: A version of this post has appeared at  TalentZoo.

There has always been pressure in the workplace to perform — but the quality and measure of that pressure seems to have increased significantly over the last few years. With greater emphasis on ideas and innovation, organizations find themselves wondering: How do we stay on the cutting edge? How do we encourage creativity and innovation?

Organizational Form Should Follow Function
While organizations have explored strategies over the years to make positive cultural changes to enhance creativity, it remains they will vary considerably in terms of their ability to do so. Most organizations do have the potential to increase their level of creativity. But, this may require a redefinition of organizational structure. Where creativity and innovation are concerned, organizational form may need to follow function.

Organizations are realizing this connection. One exciting example of this evolution, is detailed in Valve’s Employee Handbook. Valve, a video-game developer located in upstate Washington, has a flat organizational chart that allows talent to flow freely within the organization. One of the basic tenets at Valve is that ideas have tremendous value and these ideas should be explored by those who have a real interest. Employees at Valve are not limited by a reporting structure – they are  free to gravitate to the projects where they can make the greatest contribution. Projects are never assigned, as employees determine how they dedicate their time.

Work Swarming & Talent Utilization
Work swarming, similar to the talent utilization process operating at Valve, has been discussed previously by Gartner. Swarming, a type of spontaneous teaming borrowed from nature, emphasizes an organic flow of energy to a particular task. You’ll find examples of work swarming operating in various workplace cultures — for example, in hospital emergency rooms. Swarming allows needed resources to focus upon a task of real importance or potential value.

Work swarming has the potential to encourage creativity and innovation. However, there is hesitancy giving up the security of prescribed levels and roles within a traditional organizational hierarchy. Common sense tells us that Valve’s way of doing things won’t work for all organizations. But, we could adapt the process so that it can be applied. Yes, organizations may need some aspects of a hierarchy, and yes, many would reap benefits from the implementation of “work swarming.”

A Hybrid Structure
Job descriptions and reporting relationships within organizations prescribe specific activities and relationships. But in creative environments it may be advantageous for employees to function outside the realm of their “day-to-day” routine. Not unlike the 70-20-10 concept pioneered at Google, during this time new projects, ideas and trends could be explored. Employees would be allowed to “unhitch” from the organizational hierarchy and work flexibly for a percentage of their time. In this way, employees could contribute to worthy projects in which they have interest; new ideas are explored, and employee engagement might be enhanced.

This process would require a clearinghouse of information concerning trending ideas and projects — possibly through an internal crowd sourcing platform — in that way employees can make decisions concerning where to spend their time. If there is enough interest in a new project, a team is organized and employees can plug into the action and contribute. Not enough interest? The project dies before an inordinate amount of resources are devoted.

There are certainly logistics that would need to be addressed to modify an organizational form or structure. However, in the case of creativity and  innovation, changes to enhance these processes may prove to be a worthy endeavor.

Dr. Marla Gottschalk is a Workplace Psychologist and career coach located in East Lansing, Michigan. Connect with her on Twitter and Linkedin.

The “Catch 22″ of Organizational Structure, Talent & Innovation

Inherently, organizational structure is not an exciting concept. However, a recent HBR post, discussing how established organizations just can’t seem to keep pace with start-ups in the innovation arena, caught my attention.

It seems clear that the innovation dilemma has a fundamental relationship with the traditional elements of organizational structure – and how those elements develop and solidify over time. One key system which affects the potential to innovate: How organizations secure needed talent.

Structure and maturation

As an organization matures, many systems within the traditional structure can become rigid. Communication channels become formalized. Salary levels are set. On one hand, organizations become a safer and more secure place for employees. But, unwanted by-products such as inflexibility, come with the territory as well. This can affect how talent is sourced. When projects begin, managers may not even look beyond their own functional areas when staffing key roles. This can limit the ability of a maturing organization to effectively innovate.

Ideally, the talent equation begins with leadership – where leaders have the responsibility of translating organizational vision into specific goals.  These goals, in turn, require a specific set of needed talent elements for completion. Often, the necessity to forecast talent requirements into the future becomes a looming challenge. 

The “Catch 22″

The simple truth is that mining and cultivating talent through traditional channels can take too much time. The structure of a mature organization dictates that you need a significant amount of time to recruit and hire needed talent. However, organizations may not have the luxury of time to procure talent through traditional channels if they are to remain nimble and flexible. Sometimes a more direct route to find needed talent is required.

In a previous post, I discussed a prediction by Gartner, concerning the nature of work swarming. This is a concept which implies that the structure of an organization must flex to allow the required talent to work on appropriate projects within an organization. But sometimes, needed talent does not reside within the organization. In fact, the process should also allow talent from the broader external environment to contribute where appropriate, as well.

Breaking down walls

Extending the “virtual walls” of your organization can greatly expand talent sources. One interesting option is to leverage contacts within your industry, or related industries, who have direct exposure to a component of your project. One view which has been posed, is to collaborate with suppliers  to source talent and solve key problems.

Another method of sourcing talent would be to build or access a talent community, a method which capitalizes on the advantages of social media when searching for a needed skill set. In this way, an organization develops an extended talent network which can be tapped as needed. Members of the community can be quite varied and can include potential contributors such as freelancers or those working in other types of  settings.

Another novel avenue would be to utilize crowdsourcing for specific projects or issues. In this way, organizations essentially bypass portions of the traditional organizational hierarchy to enable them to address talent issues in real-time. When a problem or challenge exists, it is placed in an open forum.  Of course, there are bypass issues that the organization would have address to maximize this process – such as legal issues that would arise. (Platforms such as InnoCentive, have been already been successful in facilitating specific open innovation challenges.)

Possible Snafus?

Of course, the overall goal of applying these methods is for an organization to have the capability of remaining flexible and innovative, long beyond the start-up phase. In a sense, slowing down the solidification of a counter productive elements which deter the right talent to reach an organization. Of course, the process would have to be perfected. Here are few issues that come to mind (and I welcome more ideas):

• What types of projects or challenges would be more appropriate for these solutions?
• What specific legal steps must an organization take to make this happen?
• What role would traditional parts of the organizational structure, such as HR, play in this process?

The future of innovation within mature organizations is dependent on finding needed talent. Hopefully, with collective thought we can improve opportunities for more established organizations to innovate.

Dr. Marla Gottschalk is a Workplace Psychologist. Contact her practice at marlagottschalk@comcast.net. You can also find her on Twitter and Linkedin.

The History of Leadership 101

Organizations are complicated and fascinating entities. They are as varied as their products and each have a distinct method of interacting with the surrounding environment. They possess structure, roles, a culture and hopefully a strong and clear purpose. But, organizations also have a rich history and leaders (both past & present) that played a major role in that story.

Leaders Are Critical to Organizational Development

Leaders provide a compass for growth – align vision with talent – and they have the power to have a tremendous positive, or negative, impact. A leader can catapult an organization to the forefront of an industry or bring it to an early demise. They define an organization, for better or for worse.

Not unlike the history of leaders of nations, the history of leadership should be a respected part of an organization and its lifespan. The leader that takes the helm of an organization  can reveal volumes about the state of that organization at that moment in time. Each phase of an organization’s development may have a very different type of leader.

We Learn From Organizational History

We can learn from all this. Could the auto industry have avoided its recent issues if only they had looked back upon the leadership mistakes, and the solutions, that occurred in the recession of the early 1980′s?

Employees require the benefit of being knowledgeable about the challenges that affected previous leaders. Those challenges that were met with success – and those challenges that resulted in failure. As we can learn from our own personal mistakes – an organization can also learn from the mistakes of its leaders.

Ensure That Organizational History is Communicated

• When onboarding employees, speak about the leaders who were there in the early phases of the organization’s life cycle. Explain their vision.
• Explain how the current vision of leadership has been translated into strategy.
• Discuss key leader decisions.
• Talk about leadership failures and what was learned in the process.

With a look to the past – you can improve the future – and possibly avoid costly mistakes that have already been made.  Take the time to discuss the rich history of leadership in your place of business.

Dr. Marla Gottschalk is a Workplace Psychologist. Contact her practice at marlagottschalk@comcast.net. You can also find her on Twitter and Linkedin.

Diffussion of Responsibility and Other Organizational Culture Dilemmas

Over the years, we have seen many organizations sputter and fail. But the lessons learned from the demise of the News of the World, are simply classic.  Not only did the crux of the situation inch closer and closer to the infrastructure of an entire country’s moral compass, but the situation offered so many key lessons concerning organizational culture and the potential failings of human behavior.

A a few of the classic lessons come to mind:

• First of all, the well researched social psychology concept of diffusion of responsibility. Now, of course, the Milgram Experiment isn’t exactly the same thing as compared to what ensued within the News of the World organization. But, did no one at News of the World think that they would have to pay for the havoc wreaked upon innocent individuals? Furthermore, why did no one – step forward, blow the whistle, and put a stop to the behaviors years ago? Were employees afraid of authority figures? Did they fear for their jobs?

• How were the mores and accepted (and illegal) behaviors actually communicated within the News of the World organization? Of course, not all of the employees working at News of the World, were guilty of crimes or any wrong doing. But to those who did participate -  what gave them the notion that the behaviors were an accepted part of the culture? Was this communicated through role modeling? Threats? Coercion?

• Finally, the notion of pay for performance within organizations. Why is there not a clause in every last top exec contract, concerning scandal and/or illegal behaviors? Why is Rebekah Brooks entitled to a large severance when a boat load wrong doing has occurred under her watch?

Certainly, New of the World is not alone in terms of the problems that plague a large organization. However, I refuse to think that all organizations are capable of this level of lawlessness or chaos.

I hope that is true.

Too Big to Fail? How We Might Be Enabling Organizations

HBO has produced a drama focusing on the events behind the 2008 economic crisis. The title, “Too Big to Fail” refers to the nearly fatal infection of the financial services & banking industry. As we know, governmental intervention was required to avert its demise.

Ripe for a catastrophe

The movie attempts to probe into the crux of the crisis and offers a bit of explanation concerning why the whole mess evolved. Of course, the film touches on the contributions of sub-prime mortgages, credit default swaps and unchecked greed.  We know that eventually the woes of the financial sector spread to other industries including the automotive industry – one which seemed particularly vulnerable to a financial hit 2008. Old problems in that industry had surfaced, such as issues with gas efficiency, quality and intense competition from overseas.

Historically, it was not the first time that governmental support had been necessary to save an organization within the auto industry, or in other industries for that matter. (Think Chrysler in 1980 or Lockheed in 1971). Interestingly enough, the financial outcome of these interventions for government aren’t as poor as you might expect. But why certain industries – such as banking and auto – require help repeatedly points to chronic industry issues left unaddressed.

Organizational weaknesses must be addressed

After all was said and done, HBO’s effort was quite interesting. However, I felt a large part of the explanation was somehow missing.

The movie did not delve into the organizational factors which contributed to the tangled mess, that occurred long before the crisis began. Issues such as ineffective leadership, lack of risk assessment and the absence of strategic planning. Moreover, if these key organizational problems have not been addressed within the companies that were helped, have we only enabled these organizations to make the same mistakes once again? After all, hadn’t General Motors and Chrysler gone down this same road before? What needs to change for them to avoid another debacle 10 years from now?

It seems obvious that certain organizational issues have to be solved to avoid yet another repeat of the same events in the future. Here are a few issues to consider, although I am sure more could be added to the list.

• Teach leaders about the past. – There seems to be a lack of a “collective unconscious” when the gavel of leadership is passed on within these organizations. It seems that the completion of “Organizational History 101” should be required for all future leaders, in an attempt to avoid the same problems over and over again.
• Avoid “The emperor’s new clothes” scenario. – Autonomy is great – but a system of checks and balances should be in place when decisions are made. Who will challenge the decisions of upper management? (Obviously there was not a devil’s advocate present (or a PR rep) when auto execs took private jets to ask for financial support in 2008.)
• Don’t stop thinking about tomorrow – and don’t get stuck in the moment – even if things are looking really good. Thinking that a favorable environment (whether financial or product) will go on forever will undoubtedly catch you unprepared at some point. Run through various “what if” scenarios to avoid being caught off guard, for the ups and the inevitable downs. Setting strategy for possible challenges in the future is a necessity.
• Avoid making decisions solely from a ledger sheet perspective. Risky short-term financial gains may lead to long-term calamities. If making money seems too easy, be sure to evaluate the risks that may affect your organization. How will the move affect your exposure to other financial or customer challenges down the line? Will emphasis in one area leave you open to weakness in another?
• Utilize innovation to keep you ahead of the game. Establish metrics that monitor innovation within your organization and communicate progress regularly. Whether you track number of patents or customer service successes, innovation is like an insurance policy for your company – offering new directions and opportunities.

Let’s hope moving forward that lessons have been learned.

Dr. Marla Gottschalk is a Workplace Psychologist practicing in East Lansing, Michigan. Follow her on Twitter.